Hellobee

When I was growing up in Los Angeles, downtown was an area to be avoided with nothing much to do there. A lot has changed since then with a dramatic revitalization, and now it would take several days to see all of downtown LA’s sights! You do still see homelessness in some areas as Skid Row is nearby; it sparked a lot of important conversations with my kids. But I have never felt unsafe walking around.

Since discovering the ease of public transportation on our last trip to LA, we’ve been using it as often as we can! My parents live in the suburbs 30 minutes outside LA, which translates into 2 hour traffic during rush hour. We took the metrorail from the suburbs into Union Station, and walked to all our destinations. Our itinerary included: Walt Disney Music Hall, The Broad Museum, Los Angeles Central Library, The Last Bookstore, and Little Tokyo. The Natural History Museum and the California Science Center are great children’s museums in downtown and an all day visit. Other attractions include the Museum of Contemporary Art (across the street from The Broad), Olvera Street, Grand Central Market, Angel’s Flight Railway, and Grand Park which we were supposed to go to, but it was too cold for the splash pad.

Our first stop was the Broad Museum, a contemporary art museum that opened in 2015. Next to The Broad is the restaurant Otium, by acclaimed chef Timothy Hollingsworth. I’d love to eat there one day! We arrived before The Broad opened at 11am, so we headed to the gardens at the Walt Disney Music Hall across the street to kill a little time.

There are water fountains everywhere in LA so I always carry pennies that the kids can throw in.

My kids have been loving these simple tops from Kid-O that they carry around in their pockets. 

General admission is free to the Broad, but if you make reservations online ahead of time, you bypass the line. They carry artworks from the most popular contemporary artists including Andy Warhol, Roy Lichtenstein, Cy Twombly, Jean-Michel Basquiet, Keith Haring, Jeff Koons, and more.

There is also a cool infinity mirror room by Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama that individual groups can spend 45 seconds each inside.

 
Olive Street!

Next we headed to the Los Angeles Central Library. They have a truly incredible selection of children’s books — much more than any bookstore. They had all of my kids’ favorite books and they couldn’t decide what to read! I left them in the children’s section reading while I went on an awesome guided tour of the library. It has so much history and interesting murals, architecture, design! They even had art galleries featuring Ansel Adam’s photographs and pictures of the Los Angeles Lakers. Definitely worth a visit!

8 story high atrium looking down

Our next stop was The Last Bookstore, the largest used and new bookstore in California. The building used to house a bank, and you can still see vaults inside. They also feature quite a bit of art and individual shops by local artists. There are lots of little instragrammable moments that the kids loved. Best of all we found one of Charlie’s favorite but hard to find book series Animorphs there!

The most logical place to stop for lunch or dinner is the Grand Central Market which is very nearby. But we’d been before so we walked to Little Tokyo which has been completely redesigned in recent years and is enjoying a resurgence in its scene — the last time I was there was 12 years ago! My brother, who lives in downtown LA, recommended we visit for their restaurants and shops. We ate Japanese curry, went to Kinokuniya Bookstore (which has adorable Japanese knickknacks and office supplies), and Marukai Market which has 5 aisles devoted just to snacks (Japanese snacks are the best!).

We’ll probably head back to downtown LA to go to the Natural History and Science Museums, and will check out Olvera Street and Grand Park too since it’s right across from Union Station!