North County Center
The North County Center serves the rural communities of Mendocino County. The new center replaced existing interim classrooms in scattered locations. This first phase of the Center provides a convenient and collaborative environment for students in Willits. Both the building and site design make a strong connection to not only the immediate industrial railway surroundings, but also to the surrounding natural environment of redwood forests and oak covered hills.
Background: Willits lies at the heart of Mendocino County and for decades was a center for processing redwood trees into lumber. The decline of the timber industry resulted in an economic downturn from which Willits has not recovered, and the project site clearly reflected this condition. The site is located on a mostly industrial edge of downtown on a busy street, near the Skunk Railroad Depot.
Design Concept: During the visioning, touring and design process key goals and strategies were identified and subsequently realized at the North County Center. These include the concept of the Learning Resource Center as “marketplace”. Located at the heart of the facility, this collaborative environment is immediately adjacent to the administrative offices, promoting interaction between students and administrators. Flexibility of use is provided by folding partitions and barn doors that allow for combining spaces, and places that promote collaboration and shared use.
Forms and Materials: The building is designed with simple forms and a well-articulated structure, with rustic materials such as Corten steel appropriate to the context of the railroad, lumber mills, and metal warehouses. Crisp, sophisticated detailing and large expanses of glass set the building apart as an institution of higher learning. On the interior, high ceilings and clerestory glazing allow for plentiful natural illumination. Re-milled redwood lumber defines key spaces for interior forms.
Outdoor Spaces: Outdoor areas and abundant daylight add to the atmosphere of the Center and promote the Center in the evenings as a beacon of local educational opportunity. Studying intermingles with social times in shaded areas and at outdoor tables where students make the campus their own. Parking is located in proximity to the building and future expansion area, and is located on top of the floor slab of the industrial building that formerly occupied the site.
Design Challenge
Accommodating Multiple Uses and Activities:
This satellite campus needed to facilitate many of the uses of the District’s main campus, but within a very small space. During programming the key challenge identified was how best to accommodate multiple functions including library, study areas, class registration, computer lab and other uses while allowing it to be overseen by a very limited staff of only 3 fulltime employees. The solution was to cluster these uses together. This space, the Learning Resource Center, is a collaborative learning resource environment located immediately adjacent to the administrative offices. Flexibility of use is provided by folding doors that allow for combining spaces, and boxcar inspired rolling doors that allow the administration area to be secured for after hour functions. The central spaces were envisioned as a “marketplace for learning”, and modeled after the Napa Oxbow Market’s concept of floating forms within a larger volume.
Contextual Challenges/Visual Presence
The site is located on a mostly industrial edge of downtown Willits, formerly served by rail. For many decades Willits was a center for the redwood timber industry. The neighborhood is best known for the Skunk Train Depot, one block away from the site. The Skunk Train is a historic line of steam and diesel locomotives which now carries tourists from Willits to the coastal town of Fort Bragg, but which originally hauled logs into both towns for processing.
The project was designed to capture moments from the context, with numerous references to the timber industry and the railroad, while introducing crisp, sophisticated detailing and large expanses of glass to set the building apart as an institution of higher learning.Physical Context
The project responds to the area’s railroad, which once served Willits’ vibrant lumber industry.
Identity: In addition to the incorporation of the surrounding physical context into the design, the project stands on its own as a public facility and a beacon to the community. The glazed high gable roof form above the Learning Resource Center glows at night behind low slung and linear landscaping along the street, announces its availability to community groups for evening activities, and serves as a local gateway to higher education in a remote area.
Heritage: The project incorporates subtle references to the 19th Century logging railroad, which was important to the College as a way to put a unique face on their new campus center. Covered walkways leading up to and surrounding the outdoor courtyard recall both the covered platform of traditional railroad stations, and the front porch of pioneering ranchers that settled the area.
Box Car Hub: The central Learning Resource Center wears several hats, and does so with limited staff, who are stationed at a central hub where rolling doors reminiscent of railroad car openings signal when they are open for business.
Outdoor Activity Space: Classroom activities often spill out into the outdoor courtyard where students gather at seating pods fashioned from old railroad ties.
