1261 Harrison is a vertical mixed-use community at the gateway to Oakland’s Chinatown. The 36-story tower will be the tallest in Oakland, topping out at 460 feet, and will house 185 residential units, 120,000 square feet of Class A office space, and a community-based locavore market in its base.
The innovative form avoids the rectangular, slab-sided configuration common in Oakland by breaking the tower into two slender columns. The curvilinear forms give breathing room to the adjacent historic buildings and prevent the tower from looming over the street, as well as create a unique figure on the skyline.
The color palette of the skin is drawn directly from the local surroundings, with masonry-like colors at the base, skyline colors at mid-height, and sky colors at the apex. The skin comprises a lightweight precast frame over a glass and metal panel curtain wall in the tower, and mill-finish steel and anodized aluminum storefront at the base. In the mid-block alley that passes through the block at the back of the building, salvaged brick from the existing structure will also be used to maintain ties to the historic fabric.