Foreword by Thom Mayne
Introduction by Joseph Giovannini




Live + Work is a visually immersive monograph of the work of Shubin + Donaldson Architects, whose creative commercial spaces and high-end residential projects draw on the complex vernaculars of Southern California’s cultures and traditions. Organized around the organic process of practice, the complex genealogy of projects, and the flow of influence, this monograph examines the contemporary conditions by which we live and work, and how those terms are increasingly blended.

Visual essays of the select projects are supplemented with drawings, sketches, diagrams, interviews, and essays by Thom Mayne and Joseph Giovannini.

Press/Media:

"Book about Alumnus-led Practice Explores SoCal Spaces for Living, Working," SCI-Arc News, July 5th, 2010.


Thom Mayne founded Morphosis in 1972. As design director and thought leader of Morphosis, Mayne provides overall vision, project leadership and direction to the firm. With Morphosis, Mayne has been the recipient of the 2005 Pritzker Architecture Prize, 25 Progressive Architecture Awards, 75 American Institute of Architecture Awards and numerous other design recognitions. Throughout his career, Mayne has remained active in the academic world. In 1972, he helped to found the Southern California Institute of Architecture. Since then, he has held teaching positions at Columbia, Yale (the Eliel Saarinen Chair in 1991), the Harvard Graduate School of Design (Eliot Noyes Chair in 1998), the Berlage Institute in the Netherlands, the Bartlett School of Architecture in London, and many other institutions around the world. His commitment to the education of young designers has not wavered. Currently, he holds a tenured faculty position at the UCLA School of Arts and Architecture.

Joseph Giovannini is an author, critic, and the principal of Giovannini Associates, a New York City design firm. A Pulitzer Prize nominee, he has written as an architecture critic for The Los Angeles Herald Examiner and The New York Times, and has contributed to The New Yorker, Esquire, Vanity Fair, Progressive Architecture, Architectural Record, and Architectural Digest, among other publications. Mr. Giovannini has received numerous writing awards and has lectured widely. He earned his B.A. in English Literature at Yale, M.A. in French Language and Literature through studies at the Sorbonne, and M.Arch at the Graduate School of Design at Harvard University. He has taught at Harvard University, Columbia University, and at the University of Southern California School of Architecture.