- Special Effects Award
- Best use of unique methods or materials and/or special artistic effects
- Richard Cohen Landscape & Construction Inc.
- Project Name: Village of Hope Water Feature
- Award Sponsor: Hunter Industries
The Trophy: Special Effects: Best use of unique methods or materials and/or special artistic effects.
Who won: Richard Cohen Landscape & Construction Inc., a design, construction and landscape management firm headquartered in Lake Forest.
Who’s who: Richard Cohen is president and CEO of the company he started in November 1976. The company, incorporated in 1979, has 47 employees. Linda Cohen, Richard’s wife, is chief financial officer.
The project: Construction and installation of a water feature that surrounds and supports a 14,000-pound, 16-foot tall ceramic urn depicting Biblical scenes. It was created by celebrated Danish sculptor Peter Brandes. “From what I’ve been told, this is the biggest and heaviest urn in the world,” Cohen says. “It was made in Denmark, and they actually had to build the kiln around the urn.”
The feature is a focal point of the landscape at the Village of Hope, a transitional housing program for men, women and children, which opened in March 2008 in Tustin and is part of a broad spectrum of services offered by the Orange County Rescue Mission.
What is Richard Cohen Landscape & Construction known for? Custom residential work with “Year-in and year-out, the quality of the work we do does not vary,” Cohen says. The firm’s services include design, custom residential installation and commercial maintenance at offices, industrial parks, homeowners associations and apartments. Commercial maintenance makes up about half of the business. Cohen is a general contractor with a C-27 license. Additional licenses include: “A” engineering; C-10 (electrical); and C-53 (swimming pool).
Scope of work on this project: “We built the base of the fountain (about 10 feet square), including all the mechanical (components). … All the equipment (including pump and electrical and an ultraviolet water purification system) is housed in an underground vault about 8 feet away from the base. “We formed the base and poured the concrete, which is 6 feet underground, and had all the steel put in by our subcontractor,” Cohen says. “It’s a special high-tensile strength concrete that can handle the weight of the urn.”
Who designed the fountain? The Collaborative West in San Clemente.
Anyone else instrumental in this project? Holdenwater worked on the hydraulics.
Any challenges? “Oh, yeah,” Cohen says explaining that the art piece (with an estimated value of $400,000) was delivered to a parking lot about 150 feet away from the install site and required a 150-ton to 200-ton crane to lift it over a nearby building. It cleared the building, but as it was being fitted over a 14-inch stainless steel pole that would secure it to a 1-inch-thick, stainless-steel plate anchored to the black granite fountain base, the hole in the base of the urn proved to be too small. “As the artist was standing there, my guys were using a Makita saw outfitted with a diamond blade to cut a bigger hole so it would fit over the pole,” Cohen says.
How did you make sure the urn was adequately anchored to the base? All the welds securing the urn to the base and attaching the 14-foot tall stainless steel pole to a disc at the top were made by a certified welder and X-rayed to ensure the urn would be secure even during an earthquake.
What about the concrete? “There was an onsite inspector testing it to make sure it came up to strength,” Cohen says.
Did you restore the landscaping after the fountain was installed? “We did the drainage and redid the irrigation that had to be removed when the vault was brought in on a ramp by a forklift. … After, we had to re-lay the artificial turf around the base, and we also installed two lights that shine on the urn,” Cohen says. Foundation plantings were also installed.
How did this project stack up against others you’ve done? “We were on a pretty tight time deadline—I had only a little over a month to get the whole thing done because the urn had already been shipped from Denmark and they already had the grand opening scheduled,” Cohen says. “We had to find the granite (for the base), get all of the permits, although the Orange County Rescue Mission people helped with that—we had to dig the footing; form the concrete, order the vault. Then we found out the granite they wanted wasn’t available, so we had to find another granite in that same finish. There were definitely some challenges. … This was a once-in-a-lifetime kind of project.”
What if the artist called you tomorrow and said he wanted you to install another urn? “I’d be right there.”
