Once classmates at Harvard University’s Graduate School of Design, Scott Johnson and William Fain are now founding partners of Elysian Park-based architecture and design firm Johnson Fain, one of the most prolific architecture firms in the area and averaging $12 million in annual revenue.
The two transitioned Johnson Fain’s predecessor, William L. Pereira Associates, into the current company in 1989. Today, it specializes in high-rise density projects, namely mixed-use buildings and large-scale urban master plans.
Johnson leads the firm’s architecture and interiors practice while Fain oversees its management, urban design and planning processes. While they specialize in two different aspects of the business, coming together has allowed them to expand the firm’s reach and capabilities when it comes to taking on new projects, they said.
“I think contextually what unites us is a primary focus on urbanization, density, mixed-use and the complexity of modern space,” Johnson said. “I’m creating architectural work in that context. Bill is studying large master plans, urban design and big-site campus feasibilities, which are, in a sense, complex urban highly dense environments too. It’s parallel and, at times, sequential.”
While Johnson Fain’s designs have touched countries all over the world – including China, Taiwan, Japan, Indonesia, Thailand, Australia, Saudi Arabia and other international destinations – Los Angeles still serves as its primary market.
The firm is perhaps most famed for its dominance when it comes to the numerous office skyscrapers in Century City.
The design firm specializes in vertical high-rises and urban density
It all started when Johnson Fain was commissioned to design the headquarters for 20th Century Fox Plaza, now known as 2121 Avenue of the Stars. The 1987 unveiling of the 34-story, 650,000-square-foot Century City tower – which was fully leased at completion and recorded the highest commercial office rents in Los Angeles at its opening – pushed the architecture firm further into the spotlight.
Johnson Fain went on to design 1999 Avenue of the Stars and Constellation Place. Now, the team is designing Century City Center, a 37-story creative office building set to open in 2026. It will be the new headquarters of Creative Artists Agency and will include a 2-acre garden, as well as a gym, retail and other amenities.
“I think that is probably the only (office) building in the United States of stature that is going up right now,” Fain said. “We’re extremely grateful to be working on that.”
As their high-rise expertise became solidified, Johnson and Fain began to take everything they knew about office towers and translate that into multifamily living, which they started to include as part of their practice roughly 10 years ago.
Figueroa Eight, its latest design, is a 42-story luxury apartment complex downtown that opened in March and was developed by Mitsui Fudosan America.
The architecture firm is currently designing Citrus Commons, transforming the historic Sunkist site into a mixed-use creative office and 252-unit multifamily community in Sherman Oaks; 6400 Sunset, a 26-story residential tower in Hollywood; and Silicon Live, a 176-unit apartment complex in Westchester.
Past multifamily projects include Blossom Plaza in Chinatown, Runway at Playa Vista, as well as Metropolitan Lofts and La Plaza Village, both downtown.
When asked what project stands out most, Fain said it’s “the latest one that keeps the firm going.”
As the company evolves and eventually is handed off to the next generation of Johnson Fain partners, Johnson hopes the firm continues to lead with creativity.
“There’s no conflict in my mind between business and art,” he said. “If you want to be shallow and just apply formula, well there’s a problem and I think we could do better. We are a creative center in Southern California. I think our buildings, and particularly in the commercial sector, could be better on the whole and we should keep trying to make them better. There’s nothing about a program for a tall building or a big building that, at the outset, limits it from being fantastic except what the mind will accept.”
