Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
172
The museum offers a full calendar of lectur es, concerts, and special ev ents; call for the
latest.
600 Stat e Dr ., Exposition P ark.
&
213/744-7432.
w ww.caamuseum.org. F ree admission; donation
requested. Tues-Sat 10am-5pm and 1st Sun of each month 11am-5pm. Closed Thanksgiving, Dec 25,
and Jan 1. Parking $8.
California S cience C enter
Kids
A $130-million r enovation—reinvention,
actually—has turned the former Museum of Science and Industry into Exposition Park's
most popular attraction. U sing high-tech sleight of hand, the center stimulates kids of all
ages with questions, answ ers, and lessons about the world. The museum is organiz ed into
themed worlds, and one of the museum's highlights is Tess, a 50-foot animatronic woman
whose muscles, bones, organs, and blood vessels are revealed, demonstrating how the body
reacts to a variety of external conditions and activities. (Appropriate for children of all ages,
Tess doesn't possess reproductive organs.) Another highlight is the
Air and Space Gallery,
a seven-story space where real air- and spacecraft are suspended overhead.
Visitors must pay nominal fees, ranging fr om $2 to $5, to enjo y the science center 's
more thrilling attractions. You can pedal a bicy cle across a high-wire suspended 43 feet
above the gr ound (demonstrating the principle of gravity and counter weights) or get
strapped into the
Space Docking Simulator
for a virtual-reality taste of zero gravity. The
IMAX theater scr een is sev en stories high and 90 feet wide, with state-of-the-ar t sur-
round-sound and 3-D technology. Films are screened throughout the day and are nearly
always breathtaking, even the two-dimensional ones.
700 Stat e Dr ., Exposition P ark.
&
323/724-3623.
IM AX theat er
&
213/744-7400.
w ww.california
sciencecenter.org. Free admission to the museum; IMAX theater $8 adults, $5.75 seniors 62 and over and
children ages 12-17, $4.75 children ages 3-11. Daily 10am-5pm; call or check w ebsite for IMAX screen-
ings. Closed Thanksgiving, Dec 25, and Jan 1. Parking $8.
7
Grammy Museum
Open since December 2008 and an anchor to the L.A. LIVE
entertainment complex, this four-stor y museum has interactiv e exhibits that take y ou
from the creative process to the production of 150 different kinds of music, from pop to
jazz, rock to gospel, countr y and world, to polka, N ative American, H awaiian, blues,
hip-hop, opera, and classical. D isplays include ar tifacts like J ennifer Lopez's infamous
green Grammy dress, Billie Holiday's costume je welry, and Leadbelly 's prison par don.
There are pods with performance footage and interviews, eight interactive studios where
you can mix tracks with some of today 's biggest r ecording pr oducers, and a 200-seat
theater that shows short films. You can't possibly see it all in one visit—except for maybe
the die-hard music buffs who will pr obably never want to leave.
800 W. Olympic Blv d. (at Figueroa St.) on the L.A. LIVE campus , Los Angeles.
&
213/744-7432.
www.
grammymuseum.org. Admission $15 adults, $12 seniors and students, $11 kids 6-17, free for kids ages 5
and under; $8 after 6pm when there's an evening program (exhibits stay open until 7:30pm). Daily Sun-
Fri 11:30am-7:30pm; Sat 10am-7:30pm. Parking $5 and up.
Japanese American National Museum
Finds
Located in an architecturally
acclaimed modern building in LittleTokyo, this soaring pavilion—designed by renowned
architect Gyo Obata—is a priv ate nonprofit institute cr eated to document and cele-
brate the histor y of the J apanese in America. The permanent and r otating exhibits
chronicle Japanese life in the U nited States, highlighting distinctiv e aspects of J apa-
nese-American culture ranging from the internment camp experience during the early
years of World War II to the lives of Japanese Americans in Hawaii. The experience is
made even more poignant by the personal accounts of the docents, many of whom are
