What began 12 years ago as a single Buena Park pho shop has evolved into Kei Concepts, one of Orange County’s most dominant restaurant groups. Co-founded by James Beard-nominated chef Viet Nguyen, the group’s portfolio now spans nine unique brands — ranging
from Italian-Japanese fusion to contemporary Chinese — across 14 locations and 1,200 employees.
Next fall, Kei Concepts will make its move into Los Angeles, anchoring Culver Commons — a $24 million Regency Centers development at the intersection of Washington Boulevard and Centinela Avenue — with outposts of its Peruvian-Chinese staple Vox Kitchen and Japanese handroll counter Rol. (Kei Concepts operated Súp Noodle Bar in Cerritos from 2017 to 2020.)
At Culver Commons, the two OC imports will join a stacked tenant lineup that includes Wanderlust Creamery, Smog City Brewing, and El Moro Churrería. While the partners behind Kei Concepts considered expanding beyond its Orange County “bubble” for years, Nguyen says, the group didn’t take the leap until Regency Centers approached them about the opportunity in Culver City. Previously, the two companies partnered at Heritage Plaza, an Irvine shopping complex owned by Regency Centers, where Kei Concepts operates three restaurants: Nếp Cafe, Súp Noodle Bar, and Rol Hand Roll Bar.
“Culver City is the perfect location for our introduction of Kei Concepts to LA residents,” says Nguyen. He notes that the city’s demographics and income levels closely mirror those of the group’s most successful Orange County markets like Irvine, though with a smaller Asian population.
Bringing Vox Kitchen to Los Angeles marks a full-circle moment for Nguyen. “When I was working all over LA, the number-one restaurant I always went to every single week was Mario’s Seafood,” he says. The long-standing Hollywood Peruvian restaurant’s signature ceviches and lomo saltado inspired Vox Kitchen.
Vox Kitchen Culver City will seat 200 diners across a 5,000-square-foot dining room and a 1,000-square-foot patio, making it significantly larger than existing locations in Fountain Valley and South Coast Plaza. To further differentiate the restaurant from its predecessors, the Culver City menu is adding what Nguyen calls a “Nikkei flair” to its Chifa standards, introducing a raw bar and a dynamic slate of cocktails.
Three doors down, Rol, which currently operates in Fountain Valley, Irvine, and La Habra, will span 2,000 square feet, with counter-only seating. Its core menu of handrolls and donburi bowls will expand to feature a new lineup of traditional and innovative onigiri, including Korean-inspired variations like bulgogi and kimchi. Madrid-based architecture and experience firm Livit designed the sleek interiors for both spaces.
Nguyen views the dual Culver City openings as a litmus test for the brand’s viability outside its home turf. “Culver City will be the defining moment,” Nguyen says. “If we open it and nobody shows up and they hate us, then we still have a lot of work to do. But if it succeeds and people love it, we’ll be in 50 states.”
While it is too soon to say how the Orange County powerhouse will fare in a hyper-competitive market like Los Angeles’s, Nguyen’s underlying mission to foster connection within the Vietnamese diaspora through shared meals remains steadfast. “When you sit around the dinner table, everything becomes softer; you find it easier to forget. I feel like my job is to bring people together at the dinner table,” he says. “Everything I’m doing is for Little Saigon. Everything I’m doing is for Vietnamese people to come together to share stories.”
