Frances Anderton

Host of DnA: Design & Architecture; Producer, To the Point

Frances Anderton is the host of DnA: Design and Architecture, monthly on KCRW and KCRW.com. She is also a full-time producer of KCRW's national and local current affairs shows, To The Point, and Which Way, LA? -- both hosted by Warren Olney.

In addition, Ms. Anderton is the L.A. Editor for Dwell Magazine. She is a regular contributor to the New York Times and many other publications on Los Angeles design and architecture.

Frances is a frequent speaker and moderator at cultural institutions, including REDCAT, the Hammer UCLA Museum, the Skirball Institute, the LA Forum, and the A+D Museum; she is on the Advisory Board of the L.A. Forum. She has also been an onll-air commentator on TV and documentary programs about architecture; the latest is Visual Acoustics: The Modernism of Julius Shulman, released in 2008.

The LA/AIA Chapter has awarded her for her work in highlighting the LA design and architecture scene; and DnA has been featured in th e Los Angeles Times magazine as well as Los Angeles, Angeleno and Metropolis magazines.

Ms. Anderton was raised in Bath, a historic spa town in England. After high school she went to Florence, Italy, where she spent a year rehabilitating a casa colonica. She studied architecture at University College London (Bartlett School), and then traveled to Jaipur, India, to study the haveli courtyard house for a Royal Society of Town Planning paper. She then became associate editor of The Architectural Review magazine, one of the oldest architecture publications; her first assignment was to produce a special issue on Los Angeles.

She fell in love with Los Angeles, and moved there in 1991 to take up the post of editor of L.A. Architect, a monthly journal for the Los Angeles architectural community, published by the LA Chapter of the American Institute of Architects. In the three years she served as editor, Ms. Anderton transformed the design and editorial content, and increased the readership of the publication. But on hearing the LA-focused discussion program, Which Way, LA? she was drawn to KCRW, and volunteered there before moving into a staff position. She wed her love of design and architecture to the medium of radio when she started hosting DnA: Design and Architecture in April, 2002. And she applies her knowledge about politics and current affairs to her understanding of architecture and design.