Los Angeles

Ruggedly good looking, deeply creative, with a sunny disposition to boot…if LA were on Tinder, the app would crash.

Natural Beauty

Envy is an ugly thing, New York. While your denizens spend their time sniffling and throwing shade in the snow, Angelenos are busy riding waves, tying up their hiking boots and counting their copious blessings. Think about it: in how many megalopolises can you gallop across rugged mountains just nine miles from City Hall? Despite its heaving head count, LA is a city indelibly tied to mighty Mother Nature. Here, dense, vibrant neighborhoods back onto golden beaches, city streets lead up to flower-carpeted hillsides, and huge, deep-blue skies are an IMAX screen for lingering sunsets made to pierce your heart.

Creative Overload

Dreams are serious business in La La Land. Home to Hollywood, this is a city where fantastical thoughts are encouraged; a place gleefully wrapped in endless layers of modern legend and mythology. Every year countless small-town dreamers pour onto its streets, itching to share their tales with LA and the world – on screen and stage, in lyrics, or on the whitewashed walls of galleries. The end result is an electrifying whirlpool of creativity: edgy art spaces, cult-status rock venues, acclaimed concert halls and thought-provoking stages, all fueling a city addicted to the weird, the wonderful and the downright scandalous.

Architectural Riches

LA's obsession with creative expression extends to its stucco and mortar. After all, this is where movie palaces look like Chinese temples and ancient Egyptian tombs, where concerts halls twist and curve like steely cartoon characters, and where soda bottling plants look like landlocked ocean liners. Indeed, LA celebrates architectural diversity with astounding gusto. From storybook Hollywood abodes and Silver Lake modernist prototypes, to downtown theaters channeling the Palace of Versailles, no other American city delivers such a thrilling mash-up of architectural styles, statements and role models…often on the very same palm-studded street.

Food & Drink

So which really has the better food scene: LA or SF? While the latter may claim more Michelin stars, LA packs one heck of a culinary punch. It's here that you'll find California's best tacos, the country's most authentic Korean and one of the nation's biggest concentrations of vegan restaurants. And when it comes to imbibing, SF best take a cable car home. From dirty martinis in a basement power station, to craft brews in a steampunk bowling alley, LA has a knack for turning humble drinking sessions into otherworldly adventures worthy of a toast or three.

Must see in
Los Angeles

  • Venice Boardwalk

    Strap on those Rollerblades, hop on a pastel-pink beach cruiser or simply slip into your trunks or bikini and shake what yo’ mama gave you. Captured in countless movies and music videos, Venice's ocean-front walk is where SoCal's crazier side lets it all hang out. It's like one long, skunk-scented runway of eccentricity, flanked by soaring palms, tattoo parlors and street art and packed with new-age bohemians, hippie tribal drummers, street artists, bulging Schwarzenegger wannabes, inked skaters and proud, loud freaks warranting a cameo in that screenplay you're writing.

  • Getty Center

    A cultural citadel in the sky, the Getty Center delivers highs both literal and metaphorical. Firstly there's that soul-lifting panorama, which takes in hillside mansions, the Pacific Ocean and the unapologetic sprawl of the LA basin. Designed by Richard Meier, the billion-dollar museum showcases centuries of glorious creativity, from medieval triptychs to starry Van Gogh skies. Then there are the showstopping gardens, punctuated with blazing flowers, world-famous sculptures and trickling water. Best of all, it's completely free (except for parking – this is still LA, you know).

  • Los Angeles County Museum of Art

    Let's not mince words: LACMA is an obligatory stop for culture vultures. The largest art museum in the western US, its 100,000-plus works stretch back to antiquity. You'll find one of the world's finest collections of Islamic art, works by heavyweights such as Cezanne, Rivera, Hockney and Ruscha, as well as LA sculptor Chris Burden's crowd-stopping installation Urban Light. And it doesn't stop there, with buzz-worthy touring exhibits, film screenings, readings and Friday-night jazz gigs. Check the website before heading in: much of LACMA is slated to close for renovations.

  • Griffith Observatory & Hollywood Sign

    Mediator between LA and the heavens above, Griffith Observatory delivers stargazing of a different kind. Here, the universe is king, pondered through historic telescopes, high-tech shows, engaging exhibitions and elegant murals. It was in its spectacular planetarium that James Dean was reminded of humankind's relative insignificance in Rebel Without a Cause, one of a galaxy of films showcasing the building's handsome form and sweeping views, which take in LA's skyscrapers and mansions, endless avenues, rugged hills and that most legendary of real-estate relics, the Hollywood sign.

  • Broad

    That both the words Broad and buzz begin with the letter 'B' is no coincidence. In just a few short years, Downtown's Broad has put culture vultures in a spin. The museum's collection of modern and contemporary art is one of the world's finest, packed with pop-art paintings, video art, installations and sculpture from big guns such as Warhol, Johns, Rauschenberg, Haring, Kruger and Japanese it-kid Takashi Murakami. Then there's the building itself: designed by the team behind Manhattan's High Line, it's a jaw-dropping, lattice-work behemoth that looks plonked straight out of the 22nd century.

  • Walt Disney Concert Hall

    LA's answer to Sydney's Opera House and London's Royal Albert Hall, the Walt Disney Concert Hall demands its own standing ovation. Straight out of the mind of Pritzker Prize–winning architect Frank Gehry, its undulating steel forms evoke the movement of music itself. It's an art form treated reverently inside, where meticulous design equates to pure acoustics worthy of a conductor's tears. While you can explore Gehry's architectural wonder on a guided tour, go one better and book an evening in the company of its prodigious resident, the LA Philharmonic.

  • Movie Studio Tours

    LA is the world's movie-making capital, and snooping around its famous studios is one of the city's most idiosyncratic experiences. Top billing goes to Warner Bros, home to the biggest set-construction project in studio history, as well as a booty of Batmobiles. Filmmaking and theme-park thrills join forces at Universal Studios, while Hollywood itself is home to Paramount Pictures, America's second-oldest studio and the very site on which classics such Breakfast at Tiffany's, Grease and TV series Happy Days were shot. Are you ready for your close up?

Explore Los Angeles

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Featured Story

Best beaches in Los Angeles

8 min read — Published February 19th, 2021

Lonely Planet EditorsWriter

Los Angeles is really just a surf town at heart. With beaches stretching from Malibu to Laguna, there are plenty of stretches of sand to see and be seen.

Latest Stories from Los Angeles

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