Pershing Square is a five-acre land, originally set aside as park in 1866, which was designed by Mexican architect Ricardo Legoretta and landscape architect Laurie Olin as a symbolic bridge between Los Angeles's Hispanic and Anglo communities. It was formerly designed by Parkinson and Bergstrom in 1910 but was dug up in 1950 to provide underground parking garage.
The design of the park is anchored by two stucco structures at the midpoints of the two long sides of the rectangular city block
2013
On the eastern edge, a 10-story tall purple campanile serves as a focal point and balances the scale of the tall buildings surrounding the park
2013
At the top of the tower, a square cutout houses a pink sphere, an abstraction of the traditional bell
2013
On the north end of the park, terraced lawns create an amphitheater, intended to host events and performances, while the southern side of the park is dominated by a water feature fed by an aqueduct extending from the base of the campanile, recalling the massive infrastructure that pipes water into Southern California
2013
Many features of the park allude to the specific history and character of Los Angeles, including a grove of citrus trees that reference the regions agricultural legacy, and a hardscape installation designed by artist Barbara McCarren that evokes an earthquake fault