Pacifica Radio – KPFA 94.1 FM
Berkeley, California 1991
The Pacifica Radio/ KPFA 94.1 FM building provides an efficient, economical, and memorable home for two venerated Berkeley institutions. As community-based and listener-supported radio producers, Pacifica and KPFA depend on professional staff, as well as a diverse group of volunteers and contributors, to facilitate their day-to-day operations. Accordingly, the design process engaged all the stakeholders by way of consensus-building meetings and extensive personal interviews. The resulting schematic renderings were used to galvanize a significant capital campaign and give new focus, energy and identity to both organizations.
The design for the two-story, wood-framed building includes state-of-the-art production studios, a music library, conference rooms, offices, archives, a roof garden, and support facilities. These spaces surround a luminous, sky lit, two-story atrium which accommodates the building’s active social center.
David Trachtenberg was the licensed Project Architect for this project while an associate at Abrams Millikan & Associates.
Owner: Pacifica Radio, (Patricia Scott, GM)
Architect: Denny Abrams, Rick Millikan, David Trachtenberg (Architect of Record for Abrams/Millikan & Associates)
Structural Engineer: Tipping and Mar
Landscape Architect: The Miller Company
Mechanical Engineer: Van Mulder
Acoustical: Wilson Irhig Associate
Builder: Oliver & Company
Building Photographs: Gareth Tyrnauer
Bensky/Ellsberg Photograph: Scott Hess