Articles by Sarah Amelar

UCLA's Suprastudio Program Expands

January 2, 2013

Photo courtesy UCLA Haiti will be the focus of Thom Mayne's Suprastudio in 2013-14. Five years ago, UCLA’s Department of Architecture and Urban Design (A.UD), took the bold step of replacing its post-professional, or Masters of Architecture II, curriculum with what it calls the Suprastudio: an intensive, yearlong, R+D collaboration, led by a single faculty member in partnership with leaders from the aerospace, automotive design, or entertainment industries. The idea was to embrace cutting-edge technologies and engage architecture’s changing profession in productive and inventive ways. Teaming with companies such as Toyota and Disney, A.UD gradually ramped up the program, offering

The Q

Housing Fit for 007: Architect-developer Jonathan Segal named his 29-unit apartment building 'The Q,' after James Bond's resident gadgeteer. The tricks used here, though, are subtler than a shoe dagger.

Sarah Amelar

July 16, 2012

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When architect-developer Jonathan Segal named one of his recent buildings “The Q,” he says he was looking for “the cool factor, the debonair suaveness” of James Bond.

The 747 Wing House

Come Fly With Me: A Boeing 747 reaches new heights as the elements of a residence on the former estate of extravagant set designer Tony Duquette.

Sarah Amelar

April 16, 2012

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Step through the filigreed entry gates, and you've clearly entered another world.

A'maree's

Haute Couture: A restaurant with a Modernist pedigree is rescued from the vintage bin, reborn a high-end clothier.

Sarah Amelar

February 15, 2012

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A 1960s postcard shows a Newport Beach, California, building in its early heyday.

Under the California Sun, Architecture Blossomed

Sarah Amelar

November 15, 2011

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November 2011 Five Los Angeles cultural institutions shed new light on mid-20th-century design efforts. Pacific Standard Time: Art in L.A. 1945–1980—a collaboration among 60 cultural institutions across Southern California—is a grand bazaar, as eclectic, wide-ranging, and uneven as the period of art it celebrates. Initiated by the Getty Foundation, which provided $10 million in grants, this effort engages venues of radically different scales and aspirations to focus on the evolution of the Los Angeles art scene in the decades after World War II. With nearly every institution in on the act—from major museums to university galleries—art takes on a fluid

Twenty Five Lusk

Polishing a Hidden Gem: A radical makeover brings visibility to a new restaurant tucked away in an obscure corner of the city, while maintaining a sense of discovery for diners.

Sarah Amelar

October 16, 2011

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Just a few years ago, the idea of planting a hip, upscale restaurant on a sleepy alley in San Francisco's China Basin neighborhood might have seemed nuts.

Playa Vista Park

Where Howard Hughes once flew, Michael Maltzan has designed a park that connects a new mixed-use development with the site's colorful history.

Sarah Amelar

May 16, 2011

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On land once inhabited by native Tongva people and, centuries later, by the Hughes Aircraft Company, the planned community of Playa Vista is gradually rising on Los Angeles’s West Side.

Steve Jobs, the Demo Man

Sarah Amelar

April 4, 2011

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Decades ago, Steve Jobs purchased the historic Jackling mansion in Silicon Valley. In February, he finally succeeded in tearing the house down. Photo courtesy Town of Woodside History Committee The white-stucco house had an unusual and superbly insulating double-wall system, evoking the heft of adobe. The massing drew inspiration from Andalusian villages. Culminating years of legal battle with preservationists, Apple Computer CEO Steve Jobs finally demolished the historic Jackling House on his property in Woodside, California, in February. This affluent Silicon Valley enclave, some 30 miles from San Francisco, issued the demolition permit, and, within days, the 1926 mansion—by architect

Brooklyn Bridge Park by Michael Van Valkenburgh Associates

Brooklyn, New York

Sarah Amelar

January 16, 2011

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Designers transform a defunct shipping complex and reconnect a city with its waterfront.

Oakland Museum of California Renovation

Mark Cavagnero Associates subtly renews a 41-year-old museum designed by Kevin Roche and John Dinkeloo.

Sarah Amelar

December 16, 2010

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In 1968, the year before the Oakland Museum opened, New York Times architecture critic Ada Louise Huxtable wrote: “In terms of architecture and environment, Oakland may be the most thoughtfully revolutionary museum in the world.”