Stenfors Associates Architects

Barnes & Noble

Barnes & Noble is an adaptive reuse of a Streamline Moderne building designed in 1935 as a Ralphs supermarket by the architectural firm of Morgan, Walls and Clements. Since 1970, the building had served as a retail store for low cost merchandise and had been allowed to deteriorate considerably. Because of its prominent Santa Monica location, at the corner of Wilshire Boulevard and the Third Street Promenade, there was considerable pressure to provide an adaptive reuse project that would serve as an anchor to the northern end of the Promenade, which was underutilized by pedestrian traffic.