United Oil Gas Station
Location: Los Angeles, California
Architect: Kanner Architects
Completed: 2007

Image credit: Nico Marques

L.A. is a great big freeway - so goes the song, and some of Los Angeles' 'stars that never were', may well have found themselves 'pumping gas' at the United Oil and Gas Station. At least these failed actors and singers will have some great architecture to look at.

Image credit: Nico Marques

The filling station is described by its architects as 'a marriage of the city's love affair with the automobile and today's modern one-stop-shopping spirit of immediate gratification and convenience'.

Image credit: Nico Marques

It features a 12-pump gas station, mini-market and car wash. Reminiscent of Southern California's ubiquitous freeway interchanges, two planes soar from the ground. One, a concrete ramp, takes patrons up and over the rear of the mini-market and back down into a car wash. The second, a sinuous and curvilinear metal structure, swoops down from the sky to serve as the roof of the mini-market. The form regains an upward momentum that carries it around the front of the market where it becomes a 30-foot canopy over the pumps.