Stephen Francis Jones

A Restaurant Architect Who Can Sex Up Dinner Time at the Mall

Having grown up in New Jersey, I’m no stranger to mall dining. In middle school, my friends and I spent many Saturday afternoons consuming pizza slices and garlic knots on our way to (or from) Claire’s Accessories. My grandmother and I shared countless lunches at Bloomingdale’s café, and my brother and I adored cookies from the mall’s Mrs. Fields. All perfectly pleasant dining experiences, but they weren’t hip. So I’m sort of surprised that the architect who designed hip places like Spago Beverly Hills, the original Lucky Strike Lanes, and …

You Got a Better Idea For the Grand Avenue Project?

The Latest Design Got the Boot. The Saga Continues. Here Are Some Thoughts For the Next Round.

If you’re an Angeleno, you’ve probably had occasion to park in a large and ugly lot across from Walt Disney Concert Hall. That spot is also known as Parcel Q …

Architect Qingyun Ma

The USC Dean Loves Downtown and Breakfast Burritos; Texting and Air China Not-So-Much

Architect Qingyun Ma is a curator, winemaker, and dean of the University of Southern California School of Architecture. He is also the founder of architecture firm MADA s.p.a.m., which has …

Futurist Syd Mead

The Blade Runner Designer Talks Cars, Sinatra, and Robot Pets

Syd Mead, the man who designed the futuristic world of Blade Runner, is often called a “visual futurist.” He started his career in late-1950s Detroit, where he worked for the …

City Planner James Rojas

A Fan of Japanese Noodles, Mick Jagger, and Street Vending

City planner James Rojas, founder of the Latino Urban Forum, writes and lectures about how the American front yard and landscape are being transformed by changing tastes, changing values, and …

Architecture Critic Greg Goldin

Greg Goldin, coauthor of the forthcoming book Never Built Los Angeles, is a curator at the A+D Museum. From 1999 to 2012, he was the architecture critic at Los Angeles …