Wilshire Boulevard Temple 

Wilshire Boulevard Temple's Irmas campus is an oasis in the city. Entering the campus, a narrative walkway welcomes you in with sculpture and poetry gardens, rich with California and Middle-eastern landscape. The procession through this passageway symbolizes the forty-year journey across the desert from Egypt to Israel. Plaques describe historical events as well as celebrating the temple's 140 year history in Los Angeles. Playgrounds and parking surround a grassed area which will become a second cloister of religious and administrative buildings on the 3.4 acre site. Jerusalem stone bands the base of the buildings to also reflect the rich heritage of the historical downtown campus.

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Passageways lead to a central courtyard, featuring a sculptural stair-tower serving as a backdrop for special events and holiday celebrations. A nearby rotunda houses an exhibit area leading to a variety of resource rooms for drama, music, dance, art, and computer instruction. Three broad outdoor stairways lead to a second circulation level, reminiscent of the narrow upper-level walkways in the Old City of Jerusalem, with seating areas and shaded canopies that mark that the entrances to the classrooms and gym. The highest point above the courtyard is reserved for the study house, a library that is reminiscent of European reading rooms. 

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Of particular interest is the first level chapel interior, with it's circular cupola and tent structure that are old in tradition, but contemporary in appearance. It symbolically references the embracing unity and monotheism central to Judaism. An overhead projection booth allows the space to be used as a theatre or screening room for added flexibility. Construction included 50,000 sq. ft. of new space and 35,000 sq. ft. of recycled hospital space to house a 450 student day school, 180 preschool children, along with a chapel/auditorium, gymnasium, dining hall, three libraries and a range of community facilities.