Situated just 10 miles from downtown Los Angeles, Pasadena is a vibrant and sophisticated city. Best known to Americans for its sunny weather and its annual Tournament of Roses Parade and Rose Bowl college football game, Pasadena is also known as a “City of Learning,” containing the second-highest concentration of art, cultural and educational institutions in the United States. The city has a rich architectural and design history that includes works by Frank Lloyd Wright, the Greene brothers, Wallace Neff and artisans of the Arroyo Craftsman style. It also hosts an impressive collection of cultural institutions including the Norton Simon Museum; The Huntington Library, Art Collection & Botanical Gardens; the Armory Center for the Arts; and the Pacific Asia Museum. Pasadena has long been a center for scientific and aerospace innovation, and is home to both the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) and NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Many of our students and alumni choose to live and launch their businesses here. Renowned new business incubator Idealab and Honda’s Advanced Research Studio are also located nearby in the Old Pasadena district.

Pasadena is located at the base of the San Gabriel Mountains at the northern edge of the greater Los Angeles region. Home to 18 million residents and one of the world’s most dynamic and diverse metropolitan areas, the Los Angeles region offers an abundance of opportunities and advantages. Considered by many Asian cultures as the Western gateway to the Pacific Rim, Southern California is an international center of art, innovation and entrepreneurship. The region’s unique culture, talent and year-round sunny climate makes it home to companies in the entertainment, aerospace, fashion and consumer products industries. Such companies include Sony, The Walt Disney Company, Electronic Arts, NBC Universal, Samsung and Nokia. Over a dozen major automobile manufacturers, including BMW DesignworksUSA, Toyota, Honda, Volkswagen, Ford, General Motors and Mercedes have studios in the area. The Los Angeles region is also home to a thriving art scene with some 350 art galleries and several world-class museums, including the Getty Center, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art and the Museum of Contemporary Art.