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Architecture
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| # 272 |
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| Completion |
10 / 2024 |
| Specific Use of Building |
Restaurant |
| Project Location |
Chino, California |
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For more than seventy years, Andys has been part of daily life in Chino, California. What began as a first-generation family business in the 1950s has endured through decades of change, remaining a gathering place for a community that has grown up around it. When the second generation decided to build a permanent new home, the design challenge was clear: create a building worthy of that history - one that feels rooted, contemporary, and unmistakably theirs.
The site sits within a low-rise commercial corridor typical of San Bernardino County's suburban fabric - a landscape shaped more by convenience than craft. The 5,000-square-foot program called for a fast casual restaurant with an open dining room, an outdoor patio, and full back-of-house operations including kitchen, prep, and office. Rather than defaulting to the generic commercial prototype, the design team saw an opportunity to elevate the everyday — to give a beloved neighborhood institution a building that reflects its significance to the community it has served for generations.
The plan is organized into three distinct zones unified under a single continuous horizontal roof - the project's defining architectural gesture. The dining room, bordered on three sides by floor-to-ceiling storefront glazing, opens generously to the surrounding neighborhood. During the day, natural light floods the space and the street becomes part of the interior experience, connecting the restaurant to the community beyond its walls. After dark, the glazed volume glows warmly from within - a lantern visible from the street, signaling welcome to neighbors who have known this family for decades. To the west, an open-air patio extends the dining experience outdoors, blurring the threshold between building and neighborhood. Behind, solid walls clad in ridged fiber cement panels enclose the kitchen and service areas — durable, textured, and grounded. The contrast between transparency and mass, between lightness and solidity, gives the composition its character and quiet authority. These three parts - patio, dining room, kitchen - are distinct in material and mood, yet read as a single unified whole beneath the long roof plane that ties them together.
The project was completed at a construction cost of $3.5 million. Resources were concentrated where they matter most - in the materials and moments that shape the guest experience and define the building's public presence. The result is a building that exceeds its budget constraints without announcing the effort.
Coordinating the transparency of the dining pavilion with the technical demands of a commercial kitchen required disciplined planning. The clear functional separation of public and service zones allowed each to be resolved on its own terms, with materiality reinforcing the distinction naturally rather than forcefully.
The project exceeds California's Green Building Standards Code (CALGreen) requirements for energy efficiency, water conservation, material sourcing, and indoor environmental quality - responsible stewardship appropriate for a business with deep roots in its community and a commitment to its long-term future. |
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