About
the Building
The elliptical entrance hall to Wing Lung Bank establishes
a unique presence at a corner on Valley Boulevard right away. This street
is a fast growing financial street in the City of Alhambra, 10 miles east
of Los Angeles.
When we conceived this shape and the Hong Kong based bank loved it as part
of 1 of 3 schemes we presented, we began to think about the right material
to clad it with. We arrived upon the idea of using glass tile
because it was
a minutely scaled material which could easily wrap around the
ellipse, a shape
which has a constantly changing radius unlike a circle which has
a consistent
radius making it more suited to pre-fabricated panels of a
constant curvature.
It was also cheaper than using metal panels for the same reason,
while potentially
looking richer and unique.
I began to look online for people doing interesting work using
tile and pattern
to achieve a super graphic look which was relevant to the
function contained
within. I found Keith DeWald at Becoming Tile who was translating digital
images into tile murals. He sent me images of pebbles and waves
and this got
my imagination going. He also said that he could work with an artist. This
made me think of a large peony scan done by artist Neil Seth
Levine. How would
a 30 foot high peony look stretched over the entrance to Wing Lung Bank? We
experimented with the peony scan, a pastel of a flower and translated these
into simulated tile murals. It soon became clear that we needed
original art
created for the mural. Since the ellipse was in the corner governed by the
mountain element according to Feng Shui, I suggested an abstract
design working
with overlapping strata. The San Gabriel mountains are also nearby. We went
through several iterations ranging from the literal to the graphic and Neil
introduced the scale of a weave into the design to offer
different readings.
Ignatius Tsang and Marty Chinn at Tsang Architecture liked what he came up
with. Now we had a design we were comfortable showing to the client and the
City of Alhambra. They liked it.
Then began months of work where Neil introduced incredible
colors, branching
foliage and swirling shapes to make the mural into a work of art
wrapped around
the entrance to the bank and the rear of the elliptical entrance hall which
is visible from the banking hall. Within the entrance hall will
be multicolored
Venetian plaster and Graniti Fiandre floor tile with red, blue
and gold interlocking
shapes. The complex richness of this work of art will reflect the wealth of
the community within which the bank sits and reward visitors and staff with
a constantly changing inside-out diorama as they pass, enter and
walk through
the bank. The building will open close to the New Year.
Vivek Anand • Project Designer, Tsang Architecture • June 2,
2005s
