Platt-Whitelaw Architects

Platt/Whitelaw

James Mason Joins Platt/Whitelaw Architects

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Senior Project Coordinator Excels at Community-Based Architecture

The Platt/Whitelaw team is a tapestry of diverse backgrounds and talents. Our newest member, James Mason, adds a unique thread to our rich fabric. James has a passion for creating exceptional spaces and a portfolio of people-centric projects that both anchor and elevate their surrounding communities.

“Throughout my career, I’ve been privileged to work on a multitude of community serving projects from start to finish,” James said. From programming and design through construction and closeout, the entirety of James’ career has centered on bringing public and community-based projects to life.

He joins our firm as a senior project coordinator.

A Path to Serving Others

James’ interest in design was sparked in high school. While he harbored an interest in art, his limited drawing skills posed a hurdle. His mother’s keen eye and wisdom would set him on a different path.

“She suggested I take drafting so I could use a straight edge,” James joked. “I never looked back.”

Raised in the Lone Star State, James studied architecture at the University of Texas, San Antonio, where he met his wife, Rita, a Carlsbad native. Early in his career, he gravitated toward public projects. While he doesn’t consider this an intentional choice, it’s one he’s wholly embraced.

Over his 20+ year career, he’s worked closely with local groups and organizations to ensure the schools, libraries, life safety facilities, hospitals and other spaces he’s designed positively impact communities.

When asked about his proudest career moment, James pauses. He then describes the wonder and awe he witnessed when children — and adults alike — entered the Texas State Aquarium’s Caribbean Journey. The 71,000-sqaure-foot exhibit had been decades in the making. In 2017, right before James relocated to San Diego, the aquarium’s epic adventure through coastal forests, Mayan Ruins, a shipwreck and coral reefs opened to the public. James had successfully brought the human and animal worlds together.

James says he also cherishes memories at school opening, and reopening, events when school principals couldn’t contain their tears of joy. They knew the new spaces would profoundly impact student lives.

Strengthening the local community

Coming from a larger firm solely focused on educational design, James was drawn to Platt/Whitelaw’s diversity of projects, more personal and engaging work environment and tangible community impact.

Today, he works closely with the County of San Diego to transform behavioral healthcare services. He leads the East Region Crisis Stabilization Unit project. It’s a center, in the heart of downtown El Cajon, that will provide individuals with immediate mental health and substance abuse support and treatment services in a therapeutic setting.

Simultaneously, he leads the restoration of the Old Logan Heights Library building. The project requires a delicate balance to preserve its historical integrity while ensuring modern usability and accessibility.

Committed to Protecting the Past

Beyond his design pursuits, James finds fulfillment in preserving his community’s history through both its architectural and human connections. James spent many years with the San Antonio Conservation Society helping safeguard the city’s residential structures over a century old. Today, he connects with his aging, often isolated, neighbors in Oceanside by volunteering with Meals on Wheels.

Envisioning San Diego’s New Oak Park Library

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Leveraging Platt/Whitelaw’s Library Architectural Design Experience

In the late 1960s, our firm’s founder, Robert Platt, designed the Oak Park Library on 54th Street. More than 50 years later, we’re again serving the communities of Oak Park, Webster and Chollas Creek by helping to create a new library.

Next Steps for the Oak Park Library

Platt/Whitelaw Architects is working hand-in-hand with the City of San Diego, with input from the Friends of the Oak Park Library, to craft a request for proposals (RFP) for the design and construction of a brand-new library.

The new and larger library will be built less than a mile away on a greenfield site the city owns just southwest of Chollas Lake Park. It sits just west of the city’s operations yard on College Grove Drive.

The city received state funding for the 20,000-square-foot library as well as a 10,000-square foot sorting facility.

Designing a Library Sorting Facility

The sorting facility serves the entire City of San Diego Library system and replaces one currently at the city’s operations yard. Returned books from all the city’s libraries are sent here, fed into a system of scanners, conveyor belts, levers and chutes and then redistributed to libraries.

This unique building requires accessible loading docks and easy circulation without negatively impacting the views and experience at the adjacent library.

Architects writing RFPs

It’s uncommon for an architecture firm to be hired to craft a public agency RFP, but the city saw the wisdom in it for a couple of reasons.

