Art Center College of Design

ArtCenter College of Design was founded in 1930 in downtown Los Angeles as the ArtCenter School. In 1935, Fred R. Archer founded the photography department, and Ansel Adams was a guest instructor in the late 1930s. During and after World War II, ArtCenter ran a technical illustration program in conjunction with the California Institute of Technology.

In 1947, the post-war boom in students caused the school to expand to a larger location in the building of the former Cumnock School for Girls in the Hancock Park neighborhood, while still maintaining a presence at its original downtown location. The school began granting Bachelor's and Master's degrees in arts in 1949, and was fully accredited by the Western Association of Schools and Colleges in 1955.

In 1965, the school changed its name to Art Center College of Design. The school expanded its programs, including a film program in 1973. The school moved to the Hillside Campus in Pasadena in 1976. The school operated ArtCenter Europe in Vevey, Switzerland from 1986 to 1996. In 2003, ArtCenter was granted Non-governmental organization status by the UN Department of Public Information.

ArtCenter opened the South Campus in Pasadena in 2004. In 2019, ArtCenter revealed they exceeded their $100 million goal when their fundraising campaign for additional scholarships and expanding their south campus started in 2011. The school raised $124 million from more than 7,000 contributions. ArtCenter celebrated their 90th anniversary on April 16, 2020. The planned celebration was rescheduled due to the coronavirus pandemic.

ArtCenter College of Design has two campuses in Pasadena: Hillside Campus and South Campus.

Hillside Campus

Designed by modernist architect Craig Ellwood, the Hillside Campus broke ground in November 1974. The "bridge building" spanned an arroyo and roadway on 175 acres (71 ha) in the hills above Pasadena. Opening in 1976, the building was later expanded with the south wing, designed by former Ellwood associate James Tyler, and constructed between 1989 and 1991. The Hillside Campus houses classrooms and studio space, multiple computer labs, the James Lemont Fogg Memorial Library, a model shop with traditional tools as well as rapid prototyping technologies (multi-axis CNC, laser-cutting, and multiple types of 3D printing), painting facilities, the Color, Material, and Trends Exploration Lab (CMTEL), an (Auto) Interior Simulation Lab, the Sinclaire Pavilion, photo and film stages with printing and editing facilities, and both a curated student gallery and an external exhibit gallery, both open to the public. The Hillside Campus has been designated as a historic monument by the City of Pasadena.

South Campus

The South Campus opened in 2004 in a former aircraft-testing facility built during World War II. Renovated by the Santa Monica-based firm Daly Genik, it houses the graduate Art and the Media Design Practices programs and studios, exhibition space for both of those programs, a print shop, a letterpress studio, and public programs including the ArtCenter at Night, ArtCenter for Kids, and the Design-Based Learning Lab. There is an 16,000-square-foot (1,500 m2) exhibition space known as the Wind Tunnel, which is currently the home of the Media Design Practices program. The Wind Tunnel has hosted events including the biannual ArtCenter Design Conference like 2006's "Radical Craft" and 2008's "Serious Play"; an annual Summit on Sustainable Mobility, large exhibitions such as "Supersonic: 1 Wind Tunnel, 8 Schools, 120 Artists"; "Gardenlab", and "Open House: Architecture and Technology for Intelligent Living" (with Vitra Design Museum), and various community meetings and events.

In 2012, ArtCenter announced the expansion of South Campus with the acquisition of a former U.S. Postal Service property adjacent to the existing campus, made entirely possible through the college's philanthropic efforts. At that time, the college appointed Michael Maltzan Architecture as its partner in planning academic spaces and expansion of its educational resources. With this agreement still intact, actual renovation of the former USPS building was completed by Darin Johnstone Architecture in 2014. Also in 2014, ArtCenter announced the acquisition of an office building at the "gateway" to Pasadena and future plans for new student housing, all of which will elevate South Campus from a "satellite" location to equal programs and activities found at the Hillside Campus.