The Architecture and Design Museum (A+D), Archinect, and KCRW's DnA: Design and Architecture are coming together for SHORTLISTED!, a day-long symposium focused on highlighting the current state of earning, awarding, and judging architectural commissions in Los Angeles. 

The event, drafted in conjunction with The Los Angeles Schools exhibition at A+D, will include headline talks by Dr. Lori Bettison-Varga, head of the Natural History Museums of Los Angeles County, and Christopher Hawthorne, LA’s Chief Design Officer and former architecture critic for The Los Angeles Times. 

Crafted amid a period of upheaval surrounding Los Angeles's premier cultural institutions—including the demolition and reconstruction of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) complex, proposals to expand the La Brea Tar Pits, and plans for a new wing of the Natural History Museum, among several high-profile expansions and reorientations taking shape—the event will bring together architects, cultural leaders, educators, and the media to discuss what goes into shaping these transformative proposals. 

Topics covered will include tapping design talent from around the world amid L.A.'s growing sense of critical regionalism; what architects can do to make the cut for these career and culture-defining projects; philanthropy and procurement; cultural, political and community leadership; and the role of local architecture schools and media in the creation of our museums and civic landmarks. 

In addition to Hawthorne and Dr. Bettison Varga, participants include, SCI-Arc Director/CEO Hernan Diaz Alonso, Frederick Fisher, founder of Fredrick Fisher and Partners; David Pakshong, Design Principal at Gensler; LA-Más Co-Executive Director Elizabeth Timme; Woodbury University School of Architecture Dean Ingalill Wahlroos-Ritter, and curator and critic Mimi Zeiger, among other luminaries.

The forum was prompted, in part, by the realization that no LA architects had made the cut for any of the recent redesigns of buildings along the city's storied Museum Row, where LACMA, the Tar Bits, and the Petersen Automotive Museum are all located. 

You can hear Frances Anderton and myself discuss the significance of the George C. Page Museum building in a recently aired production of DnA here. 

“The spirit of Los Angeles is open, cosmopolitan and welcoming,” the organizers explain in a press release, adding, “But we do want to ask how architects working, teaching and studying in this epicenter of innovation get to make their mark on the buildings that define contemporary culture. We want to discuss this in the context of architectural language and whether there is a case to be made for nurturing a contemporary regionalism in our fast globalizing cities.”

Shortlisted! is co-produced and co-hosted by A+D Museum Executive Director Anthony Morey, Archinect managing editor Antonio Pacheco, architectural designer and SCI-Arc instructor Rebecca Fitzgerald, and Frances Anderton, host of KCRW’s DnA: Design and Architecture. 

The forum is free and open to all. 

Where: A+D Museum, 900 East 4th Street, Los Angeles, CA 90013

When: 9:30am – 4:00pm, Saturday, November 16, 2019.

Information: aplusd.org