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A Recreation Center by Leddy Maytum Stacy Architects Activates a Rebounding San Francisco Neighborhood

Herz Rec Center — Photo © Bruce Damonte
Herz Recreation Center, San Francisco

Architects & Firms

The new Herz Recreation Center, a 12,500-square-foot building in San Francisco’s Sunnydale neighborhood, has architectural amenities that any community would envy. Designed by local firm Leddy Maytum Stacy Architects (LMSA), the center’s lobby is warm and welcoming, its multipurpose room soft and calming, its office sunny and homey, and its gymnasium tall and well-lit, an airy space sandwiched between a pale wood ceiling and floor and filled with light from clerestory windows, three large glass double doors, and skylights in its shed roof. With its mass-timber structure, its targeted LEED Platinum designation, and its net positive energy design, Herz is an innovative addition to the city. Yet its story may be less about its architectural execution than its public purpose—to help rehabilitate a neglected neighborhood.

Photo © Bruce Damonte

Herz and the adjacent Hub community center (also designed by LMSA for San Francisco Recreation & Parks Department with Mercy Housing California and Related California) are key components of Sunnydale HOPE SF, a multiphase project that is in the process of replacing deteriorated WWII-era public housing with roughly 1,770 residential units, 3.5 acres of open spaces, and 60,000 square feet of retail and community spaces. The old concrete structures had become moldy, leaky, and infested with rodents, earning Sunnydale the nickname “The Swamp.” And the neighborhood was “quite possibly the most dangerous, depressed, and decrepit area of the city,” according to a 2008 SFGATE article. “In the 1980s residents would have late-night vigils on this corner,” says LMSA principal Gregg Novicoff, “because there was so much gunfire.”

That corner has now been transformed into a welcoming plaza with handsome furnishings, landscaping, and public art. The plaza originates a path between the new buildings and into 313-acre John McLaren Park, San Francisco’s second-largest park. Sunnydale had previously been divided from the green space by a culvert and a chain-link fence. These barriers are now gone, replaced with a walkway alongside the gym. Just beyond this, a Monterey cypress grove was similarly inaccessible to Sunnydale residents. The trees, near the end of their lives, were also removed from the site. Some of their wood was reclaimed in nature play areas and as seating inside Herz’s lobby.

Photos © Bruce Damonte

The repurposed cypress complements Herz’s mass-timber construction. According to the designers, they used cross-laminated timber (CLT) both to connect to the park and for its calming effect. “This was one of the first mass-timber projects we had done,” says LMSA associate Sara Sepandar, “so there was a bit of a learning curve.” She says the designers wanted to “celebrate the mass timber as much as possible and let that be the showcase of the building.”

Acoustical panels are tucked into the gym’s ceiling to keep the focus on the CLT beams while minimizing the inevitable noise of an active and large space that houses a professionally sized basketball court. “The neighborhood wanted a full-size court,” says Novicoff, which LMSA was able to construct despite the project’s modest $18.8 million budget. “It’s something that would be equivalent to a new gym in the Marina District or Presidio or any other well-resourced neighborhood.”

Photo © Bruce Damonte

Safety was another neighborhood consideration in Herz’s design, and it is managed with subtlety. Rather than set windows behind security grilles, LMSA placed them to give office workers views out to the entrance plaza and into the gym. Video monitoring and key cards are also used. On a summer afternoon, kids from the Boys & Girls Club in the nearby Hub follow badged staff through the glass doors and onto the court. Seemingly oblivious to concerns, they fill the space with bouncing balls and lots of energy. “They’re somewhere safe,” says Novicoff. “They’re not on their phones. They’re just having fun.”

It seems fitting that Herz Recreation Center is one of the final projects undertaken by LMSA founding principal Marsha Maytum, who died in 2024. “She was super passionate about our city, and certainly neighborhoods that have been neglected,” says Novicoff. “When we started meeting the families and hearing their stories, we became more and more connected.”