Meet the Board

Sarah Locke
President

Sarah Locke is an interior designer and heritage conservation consultant in Los Angeles, former director of Long Beach Heritage, and the current president of Docomomo’s Southern CA chapter. She has worked on a range of projects, including HABS documentation of the Eames House, the Case Study House multi-listing National Register nomination, and a wide variety of tours and educational programming. Her interior design portfolio includes Eichler, Cliff May, Paul Tay, Edward Killingsworth, and A. Quincy Jones.

Katie Horak
President Emeritus

Katie Horak is President of Docomomo US and a Principal at Architectural Resources Group, an architecture and planning firm that focuses on the historic built environment. Her work at ARG ranges from rehabilitation projects on some of Los Angeles’s most recognizable landmarks to large scale planning projects. In addition, Katie is an Adjunct Assistant Professor at USC, where she teaches graduate-level courses in the Heritage Conservation program, and she is the founding President of the Southern California Chapter of Docomomo US.

Hannah Simonson
Vice President

Hannah Lise Simonson is an architectural historian and cultural resources planner, currently working in the Los Angeles office of Page & Turnbull. After receiving her Master of Science in Historic Preservation from the University of Texas at Austin, she lived in San Francisco and was the president of the Northern California chapter of Docomomo US for five years. A recent transplant to Los Angeles, she is excited to explore all the Modernism and late 20th century architecture that Southern California has to offer.

Elsa Haarstad
Secretary

Elsa Haarstad is an architectural historian and historic preservationist. Currently, she is an Assistant Project Specialist at the GCI working with the Conserving Modern Architecture Initiative (CMAI) on their training and education initiatives. Previously she was the CMAI's 2022-2023 Graduate Intern working on the International Course on the Conservation of Modern Heritage. Elsa is a graduate of the School of the Art Institute of Chicago's Master of Arts in Modern and Contemporary Art History program with an emphasis in design and architectural history and also has an MA in Historic Preservation from Goucher College in Baltimore, Maryland.

Gail Ostergren
Treasurer

Jesús “Chuy” Barba Bonilla

Chuy is an architectural designer focused on heritage conservation with experience at a wide range of scales. He was born in Mexico and grew up in Zacatecas, a Spanish colonial mining city that was declared a World Heritage Site by UNESCO, this is where he became passionate about history and architecture. Chuy is currently working as an architectural designer at the firm of Page and Turnbull and recently obtained his Master’s in Heritage Conservation at the University of Southern California. He also serves on the Board of Directors at DoCoMoMo US. His project expertise focuses on advocacy for cultural patrimony, heritage conservation, adaptive reuse, and rehabilitation of historic buildings, structures, and sites. He is passionate about architectural design and cultural heritage. His work strives for placemaking that provides environmental responsibility, ease of access, community engagement, and social justice.

Erik Van Breene

Erik Van Breene is a third generation Angeleno who earned his Bachelor of Arts in History from California State University Long Beach (CSULB) and his Master’s in Heritage Conservation from the University of Southern California. In 2022, Erik wrote his master’s thesis on Los Angeles County’s Armenian community, the first historic context for L.A.’s Armenian community with a historic preservation lens.
Since graduating from CSULB, Erik has worked in real estate development, historic archives, preservation advocacy at the Los Angeles Conservancy, and is currently working for the City of Los Angeles Department of City Planning

Adrian Scott Fine

As President and CEO for the Los Angeles Conservancy, Adrian Scott Fine oversees the organization’s overall leadership for the organization within the greater Los Angeles region (serving 88 cities and unincorporated L.A. County, encompassing more than 4,000 sq. miles). This includes managing teams that help set priorities and provide strategic direction to educate and build awareness, protect historic places, and develop new proactive initiatives and programs, all while working collaboratively with local governments, nonprofit organizations, and community stakeholders. The Los Angeles Conservancy is the largest local, nonprofit membership-based, heritage conservation organization in the U.S.

Jason Foo

Jason Foo is a preservation advocate, writer, and researcher based in Huntington Beach. He has been a docent for the Los Angeles Conservancy since 2009. As a member of its Modern Committee, he contributed to programs on “The Sixties Turn 50” and Millard Sheets. As a board member for Preserve Orange County, he organizes public programs and writes about historic resources. In 2023, he co-organized a multi-city bus tour of William Pereira’s iconic buildings in Orange County.

Steven Keylon

Architectural historian Steven Keylon lives in Palm Springs, California, and writes and lectures about Southern California’s cultural landscapes. He is the past president of the California Garden & Landscape History Society, (CGLHS), and has been editor of their journal Eden since 2017. He is also vice president of the Palm Springs Preservation Foundation (PSPF). He is the author of several books: The Design of Herbert W. Burns (2018), The Modern Architecture of Hugh Michael Kaptur (2019), and is the co-author, with Tracy Conrad and Steve Vaught, of Tom O’Donnell: Generous Spirit of Palm Springs (2022).

Sam Malnati

Sam Malnati is a graduate student at the University of Southern California, where she is pursuing a dual degree in Heritage Conservation and Urban Planning. She has a background in Architectural Studies from Mount Holyoke College and currently works as a Documentation Project Technician at AQYER in San Marino. Sam lives in Pasadena as a Scholar in Residence at the Gamble House for the ‘24-25 academic year.

Trudi Sandmeier

Trudi Sandmeier is the Associate Dean for Academic Affairs, the Director of Graduate Programs in Heritage Conservation, and a Professor of Practice in the School of Architecture at USC. She is a co-creator and co-host of the podcast Save As: NextGen Heritage Conservation (saveas.place) and a co-editor of the Routledge Companion to Global Heritage Conservation (2019). Her work centers on the conservation of the recent past and efforts to make visible the impact of under-recognized constituencies in the historic built environment.

Brannon Smithwick
Brannon is an Architectural Historian and Preservation Planner at Architectural Resources Group in LA. She holds master’s degrees in Heritage Conservation and Urban Planning from the University of Southern California, as well as an associate’s in Interior Architecture from UCLA. In addition to serving on the board of Docomomo SoCal, Brannon is a member of the Vernacular Architecture Forum where she serves on the Future Visions Committee. Her other memberships include the National Trust for Historic Preservation, the Society of Architectural Historians, the Oral History Association, and ICOMOS/USA World Heritage, for which she was a 2023 International Exchange Program (IEP) intern.