Exterior of a modern building with a decorative metal roof featuring bird cutouts, illuminated stairs, and parking lot with cars, trees, and streetlights at dusk.

Encore Teppan - Restaurant Renovation

Diamond Bar, CA

5,500 sf

Completed 2015

Photographed by Stella

Encore Teppan is a high-end Japanese Teppan Restaurant beautifully renovated by JH2 architects in November 2015 and salvaged from a building originally constructed in the year 1965.

Built with the intentions of capturing modernity and style, a massive stone landscape was altered to create the epitome of a luxurious dining experience located in Diamond Bar, California.

Modern building with outdoor stairs, black railings, and unique lattice design on the facade, illuminated by exterior lights at dusk.

Exterior of a modern building with decorative wooden lattice panels, a small fenced entryway, and a sliding glass door, illuminated by warm lighting at dusk.

Metal railing with cut-out bird shapes, located on an outdoor terrace or balcony, with a blue sky and clouds in the background.

Architectural & Interior Restaurant Renovation in California

Interior of a restaurant with booths on the right, a long bar on the left, and seating near the windows at the back, featuring modern decor and natural light.

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The main design goal behind the project was to improve the entry space of the new restaurant. The existing building had an unattractive entry area, with a traditional heavy roof structure and an unpleasant, massive stone landscape.

Restructuring the southwestern building corner area meant greeting the audience with a custom design, detailed, patterned metal screen canopy, and woodwork paneling reminiscent of a bird’s nest pattern to emphasize Encore’s newly refurbished luxe experience.

Exterior of a modern building with black tiled flooring, concrete walls, and wooden decorative elements including a ceiling with bird-shaped cutouts and a sliding wooden screen, under a blue sky with clouds.

Empty restaurant table with four place settings in a cozy dining area, featuring wooden furniture, a padded booth seat, and decorative partition panels.

Interior of a modern restaurant with a large central dining area, surrounded by chairs and tables, large windows, and a kitchen area with a grill and counter in the background.

For a smart and sophisticated look, steel beams are formed at the entry and thin metal sheets are laser-cut in the outline of birds flying above that are on-brand with the bird’s nest paneling entryway. Warm LED tube lighting tract compliments the intricate details for the metal structure and concrete panel wall as well.

Metal sliding panels in front of the store front and canopy top panels above the entry doors were achieved by using treated corten-steel and custom designed laser cut patterns which were leveraged as pure architectural details.

Encore Teppan is home to the largest teppan grill in the United States, which orchestrated an architectural feat of vacating ceiling space in order to accommodate the heat and smoke from the freshly grilled cuisine.

Choosing a new grill system without a hood helped not only to resolve the lack of hood space problem on the roof, but also to design a clear interior ceiling space with respective original structural elements of the existing columns, beams and rafters.

Empty Japanese teppanyaki restaurant with a large steel griddle in the center, surrounded by tables with plates and red napkins, large windows in the background, and a dark ceiling.

A restaurant with a long, polished marble bar counter set with white plates, red napkins, and cutlery, overlooking large windows and a small dining area with tables and chairs.

Architectural drawing of a building facade with a sloped roof, brick and concrete walls, large glass windows, and an outdoor staircase on the left side, set against a cloudy sky background.

The vacancy of ceiling space complimented by skylit renovations harmonizes with the natural lighting of the rest of the restaurant in order to create an atmosphere that pairs tradition with modern style, especially highlighting the design features suited for dry desert-like weather in Southern California.

The restaurant displays horizontal shape to capitalize on the aesthetic of space, gravity, and its relation to the sky. With emphasis on its stylish renovation at the storefront, metal screen sliding panels and readjusted skylights provided for an accessible view of natural light. Encore creates a luxurious ambience fusing the environment, tradition, and style to create a unique dining experience for all.