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XSouthern California Close-Ups | A vacation guide to the Southland
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Set an out-of-towner loose to roam the Los Angeles area between West Hollywood and Koreatown and what can you expect? A food-truck overdose, perhaps. Or the bold suggestion that we extend our subway system westward. (Hey, we're working on it.) Or maybe just your basic Asian-Russian-Latino-gay-vegetarian-barbecue-automotive-modernist-tar-pit-chili-dog weekend.
In other words, it's a trip worth taking, and a great way to catch the city in the act of reinventing itself, from the Japanese department store that's now a car museum to the Jewish avenue that's now a skateboarder haven. Here are the makings of eight great days in West Hollywood, the Miracle Mile, the Fairfax district, West Hollywood, Koreatown and a few neighboring territories. Read more... --Christopher Reynolds, Los Angeles Times staff writer |
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Scroll over each image for info on each itinerary
1. The heart of WeHo. West Hollywood is what you get when you place a 1.9-square-mile neighborhood between Hollywood and Beverly Hills, fill it with a booming gay population and an enduring community of Russian immigrants, then give it cityhood (which happened in 1984). Click for more...
2. Rockin' on Sunset.In the '70s, they say, the Led Zeppelin guys rode motorcycles through one or more Sunset Strip hotel lobbies. Now that you're here, you realize they were probably just looking for parking. The Sunset Strip has action and pop-culture history, so people come. Click for more...
3. Art and tar. The Los Angeles County Museum of Art (5905 Wilshire Blvd.) sprawls along Wilshire on the Miracle Mile like a small college designed by an architect with a multiple-personality disorder. (The buildings have gone up piecemeal for five decades.) For a dose of order, step into the grid of 202 street lamps out front ("Urban Light" by Chris Burden, 2008). Click for more...
4. To market, to mall. Farmers Market, at 3rd and Fairfax, was born in 1934 as a dirt lot where farmers sold goods from trucks. Now the grounds include about 40 restaurants and dozens of shops, some local, some national, and a few produce merchants. Next to the market is the Grove, which has upscale retail, movies, a grassy patch and cavorting fountains for kids. Click for more...
5. Fairfax's ethnic eats. Canter's Deli (419 N. Fairfax Ave.) stays open all night, goes back to 1931, anchors the Jewish business district along North Fairfax and is as old school as L.A. gets. But it has a rock 'n' roll life too. In the 1960s, Frank Zappa and the Doors used to hang out on Tuesday nights at Canter's Kibitz Room lounge. Click for more...
6. La Brea, Melrose. Brace yourself. Your first stop is the original Pink's (709 N. La Brea Ave.), a hot dog haven founded in 1939 by Paul and Betty Pink. It opens at 9:30 a.m. Arrive much later and there's likely to be a long line. Order the chili dog ($3.45), admire the wall of fame (Steve Martin, Quincy Jones), sit in the rear patio and watch your meal vanish. Click for more...
7. K-Town. Koreatown was born in the 1970s as Korean immigrants settled in the area along Olympic and Wilshire boulevards between Vermont and Western avenues. It has grown into an equal-opportunity night-life zone, frequented by USC and UCLA students and grads, lighted by electronic billboards and fed by all-you-can-eat barbecue joints and trendy food trucks. Click for more...
8. Wilshire on wheels. It's L.A.'s grand boulevard, a 16-mile shrine to all things automotive and a collector of immigrant cultures. Click for more...
Video: Wilshire to West Hollywood
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The Find: Seongbukdong in KoreatownThis is how to experience the essence of pure Korean funk: First, take mackerel, queen of the powerful, oily fishes. Then add special... |
The Review: The Tar Pit is Campanile chef-owner Mark Peel’s supper clubI've always been fascinated by the photo of my young parents taken at a supper club in New York. They look impossibly glamorous sitting at a... |
The Find: Mapo in L.A.'s KoreatownIf Korean barbecue restaurants are the cultural equivalents of American steakhouses — overwhelming piles of meat and booze for a... |
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The Review: Bann Restaurant & Lounge in KoreatownA block from the Wiltern, giant ivory silk lanterns in crystalline geometric shapes and finished with a tassel hang from the double height... |
The Review: Carlitos GardelFor years, I wrote to the sound of tango music from the '20s and '30s — Don Barreto, Roberto Firpo, Ada Falcón and, of course,... |
The Review: Vinoteque on MelroseThrough an open doorway on Melrose Avenue, up a few steps, is a secret garden with walls washed in burnt orange and tall wooden planter... |
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The Find: Jangchung-Dong Wong Jokbal in KoreatownNow that thrill-seeking diners have advanced beyond pork belly and crispy pig's ears and are going hog wild over snout-to-tail pork events,... |
The Find: ManjaShera Allen takes from-scratch Malaysian home cooking to a refined new level in West Hollywood. |
The Review: Hatfield's in Los AngelesBehind the wall of windows that look into the showplace kitchen, cooks in tall toques bob and weave around the stoves in an intricate... |
The Review: Salt's Cure in West HollywoodAt Salt's Cure, an endearing new WeHo restaurant, the server brings out a wooden board with a few of the cured and smoked items we've chosen... |
Hot spot? Mozza is on firePizzeria Mozza isn't just a restaurant. It's an action film, a master class in the art of making pizza, a trip through Italy's wine... |
Dodge House in West Hollywood: All that's left is the architect's genius and a cautionary taleThe Dodge House in West Hollywood was considered one of the most architecturally significant American houses of the 20th century. Designed... |
The Review: A new chef enlivens AmmoChefs come and chefs go. Some don't change a thing. Others don't quite fit in. But sometimes a new chef can bring a breath of fresh air to a... |
Street Fashion: Melrose Trading PostMiracle Mile resident Joel (who declined to give his last name), wearing jeans and an inside-out American Apparel T-shirt, Forever 21 jeans,... |
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$85; $130 with wine
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Sunset spot adds artisan cheese and a raw bar
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Normally it's impolite to laugh when a guy introduces you to his new girlfriend, but director Mitch Silpa is counting on it. "Special Lady Friend" is a new set of improve and sketch comedy from some of Hollywood's premiere more talented players, this time focusing on relationships that are funnier than yours.
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Indulge your tastebuds on a tasting tour of the original Farmers Market and eclectic W. 3rd Street. Guests graze continuously along the tour route at ethnic eateries, gourmet grocers and bakeries. Advance purchase required.
Adult $49, Children $25.
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