The Oyster Gourmet


Location: Los Angeles, CA
Year: 2014
Status: Complete


The Oyster Gourmet, a food kiosk and champagne bar on the northwest side of Grand Central Market in downtown Los Angeles, is an ornamented mechanical shell. It is opened and closed by means of a hand-crank that hauls up a series of leaves so they cantilever out over the bar as an awning. When closed, the shell looks like it is concealing some fantastical or otherworldly interior. But as it opens, something unexpected comes into view: not an alien interior, but a restaurant, which for all the theater of its revealing is remarkably and comfortably familiar.











Project Team: James Chesnut, Noel Hernandez, Courtney Kraus, Dan Marty, Noah Rubin, Trenman Yau