The city hired Platt/Whitelaw partly because of the steep site. The buildings must be configured and sited carefully, and a new traffic light and driveway is required for access and circulation. Involving an architect early in the process will provide additional clarity for the design-build team ultimately selected.

Another reason to hire us is community outreach. Friends of the Oak Park Library is a very active library booster group, and the city wanted a team familiar with not just library architecture but also with leading public outreach and design charettes. The city knew this collaboration between Platt/Whitelaw and the Friends group would elevate the library vision articulated in the RFP.

The resulting library design and space planning program requested in the RFP specifies an idea/maker lab, computer stations spaced throughout the library, multiple study rooms and a homework room. Lacking a large community room or a place for kids to hangout nearby, Friends of the Oak Park Library advocated for the 3,250-square-foot multi-purpose room that we included also.

Design/build teams responding to the RFP will be asked to incorporate public art inside and outside the library. They will also need to provide space for displays in the library lobby.

Community Engagement and Far-Out Ideas

Someday, thanks to an idea from one Friends of Oak Park Library member, the site may also include an observatory. While the cost exceeds what the city has available to spend now, the RFP asks the design-build team to set aside space for an observatory in the future.

The idea was inspired by a similar library-observatory facility in Riverside County, California that was created to provide children from underserved communities a chance to experience astronomy, astrophysics and more.

Teamwork and Shared Visions

The RFP for the Oak Park Library and sorting facility is scheduled for release this fall. While our firm can’t submit for the project work, our Oak Park Library RFP team of Peter Soutowood and Emad Abdulwajid is proud to play an important part in its vision.

From the original Oak Park Library architect Robert Platt to the designers energizing our firm more than 50 years later, our staff cares deeply about designing libraries and other community facilities.

We’d like to conclude by recognizing some of the people who were instrumental in securing the funding for the new Oak Park Library: Claudine Thompson, Senate President pro Tem Toni Atkins and Assemblywoman Dr. Akilah Weber, who grew up in Oak Park. We’d also like to thank Monica Arredondo and Abdirahman Osman at the City of San Diego as well as Misty Jones, the San Diego Public Library Director.

 

Gloria Nonaka-Rubio Joins Platt/Whitelaw

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How a family on the frontlines of history influenced her career ambitions

Our team is diverse in many ways, including in our professional backgrounds. For example, Platt/Whitelaw’s newest team member, Gloria Nonaka-Rubio, cut her chops at both engineering and general contracting firms.

“Attention to detail is one of my top strengths,” Gloria said. Through her time working with engineers and contractors, she saw how even a small mistake or inaccuracy on architectural drawings could lead to issues down the line.

Becoming an architect

Gloria’s initial motivation for choosing a career was to help people. She had a strong interest in art and design growing up, but she thought the legal profession would better suit her ambitions. After trying out law school, she realized that architecture was a better professional match for her. She also realized that it, too, offered ways to help people.

Gloria is a licensed architect in Mexico and has worked on both sides of the border. She parlayed her design experience with industrial, retail, residential and high-rise buildings into providing architectural support, primarily for school projects, at Platt/Whitelaw.

In addition to supporting communities through school design, historic preservation—another Platt/Whitelaw specialty—also suits Gloria’s passion for design. She’s already had the chance to work on the historic Julian Witch Creek Schoolhouse belltower through Platt/Whitelaw.

History through the lens of the Nonaka family

Gloria’s enthusiasm for history is firmly rooted in her family history. Her grandfather owned Tijuana’s first photography studio and documented much of Tijuana’s growth. Gloria’s father was involved in the Tijuana Historical Society, and Gloria herself fought to preserve a Tijuana building where she worked.

Her family played a role in some historic events, too. Her Japanese grandfather fought in the Mexican Revolution. Then, during World War II, he and his family were given 48 hours to move from Tijuana to Mexico City. Residents of Japanese descent were removed from coastal areas and ordered to the east, with no compensation.

Explaining her passion for history and its associated architecture, Gloria said: “We are who we are because of it.”

Moving forward

While work keeps her very busy, Gloria’s current ambitions include earning her California architect’s license and completing LEED Certification training. She also makes time to spend with her husband and their two dogs and to support dog adoption groups.

