LA shop’s steel structures to help transform neighborhood

The petals of the shade structures are made from ¾-in.-thick and 1.5-in.-thick Schedule 80 steel pipe.

It is the largest structural project to date for Los Angeles-based Cinnabar.

When all is said and done, the shop will have fabricated 25 steel shade structures that will adorn a number of new parks in the city’s Crenshaw neighborhood. The parks are part of the Destination Crenshaw initiative, a $100 million arts, tourism, and community investment that spans 1.3 miles along Crenshaw Boulevard, the hub of the historically Black neighborhood. CNN described the highly anticipated architectural venture as one of the projects “set to shape the world in 2023.”

The 15-ft.-tall structures resemble African giant star grass, with petals growing out from the stems at an angle. The grass is a theme throughout the project. Not only are Cinnabar’s structures meant to provide shade to park visitors, but they’re also meant to be works of art alongside the more prominent rotating and permanent installations that will be on display along this stretch.

Work on Destination Crenshaw will continue into 2024. The project is a point of pride for the Cinnabar team, said Metal Shop Manager Benito Barco.

“The fact they are art and shade is really meaningful for the project and meaningful to us since we’re an LA-based shop,” Barco said. “I have crew that live in that district of the city. It's important to us, and I think is important to the client that they had a local shop that would really care for the project.”

Cinnabar CEO Basil Katz said architectural firm Perkins+Will, designer of the Destination Crenshaw architectural components, “made the decision to go for a shop like us that’s a little bit smaller but much more dedicated to process and quality, not only just working through detail and design and the sequencing of assembly and construction on-site, but also really paying attention to the finish and the aspiration that these could be beautiful.”

About Trees and Petals

The structures have been quite an undertaking. Each tree weighs about 1,100 lbs., and the petals weigh an additional 600 to 650 lbs.

Barco said the trees require ¾-in.-thick and 1.5-in.-thick parts cut from A572 steel. The petals, meanwhile, are made from ¾-in.-thick and 1.5-in.-thick Schedule 80 steel pipe; some of the pipe is laser cut, some of it rolled, and some of it cut in-house.

The structures’ tree parts are welded in-house at the shop and on-site during installation, Barco said.

“Three branches about 14 ft. in height—they're pretty tall and heavy—get welded to a 1.5-in.-thick round steel plate that will eventually be put on a concrete slab,” he said.

Los Angeles-based Cinnabar has spent 2023 working on about two dozen 15-ft.-tall steel shade structures that will adorn several new parks in the city’s Crenshaw neighborhood as part of the ambitious Destination Crenshaw initiative. Images: Cinnabar

On the petals, Barco said, “We’re creating a perimeter with the 1.5-in. pipe and we’re laser cutting it, rolling it, and welding it together using various jigs we made here in the shop.”

The completed petals get welded on top of the tree on-site, providing the structure its shade feature.

All aspects of this project have required outside-the-box thinking. Barco said they built jigs to not only simplify the welding process but to also meet requirements. For instance, they built a jig to put the stems together while the structure was upside down.

“We’re putting the base plate on and flipping it over and then adding the three stems upside down,” Barco said. “The reason we did this was a lot of it was positioning and what types of welds we’re qualified to do. We're not qualified to do any overhead or vertical welds.

“We made these jigs so they’re easy for us to get to a piece, easy for us to fabricate, and that we have the qualifications to do that type of weld.”

The Cinnabar team has made custom cradles to transport the structures from the shop to galvanizing to painting and ultimately to the parks.

As of mid-summer, fabrication of the structures was ongoing, and installation is scheduled to continue into 2024.

Moving Away From Floats

Cinnabar is no stranger to creative projects. Some of the shop’s work can be found in large-scale, permanent installations in museums, theme parks, and cultural institutions across the country.

Barco said they recently completed an installation of projects for galleries at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C. Cinnabar fabricators also recently fabricated furniture for the Wilshire Boulevard Temple in Los Angeles.

The shop’s work can be seen in sculptures like the Curtain of Courage Memorial in San Bernardino, Calif., a series of curtains and benches dedicated to the victims of the 2015 San Bernardino terror attack. Another notable project for the company was the large Predator drone sculpture located in Manhattan’s High Line Park.

This project has required Cinnabar to make different jigs to help simplify the fabrication process and meet strict welding requirements.

Believe it or not, the shop got its start by making floats for the Rose Bowl, said Bid Manager Katelyn Remington-Arata—but that is no longer the case, as Cinnabar has evolved in its 40-plus years.

“Since then, we’ve had I would say a very adventurous ride through a lot of different industries," she said. "Rose Bowl floats, theme parks, more so now museums and immersive entertainment.”