Glasswerks brought precision fabrication to North City Phase A, supplying the glass systems for a twelve-story residential development in San Marcos, California.
Building a Community, One Elevation at a Time
Designed by Safdie Rabines Architects and developed by Urban Villages San Marcos, LLC, North City Phase A is a twelve-story residential building anchoring a larger master-planned community in North San Marcos. The project wraps a central courtyard with ground-floor retail, amenity space, and residential units above, all enclosed in glazing that shifts in makeup as the building rises.
Glasswerks fabricated the complete glass package for the building envelope, creating distinct assemblies for the lower and upper floors to meet the structural, acoustic, and safety requirements at each level.
Our Scope of Work
Glasswerks fabricated the following systems for North City, glazed with Solarban 70 Clear for high-performance solar control:
Window Wall:
Spanning floor to floor across all residential levels, 147,000 square feet form the building’s primary glazed envelope.
Storefront:
Ground-floor retail and amenity glazing, 28,000 square feet in total, built for street-level durability and visual openness.
Juliet Balcony Glass Guardrails:
Wall-mounted laminated guardrail units serving the building’s Juliet balcony units, totaling 5,500 square feet.
Operable Window Units:
900 operable vent units integrated throughout the residential floors for natural ventilation.
Glazing makeup was tailored by elevation, with fabrication shifting at Level 7 to meet the building’s changing structural, acoustic, and safety requirements as the tower rises. Each unit was fabricated to close tolerances so the transition would read as a seamless part of the facade.
“North City meant fabricating to shifting specs on the same building, and getting the transitions right between floors was critical. Seeing that kind of detail translate from drawing to finished facade is what this work is about.”
Project Team
- Owner: Urban Villages San Marcos, LLC
- Architect: Safdie Rabines Architects
- Structural Engineer: KPFF
- Civil Engineer: Stevens Cresto Engineering, Inc.
- Landscape Architect: OJB Landscape Architecture
- Glazing Contractor: Tower Glass Inc.
- General Contractor: Turner Construction
- Photographer: Jake Orness
