O-Bar Restaurant - West Hollywood, CA

Thomas Schoos & Michael Berman
O-BAR Designers and Owners

Thomas Schoos

As co-owners of the successful Los Angeles based firms Thomas Schoos Design Lifestyles and Schoos Haus, one enters into the world of this duo accompanied by the scent of wild orchids, indeed a virtual Balinese rainforest, aptly described as a feast for the senses. In a span of seven years, the team has built a clientele that reads much like a who's who of Hollywood and New York, with their work appearing in Architectural Digest, Angeleno, InStyle, The Hollywood Reporter, Feng Shui for Modern Living, Los Angeles Magazine, and Brentwood Magazine. Their showrooms feature furniture and artifacts of their own design and manufacture, as well as an exotic assortment of hand-selected imports from Thailand, Africa, India, Egypt, and Europe - creating a distinctive style and aura for which they have become renowned.

Michael Berman

The two first entered into the design of restaurants with the opening of TAO in New York City, and then KOI, a Los Angeles hot-spot, known for its customized marriage of indoors and out. With the opening of their own restaurant, O-BAR serves up the design teams' dreams. Sweeping, fabric draped cabanas dramatically frame the entrance, with serene garden patios anchoring the front and rear of the space. Their personalized style is enjoyed in the movement of fountains, awash against a backdrop of hand-crafted stone light fixtures gently descending from vaulted ceilings, set against curvaceously-accented wall treatments. The magical qualities extend into the bar area, topped with a dazzling crown of white cane, gently illuminated atop the bar, with quartz stone votives sprinkled throughout, eliciting the Schoos elements into a 'renewed lifestyle of dining in Los Angeles.'

The design sensibilities of Berman and Schoos continue to attract a wide variety of clientele. Their touch is seen in the homes of actors Will Smith and Jada Pinkett, Courtney Cox-Arquette, Laurence Fishburn, Kirstie Alley, Tommy Mattola, Ellen Degeneres, Nick Lechay and Jessica Simpson, Holly Hunter, and Ridley Scott. Their unique fountain designs grace the retail outlets of Aveda, as well as the interiors of the Overbrook Entertainment Offices at Universal Studios. With their celebrity clientele in tow, the duo's future includes bringing their design visions to the television screen, along with future plans for restaurant growth and expansion.

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Thomas Schoos & Michael Berman O-BAR Designers and Owners

Thomas Schoos & Michael Berman
O-BAR Designers and Owners