If Any Los Angeles Site Could Be a Restaurant. . .

Steven Ehrlich: “The old restaurant in Union Station. It’s a wonderful space and ready to go. Second, a cafe in the main atrium of the Bradbury Building, one of my favorite spaces in all of L.A. Also: It would be great to have a wonderful restaurant overlooking the Sepulveda Dam in the Valley with an old, sculptural long vista. You’d have to make a journey to get there and it would be worth it. We need more of the kind of restaurants you find in Europe, which are simply ‘there’ because there’s a wonderful view.”

Tony Greenberg: “Windward Street in Venice between Pacific and Speedway. It’s not a building, per se, but a whole block as outdoor space. I’d close off the street and create an outdoor plaza.”

Elyse Grinstein: “My very favorite place: Union Station. There’s a great restaurant that was open in the ‘20s with an enormous copper bar. I would have loved to have done the Pan Pacific. It seems like that’s a good way to preserve these old buildings. Like what was done with Campanile.”

David Kellen: “The Griffith Observatory, a very heroic form. The location is fantastic, it has great views. I would make sure that there were tables all around looking out. We’d have to punch a few holes in the walls. . . .”

Michael Rotondi: “Found spaces, the kind you can’t do from scratch anymore, are what gets an architect excited. There’s one building I like a lot on Glendale Boulevard, an old brick warehouse on the side of a hill. . . .”

Michele Saee: “I would take any space. I don’t really believe that specific spaces really exist in Los Angeles. I think they’re all the same. What was City? And Angeli Trattoria was a carpet store. These big warehouses are the ugliest buildings, but you can invest your own fantasy in it.”

Josh Schweitzer: “There’s an old Spanish Mediterranean courtyard, all worn in with those wonderful qualities you get in European courtyards in hot climates. It’s on Wilshire between Western and Oxford. It’s a little microwave place now. But it’s just great: The space is all there. Put out some new tables and chairs and it’s done. It would be spectacular.”