The Best Alternative Museums In LA

Visitors who crave culture usually flock to a couple of big names in Los Angeles, including LACMA, MOCA, the Getty Museum and more recently, the Broad. But there are alternatives, both big and small, that help tourists and locals alike delve deeper into LA’s vivid and diverse history. Here are a handful of some of The Culture Trip’s favorite alternative museums operating in LA County.

1. Museum of Jurassic Technology

Museum

Experiencing LA’s favorite ‘anti-museum’ is something truly one of a kind; it’s a visit that makes you question the institution’s very existence. Almost nothing about MJT is straightforward to the average visitor. Meandering through the dim, confining halls of this Culver City museum leads you to a multitude of permanent exhibitions that include microscopic mosaics, dioramas of LA trailer parks as the Garden of Eden, and documentary film tributes to Soviet dogs in space. Be sure to make time for a round of complimentary tea and cookies in the museum’s peaceful rooftop garden.

2. Wende Museum

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Ideal for history buffs, the Wende Museum is a gold mine for Cold War relics in the form of artifacts, films and archives. So, why LA? The museum claims that the ‘critical distance’ from Europe allows it to preserve artifacts that would otherwise be lost or destroyed. Their catalog is so extensive that TASCHEN even published a recent book about it, titled Beyond the Wall. See the collection firsthand during the museum’s designated times for a highly informative guided tour around the museum’s upstairs gallery, and then walk to the downstairs vault where shelves of countless artifacts are stored.

3. Petersen Automotive Museum

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Reopening in December 2015, this museum’s newly revamped façade houses one of the largest automobile collections in the world. The expansive collection includes hundreds of vintage and limited-release models, as well as famous cars from films like Herbie: Fully Loaded and Thelma & Louise. In the past, younger automotive aficionados could learn about the science behind modern vehicles in the Discovery Center, while the museum’s Streetscape exhibit used scale models of Southern California city streets and storefronts to contextualize LA car culture throughout history.

Located in Griffith Park as part of the Los Angeles Live Steamers Railroad Museum, this small museum functions as homage to both an animation great and his lesser-known fascination with trains. In the 1950s, Walt Disney operated his own miniature railroad out of this backyard barn on Carolwood Road, only a few years before undertaking the construction of Disneyland. The barn houses Disney memorabilia largely centered on his love of railroads, as well as items gifted from his animators. This place is often portrayed as the ‘birthplace of Imagineering’ and a predecessor to the Disney theme parks, and at the very least is an interesting tribute to the man behind the Mouse. Open every third Sunday from 11am-3pm.

Walt Disney’s Barn, 5202 Zoo Drive, Los Angeles, CA, USA, +1 310 213 0722
By Mayura Jain