Rossetti Designs Top-Notch Lakers Facility

EL SEGUNDO, CA—Sports and entertainment design firm ROSSETTI has designed the new Lakers headquarters and training facility in El Segundo, CA. The facility will uniquely house the team's business operations and training court in one building, along with the home court for the D-fenders team.

“The Lakers are building a new home for themselves, and unlike most training facilities, this will actually house their business operations and investment operations all in one building,” Jim Renne, sports principal at ROSSETTI, tells GlobeSt.com. “After several meetings with them, we came up with the idea to integrate their organization by combining their business operations with basketball training, so not only would they be in one place, but it would be designed in a way that we would encourage interaction with different departments. At the end of the day, though, this is about basketball, so we designed the building with the practice court in the center as a reminder of that.”

The Lakers purchased five acres at the Elevon campus in El Segundo for the new facility; the team currently practices at the Toyota Sports Center. Construction on the property will begin in the fall of this year. The court will sit in the center of the facility, while the offices will be housed on the second floor and will feature views of the ground-floor court. “It is a very simple idea, but it is challenging to bring together different departments so that they can be effective but are still surrounded by basketball,” says Renne.

The D-fenders will also play on the court, which can accommodate 750 fans. “That invites the public into the basketball area,” Renne adds. “It is really unique—probably the most unique in the league.” To show it off, the top of the building will also display the team's logo so that people flying into LAX will be able to see the building from the sky.

The facility will be state-of-the-art and will be built to LEED-Gold certification standards.  “We wanted to create something that felt like a second home and had amenities that would help create a sanctuary for the players,” says Renne. “It is a place where they will want to stay longer.”