Category: News

CIVIC PURPOSE: URBAN DESIGN IN PRIVATE PRACTICE features three decades of urban design projects at Johnson Fain varying in type and scale from conceptual architecture to the design for major city additions,

TECTONICS OF PLACE II / THE ARCHITECTURE OF JOHNSON FAIN, the second volume on the recent architecture of the international design firm, was published in 2023.

Curved buildings and a massive earthen mound feature at a museum in Oklahoma that was designed by architecture studio Johnson Fain over two decades ago and is finally complete. The First Americans Museum (FAM) aims to educate the public on the cultures and histories of the 39 Native American tribes that exist in Oklahoma today. It is located in the state’s capital, Oklahoma City

Twenty-five years in the making, the First Americans Museum in Oklahoma City opened to the public in September 2021. Los Angeles’s Johnson Fain started working on the project from 1996, developing a concept that honors the tribes in Oklahoma today and recalls historical tribes through an earthen mound at the center of the project. The architects answered a few questions about the First Americans Museum.

Read the 25-year long journey to complete the largest single-building tribal cultural center in the country, with a mission to tell the authentic story of resilience and culture of the first Americans.

First Americans Museum project has been featured in an article in The Wall Street Journal. The 175,000-square-foot, $175 million project, designed by Johnson Fain, honors the rhythm of the seasons, outdoor life, the significance of the sun, and the importance of dance.

This Week on Monday Morning Coffee with Inside The Firm, we are joined by Johnson Fain partners Scott Johnson, FAIA, and William Fain, FAIA. Scott Johnson was educated at Stanford University, the University of California at Berkeley (BA in Architecture), and the Harvard Graduate School of Design. Hew was a p ast Director of USC’s M.Arch program, and is the author of 5 books on architecture, ranging from tall-building design to the visual arts and architecture. William Fain is an architect and urban designer with an international reputation and a long list of professional honors. He is a native Californian who took degrees from UC Berkeley (Bachelor of Architecture) and the Harvard Graduate School of Design (Master of Architecture in Urban Design), also spending a term at Manchester University in England. During his career, he has won two separate Fellowships from the National Endowment of the Arts and Humanities and was the recipient of a Rome Prize Fellowship at the American Academy in Rome, Italy. He has taught at Harvard University and the Southern California Institute of Architecture. Join us as we dive into their journey.