Anthony Poon + John Kim (Poon Design) Discuss Process and Restaurant Projects

  • Home
  • Food
  • Anthony Poon + John Kim (Poon Design) Discuss Process and Restaurant Projects
Architects Los Angeles

Anthony Poon and John Kim worked together at HHPA before partnering on a Beverly Hills based firm.

Poon Design is a multi-disciplinary architecture and design firm from Anthony Poon and John Kim that’s on the rise in the L.A. restaurant world. The duo met locally while designing museums for Hardy, Holzman Pfeiffer (HHPA) in DTLA. Poon Design is currently responsible for Chaya Downtown and Mendocino Farms and has big plans for 2020. They’re not limited to restaurants; the duo designed an Air Force chapel in San Antonio that resembles a fighter jet and several contemporary schools. They’re not even limited to architecture. The highly capable Harvard University Graduate School of Design grads also handle branding, graphics, menus, and websites. I met Poon and Kim at their Beverly Hills office on New Year’s Eve, and they shared insights into their process and discussed current and future restaurant projects.

Anthony Poon first entered the restaurant world in 1991, partnering with two UCLA students on Two Part, a sweet West L.A. café. An instructor provided seed money for the concept because he liked the business plan so much. Jennifer Black was Wolfgang Puck’s pastry chef at Eureka, and the idea was to offer her “5-star desserts” in a quick casual setting. Poon developed a holistic design philosophy at this “venue of creativity” that encompassed a logo, T-shirts, coffee cups, music, and curated art shows. He says, “The experience isn’t just the color on the wall.” Two Part remained open four nears before the partners sold the space to a Parisian couple. The address now hosts Asakuma Sushi.

Poon is a San Francisco native who originally pursued a concert pianist’s career, but wasn’t willing to settle to be a commercial pianist. He studied architecture and music in college at UC Berkeley. From there, Poon considered Juilliard for music, but opted for Harvard and architecture. Better weather brought him from Boston to L.A. He worked for Hardy, Holzman Pfeiffer (HHPA), a legendary New York firm that specialized in arts and institutions. This is where Poon met John Kim. Together, they re-started Poon Design in summer 2005, hungry for more diverse projects in different industries.

Poon described this trajectory as a “pretty conventional path for young architects…We can do this on our own, do it better…leave secure, complacent jobs…it’s the entrepreneurial path.”

For each project, they create booklets that document the creative process, including study models, sketches, executed interiors, lighting design and branding. Poon says, “Most clients want to be efficient, but also have clear creative thinking.” They help shape these different visions.

A Manhattan Beach branch of popular Orange County restaurant Memphis opened last summer, offering “Memphis food in a beach café, but a very modern setting.” They also handled Breadbar menu display and Cake Monkey , packaging.

Upcoming projects include a quick casual Indian concept called Saffron that aspires to be “the Chipotle of Indian cuisine,” which Ben Karlin and Peter Stris will launch in late 2010. Kim says, “That was the challenge, overcoming the dogma associated with Indian restaurants.”

The duo’s also helping Mendocino Farms expand from DTLA to Marina del Rey. Kim says, “There are very few models for an urban food place that has gone suburban.” The goal is to translate Mario Del Pero and Ellen Chen’s popular lunch business sandwich concept into a “community restaurant” that includes weekend and nighttime hours, chalkboard walls for kids and “more structured” outdoor seating. “We don’t want it to be cookie cutter,” Poon says, “but you can’t change it so much that you can’t link it as a brand.”

Onigiri Café is also scheduled for Santa Monica’s Main Street by spring. The family-run concept from a father in Japan and mother and son in L.A. will offer onigiri (stuffed rice balls) and house-made frozen yogurt. They’re also bringing a quick casual Korean concept to Beverly Hills and a Cake Monkey retail location is also possible for DTLA.

Poon Design is gaining momentum in L.A.’s restaurant community, though Poon and Kim have more to give.

Tags:

Joshua Lurie

Joshua Lurie founded FoodGPS in 2005. Read about him here.

Leave a Comment