Los Angeles — the second-largest city in the United States and, depending on your definition, the entertainment capital of the world — spreads across 1,300 square kilometres of coastal plain and inland valley, a sprawling metropolis of 13 million people that encompasses extreme wealth and extreme poverty, extraordinary cultural institutions and legendary beaches, film studios and aerospace factories, Mexican food culture and Korean barbecue, surf shops and Michelin-starred restaurants. Unlike New York's vertical density, LA is a horizontal city — a place of freeways and neighbourhoods that rewards those who embrace the car-dependent nature of the place, explore beyond Hollywood and the tourist strip, and understand that the city's greatest pleasures are often accidental: a taco truck in East LA, a street mural in the Arts District, a sunset from the Griffith Observatory.
The entertainment industry is LA's dominant cultural force — its studios (Warner Bros., Universal, Sony, Paramount) have shaped global popular culture for over a century, and the city's geography of celebrity is visible everywhere from the Walk of Fame's stars to the houses in the Hollywood Hills. But the best of LA lies beyond this surface: the world-class art collections of the Getty and LACMA, the extraordinary ethnic diversity of neighbourhoods like Koreatown, Little Ethiopia and Boyle Heights, the Pacific beaches from Malibu to Long Beach, and the wilderness of the Santa Monica Mountains rising immediately behind the city.
Hollywood & the Star Attractions
The Hollywood Walk of Fame — 2,700+ brass stars embedded in the pavement of Hollywood Boulevard and Vine Street — is more chaotic than glamorous in person (the surrounding block is tourist-shop dense) but remains a compelling piece of cultural mythology. The TCL Chinese Theatre, with its forecourt of celebrity handprints and footprints in cement (Marilyn Monroe, Humphrey Bogart, Elizabeth Taylor, going back to 1927), is directly adjacent. Universal Studios Hollywood — a working film studio and theme park — combines behind-the-scenes studio tours with The Wizarding World of Harry Potter, Jurassic World and the Transformers rides. Griffith Observatory, set on a hillside above Hollywood with panoramic city views, is one of LA's finest free attractions — the view of the Hollywood Sign (best photographed from here) and the sunset over the city justify the drive up even without entering the observatory.
The Getty Center & Museums
The Getty Center — set on a hilltop above Brentwood with views across LA to the Pacific — is one of America's finest museums and admission is entirely free (parking $20). The Richard Meier-designed travertine complex holds one of the world's finest collections of pre-20th century European paintings, drawings, sculptures and decorative arts: van Gogh's Irises, Rembrandt's An Old Man in Military Costume, Degas, Renoir, Monet and Manet in rooms that open onto terraces with sweeping city views. The central garden — designed by Robert Irwin as a deliberate artistic counterpoint to the classical collection — is a sculptural masterpiece in itself. The Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA), the largest art museum in the western United States, holds 142,000 works spanning 6,000 years — the Islamic art collection and the contemporary Pacific art galleries are particular strengths.
Beaches, Venice & the Pacific Coast
Venice Beach — LA's most colourful stretch of sand — has the famous Venice Boardwalk, where bodybuilders work out at Muscle Beach, street performers juggle and roller-skate, and artists sell work from the stalls along the promenade. The adjacent neighbourhood of Venice (distinct from the boardwalk scene) has become one of LA's most fashionable: its network of pedestrian canals (a genuine Venetian pastiche from 1905, now lined with multi-million-dollar homes) and the Abbot Kinney Boulevard of independent restaurants and boutiques are the best of the area. Santa Monica, a mile north, has the Santa Monica Pier (the western terminus of Route 66) and a wide, clean beach that fills with locals every weekend. The Pacific Coast Highway (Highway 1), running north from Santa Monica through Malibu (27 miles of celebrity beach-colony) to Point Mugu, is one of America's great coastal drives — the road literally hugs the Pacific cliffs.
