OTL’s Role:
Jordan Downs Freedom Plaza
LOCATION
Watts, California
DEVELOPER
Primestor Development
GENERAL CONTRACTOR
VCC
ARCHITECT
Nadel Architecture + Planning
LANDSCAPE ARCHITECT
Fong Hart Schneider-Partners
PROJECT OVERVIEW
- Design
- Build
- Architectural Fountain
- Custom Fabrication
- Stone Etching
In Watts, a Los Angeles neighborhood undergoing one of the nation’s largest public-housing revitalizations, Freedom Plaza gives the redeveloped Jordan Downs community a 115,000-square-foot retail center. OTL designed and built Instill, a water feature whose etched stone columns carry words and phrases gathered directly from Watts residents.
PROJECT
CHALLENGE
Los Angeles required Freedom Plaza to include public art, but the city initially hesitated to count a water feature toward that requirement. Stakeholders needed a fountain compelling enough to qualify as genuine art while still speaking authentically for the Watts community it served.
OTL’S
SOLUTION
Working with a team of architects and a general contractor, OTL gathered words and phrases from local residents and etched them in custom typography across dark-grey polished basalt columns fabricated by Southwest Boulder. Careful coordination with the local health department kept the fountain’s flush-mounted basins compliant even though visitors could easily wade in, while a dedicated filtration and sanitation system keeps the water clean.
Instill now gives Freedom Plaza a true neighborhood voice, its etched columns turning grant-qualified public art into a genuine tribute to the people of Watts and a symbol of the area’s ongoing renaissance.