 

 

A School with a Superpower

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As school starts again this year, children attending Clairemont Canyons Academy are in for a big surprise. They will arrive at a colorful new 2-story administration and classroom building.

As kids fill the brand-new halls, work will continue elsewhere on the campus to modernize the existing school facilities and create a new joint-use field and ball court by the next school year.

We consider ourselves incredibly lucky to have provided the initial architectural assessment and then full architectural services for this special school…because Clairemont Canyons Academy has a superpower.

It’s a place for almost any kind of student to thrive. It’s a mainstream elementary school but with a high percentage of special-needs students. (San Diego Unified School District merges special ed programs with regular students for diversity and a stronger student body.) As such, the design plan for Clairemont Canyons Academy includes many unique features.

This unique school and its diverse student body inspired the architectural strategies and features we included to distinguish the Clairemont Canyons Academy learning environment.

The new building has 14 classrooms, a maker’s lab, a sensory room, and an administration core with student services, including counseling and speech and music therapy programs.

  • The sensory room has black-out curtains, a water feature, an audio system, therapeutic chairs, a special-needs harness, a projector and more.
  • Special education rooms must be on the first floor, so that floor includes a wheelchair storage area.
  • Special needs classrooms have running hot water to accommodate any required feeding tube cleaning.
  • The first floor also includes more single-use restrooms to provide space for helpers. Restrooms have a power source for mobility lifts.
  • The first-floor group restroom has its sinks in an alcove in front of the room of toilets for easy monitoring and helping kids at the sinks.
  • The new building includes two elevators instead of the usual one elevator.
  • Generous whiteboard and corkboard space is provided for teachers because they find it helpful to be able to pin, tape or use a magnet to display materials at all heights.
  • Since the campus fronts the busy and sometimes noisy Balboa Avenue, we found supercharged ways of managing the acoustics. This helps all kids, but especially those with sound sensitivities, focus on their schooling rather than auditory distractions.

Other creative ideas we employed had more to do with the site and circumstances than the diversity of students.

  • The long, narrow site for the news administration and classrooms building meant long, straight corridors. We broke those up with fun pops of color on the walls and the floor.
  • Reception areas can get noisy at any school. With especially high ceilings in Clairmont Canyons Academy’s reception area, we chose to hang artistic acoustic baffles above the main counter to quiet things down.
  • Natural light quality varied between offices, so we designed small windows just below the ceiling that could share some light from one office into another.

Finally, we wanted to enliven and enrich the students’ on-campus experience, so we incorporated bold colors inside (as mentioned) and out. Two exterior sides of the classroom building display copper-hued metal cladding. Brightly colored exterior window shade canopies are both practical and whimsical.

We’re excited that kids will soon fill the halls and classrooms of Clairemont Canyons Academy. We wish them, the teachers and the staff the very best for the 2022-2023 school year and beyond!

 

 

 

Welcome Back, Peter Soutowood!

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After 10 years, we are excited to announce that Peter Soutowood is returning to the Platt/Whitelaw team.

Peter will be rejoining the firm as a senior associate, bringing his 18 years of architectural and entrepreneurial experience back to our firm in his new role.

A well-respected and celebrated member of the industry, Peter is not only an accomplished architect with an impressive portfolio, but also a friend and colleague with a comprehensive understanding of the nuances of our public and community-based projects. His history of building attractive and vibrant communities was, and will continue to be, an asset to Platt/Whitelaw.

Peter proved to be a valuable member of our team as a project architect for Platt/Whitelaw from 2007 to 2012. His project management skills and oversight of designers, engineers and construction management staff facilitated the trajectory of projects of all sizes, in every stage from design and planning through completion. His ongoing involvement in both professional and community organizations is proof of his commitment to the industry and continued expertise in the industry.

Since working with us, Peter has gone on to hold various positions at other architecture firms, including his own. He has remained active in his community, serving as chair of the Design Review Board in La Mesa for three years and as chair of the La Mesa Village Association since July of 2016. Peter also remained active with his alma mater, the NewSchool of Architecture and Design, where he previously served as chair of the Alumni Mentorship Committee and as both a board member and president of the Alumni Advisory Board.

We are thrilled about Peter’s return and can’t wait to apply his expansive knowledge and expertise to our projects.