From The Magazine
Invite Only: Inside Katsuya Century City
Inside Katsuya Century City with Ben Dayag, Culinary Director at Katsuya, who took us through the restaurant and offered a look at the thinking behind its food, design and hospitality.
- Written By: Julianne Elise Beffa / Photography By: Benjamin Allen / Videography By: Von Jackson
Walk into Katsuya Century City and the first thing you notice is the ceiling. Towering above the dining room are oversized eggplant-shaped sculptures, suspended against a backdrop of cedar beams and high ceilings that give the entire restaurant an immediate sense of scale. Designed by Rockwell Group, the space is sleek and distinctly Japanese in its aesthetic, but there is enough warmth in the wood, greenery and open kitchen to keep it from feeling overly formal. It is a restaurant designed to make an impression before the first dish even reaches the table.
For the latest edition of LOOP’s Invite Only, we went inside Katsuya Century City with Ben Dayag, Culinary Director at Katsuya, who took us through the restaurant and offered a look at the thinking behind its food, design and hospitality.
“This is the future of our new Katsuya,” Dayag tells LOOP as he walks us through the space, pointing out the artistry throughout the dining room, the dramatic bar and the variety of seating designed to accommodate everything from a date to a large group. The restaurant opened at Westfield Century City in July 2025, marking the fourth Los Angeles location for the Katsuya brand and giving the concept a new setting in one of the city’s busiest dining and shopping destinations.
The design is intentionally different from previous iterations of Katsuya. Rockwell Group was brought in to create something cleaner and more contemporary, with cedar, high ceilings and Japanese-inspired details taking the place of a more architectural aesthetic. The result is a room that can shift with the occasion, whether someone is stopping in for a quick cocktail and a few bites, settling in for lunch or committing to a longer dinner.
That flexibility was clearly part of the plan. Dayag describes the restaurant as a place where guests can come in for a quick roll or stay for four or five courses, with seating that works equally well for solo diners, couples and larger parties. The patio extends the experience outdoors, while the bar offers its own reason to stop in, with wines, sake and spirits lining the space.
The kitchen, meanwhile, is intentionally visible. An open layout allows guests to watch the team move between the robata, tempura and sauté stations before arriving at the sushi bar, where chefs prepare fish throughout the day. Some of that fish comes directly from Japan, including product sourced through the Toyosu Market, while other selections come from California’s coastline, reflecting the combination of Japanese tradition and local influence that has always been central to Katsuya.
This is our home and we want (guests) to come and feel at home.
That balance is perhaps the most important part of understanding the restaurant. Katsuya was born in Los Angeles in 2006, when Sam Nazarian and the recently deceased, Chef Katsuya Uechi came together to create Katsuya by SBE in Brentwood, and Dayag sees the relationship between Japanese cuisine and Los Angeles as a natural one. Sushi fits the city’s preference for fresh, lighter food while also allowing the restaurant to serve an audience that spans generations, from families to longtime sushi lovers and a younger crowd discovering the brand for the first time.
The culinary philosophy is rooted in Washoku, the traditional Japanese approach to food that emphasizes seasonality, balance and respect for ingredients, while still leaving room for Katsuya to put its own spin on familiar dishes. The restaurant’s signature Crispy Rice is a perfect example. The original version helped define the Katsuya identity, but the Century City menu expands on the idea with Wagyu Crispy Rice, Hamachi Crispy Rice and an avocado version for vegan diners.
The classics, however, have not gone anywhere. Spicy Tuna Crispy Rice, Miso Cod and Rock Shrimp remain among the dishes guests return for, while newer additions are meant to bring something unexpected to the table without losing the simplicity that sits at the heart of the cuisine. “We like to keep things simple, humble, but also use technique to showcase the quality of our dishes,” Dayag explains.
His personal favorite is the Toro Tartare, which may also be one of the dishes that best captures Katsuya’s willingness to make the dining experience about more than flavor alone. Served in a porcelain hand, the dish incorporates shiso for freshness and texture while turning the presentation itself into part of the experience. It is playful without becoming gimmicky, which is a difficult balance for any restaurant trying to create dishes that are as memorable on camera as they are at the table.
That idea of experience extends throughout the restaurant. Katsuya Century City was designed to accommodate different versions of a night out rather than dictate one particular way to dine. You can stop in for a cocktail, order a quick roll at the bar or settle into a longer meal built around more luxurious dishes, with the space designed to make each version feel equally natural.
There is a Japanese word Dayag returns to when describing that feeling: “invite.”
The idea is rooted in the way a traditional Japanese home welcomes a guest, and Katsuya has taken that philosophy into the restaurant itself. “This is our home where we want you to come and feel at home,” Dayag says, describing the sense of welcome the team hopes guests experience from the moment they walk through the door.
It is a fitting philosophy for a restaurant whose greatest goal, according to Dayag, is not simply getting someone through the door once, but giving them enough reasons to come back. The menu is designed to encourage that kind of return, with familiar favorites for regulars and enough new dishes to keep the experience from becoming predictable. Fresh fish arrives regularly, the menu continues to evolve and the restaurant’s large footprint means a guest can have a completely different experience depending on where they sit and how they choose to spend their time.
That may ultimately be what makes Katsuya Century City interesting within the larger Los Angeles dining scene. It does not ask guests to choose between casual and elevated, traditional and contemporary, food and atmosphere. Instead, it leaves the door open for all of it, creating a restaurant that can function as a quick lunch stop, a date-night destination, a group dinner or simply somewhere to sit down for excellent sushi and a cocktail.
For Invite Only, getting a look inside that process offered a glimpse at what Katsuya is building in Century City: a restaurant grounded in nearly two decades of culinary history, but designed around where the brand wants to go next. And if Dayag’s description of the restaurant as a home is any indication, the real measure of its success will not be how many people walk through the doors once, but how many decide they want to come back.
