OFFICEUNTITLED Transforms Santa Monica Office Floor into School After Palisades Fire

Following the 2025 Palisades Fire that destroyed Village School, a 300-student elementary school in Santa Monica, the school partnered with the City of Santa Monica and architecture studio OFFICEUNTITLED to convert a vacant corporate office floor in BXP's Colorado Center into a temporary campus. The first phase, completed within three weeks, used furniture and protected circulation routes to create classrooms. A second phase, finished over one summer, established a more permanent interim campus with purpose-built classrooms, labs, and shared spaces. The design, led by OFFICEUNTITLED, features 'Imaginariums' for playful learning, two internal boulevards (Bookworm Boulevard and Growing Grove), and a wayfinding system using deconstructed logo figures. The intervention deliberately retains existing finishes and systems, using paint, graphics, and modular furniture to transform the space. Standardized partitions and demountable glass doors allow for future reuse. The project demonstrates adaptive reuse of underused commercial real estate, providing a model for converting empty offices into community spaces. Images are by Vittoria Zupicich Photography.