What is host city?

Host City is an editorial project covering the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics as an ambitious, city-shaping moment. We love Los Angeles. We are interested in what makes it work, what's breaking, and what an event of this scale does to the parts that are already fragile and to the parts that are resilient.

Our lens is focused on the neighborhoods, infrastructure, the leaders and the brands, and the cultural memory. We write features, shoot photo essays, conduct interviews, and produce videos. We will primarily publish on Substack and YouTube.

We are not a sports publication. We do not cover athletes, brackets, medal counts, or competition results. Other people do that work, and they do it well! Host City covers everything else: the bus operators hired and trained for the Games, the hotel rates negotiated three years out, the residents of Inglewood who have already lived through one transformation and are now living through another, the 1932 Olympic Village in Baldwin Hills and what happened to it in the ninety-six years since.

The publication is independent. We are not affiliated with LA28, the United States Olympic and Paralympic Committee, the IOC, or any host-city government office.

Contribute to Host City

We are building an open contributor network — Los Angeles-based first, but not exclusively — and we want to hear from you!

We're specifically looking for:

Writers and reporters. Feature writers, beat reporters, and short-form contributors with experience in any of: urban policy, transportation, real estate, labor, immigration, civic history, sports business, or local LA reporting. We are especially interested in writers with deep neighborhood knowledge. National experience is welcome but not required.

Photojournalists and photo essayists. We commission both single-frame editorial photography and longer-form photo essays. We are looking for photographers who can shoot in a documentary-editorial register — observational, specific, patient. LA-based photographers will be prioritized for time-sensitive assignments.

Video creators and documentarians. We produce short-form (5–10 minutes) and mid-length (15–25 minutes) video for our YouTube channel. We're looking for people who can shoot, interview, and edit, or who can lead a small crew. We want documentary-style, strong audio, and a willingness to spend real time on location.

Designers and data visualizers. Editorial illustration for features, infographic and data visualization for explanatory work, occasional cartography.

Host City pays for every commissioned piece. Specific rates depend on length, complexity, and form, and are agreed before commissioning. We do not run unpaid work.

How to become a Host City contributor

Send an email to contribute@hostcity.media with three things:

  1. A one-paragraph note on what you'd like to cover and why Host City. Specifics outperform generalities. "I want to report on the Inglewood housing situation" is stronger than "I'm interested in housing." "I shot the 2024 Inglewood Stadium openings on assignment for X" is stronger than "I have experience in LA."

  2. Three to five samples of relevant work — links, PDFs, or video URLs are all fine. We don't need a comprehensive portfolio, just your strongest signal.

  3. A short list of three to five story ideas you'd want to pitch us, each in two sentences. This is the most important part. We commission ideas, not résumés!

We hope to work together :D