This new Mid-City apartment building will replace pink houses that neighbors hate

Three Mid-City houses painted neon pink will be razed in about three weeks to make way for a 45-unit apartment complex, a rep for M-Rad, the architecture firm designing the apartment project, tells Curbed. (Four of the units will be set aside for affordable housing.)

The project’s site is presently occupied by three houses painted bright pink by an artist that M-Rad reached out to. Some neighbors have complained that they were not asked or notified that the houses were going to be undergoing a vibrant transformation, but M-Rad principal Matthew Rosenberg tells Curbed that getting people’s attention was definitely the point.

The project, called Hello Saturn, is reminiscent of a honeycomb, and steps back from the corner to a height of four stories.

The layout of the modern structure “dumps light into every unit,” Rosenberg says. It also allows each resident to have a deck as well as a light-flooded unit. To capitalize on those sunny decks, M-Rad is in talks with a vertical garden company to add greenery to each unit’s open space.

Courtesy of M-Rad Architecture

Courtesy M-Rad

The complex, developed by LI Investments, will offer a mix of one-, two-, and three-bedroom units over underground parking. Residents will have access to a communal courtyard in the center of the complex and have access to the complex’s gym.

He says the pink houses were an attempt to start a dialogue with neighbors and the community about how long it takes to get city approvals to put in new residential buildings. Rosenberg says painting the houses was also an attempt to activate the houses so they didn’t invite squatters and homeless occupants while the developer waited to get approval for its demolition permits.

“We want neighborhoods to be safe while projects are in development, so [residents] don’t have to live across from homeless people” while projects are in progress, Rosenberg said.

• Three Mid-City houses painted hot pink by local architecture firm [Curbed LA]