The building has seven tiers and is constructed of angled, painted, pre-cast concrete panels with reticulation, a textured finish that displays curvilinear forms. It is located on a 92-acre (370,000 m 2) parcel of land in Laguna Niguel, California, between Los Angeles and San Diego, and approximately 4 miles (6.4 km) from the Pacific coastline. A large portion of the more than one million square foot building is below grade. The sculptural Chet Holifield Federal Building is a stepped pyramidal form that has a similar appearance to ancient ziggurats. Perhaps innovative for its time, the building has more recently been described as "appearing to be one part government building and two parts apocalyptic stronghold", and as a "white elephant." In 2019 the Chet Holifield Federal Building was one of five California properties on the list of Federal properties recommended for disposal by the Public Buildings Reform Board. Holdings of the National Archives and Records Administration for the Pacific region were once located in the building but have since been relocated to a new center in Perris, California. Today, the building's primary tenants are the United States Department of Homeland Security and the Internal Revenue Service. This area of California had undergone rapid development while the building was held and federal agencies had increased staff in the area to serve the population. Much of the building continued to be vacant for the next decade.Īfter GSA attempted to sell the building in the 1980s, it decided to keep it and assign agencies to it. "Chet" Holifield, who had represented California's 19th congressional district from 1943 to 1974. In 1978, the United States Congress passed a bill to rename the building in honor of Democratic Congressman Chester E. In 1974, GSA assumed control of the building. Rockwell eventually offered to trade the building to the United States government in exchange for three surplus government facilities of equal value located near Los Angeles International Airport. “He got to the fourth floor and he said one thing, a short sentence: ‘This is far too nice for an electronics firm.’ And everything came to a screeching halt.” ĭesigned to accommodate 7,000 aerospace employees, after the acquisition by Rockwell the building sat empty for several years. “The chairman of the board came to take a tour,” Morris said of a 1969 visit to the building. William “Art” Morris, a corporate architect for North American, who contributed to the building's design, told the Orange County Register in 1993 that the building was deemed too fanciful for the defense contractor. The company had a large building without enough work to support staff there. There are a couple of accounts as to why this happened: The more common story is that as the Vietnam War wound down, Rockwell's defense contract with the federal government fell through. But, Rockwell never occupied the building. The building's construction was undertaken at a transformative time in the defense industry: while it was still under construction, North American Aviation merged with Rockwell International, a manufacturing conglomerate that worked in the defense and space industries. Construction took nearly three years, and in 1971 the building was completed. North American Aviation wanted an area that would be private and secure. The site was chosen in part because, in the mid-1960s, it was a very quiet area of southern Orange County. The building is located in the heart of a shallow valley surrounded by the San Joaquin Hills. The building was originally constructed in 1968 for North American Aviation, a defense and aerospace industries manufacturer, to house the company's corporate offices on the top floors and an electronics manufacturing plant on the bottom two floors. The unusual form refers to ziggurats, ancient Mesopotamian temples. The building was designed by William Pereira, who developed a stepped pyramid silhouette that is rare in American architecture. Primary tenants are now regional offices of the United States Department of Homeland Security and the Internal Revenue Service. National Archives and Records Administration had holdings for the Pacific region stored here, but has since moved to another location. Since 1974 it has been owned and managed by the General Services Administration. It was built between 19 for North American Aviation/ Rockwell International, and designed by William Pereira. The Chet Holifield Federal Building, colloquially known as "the Ziggurat Building", is a United States government building in Laguna Niguel, California.
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