LOS ANGELES, CA: The Huntington

Location: The Huntington Library, Art Museum, and Botanical Gardens
Address: 1151 Oxford Road, San Marino, CA 91108
Website: huntington.org

Getting There

The Huntington has a large parking lot if you choose to drive yourself or you can use a rideshare and be dropped off right at the door. The campus is about a 30 minute drive from Los Angeles. Technically this is in San Marino, but it is well worth the detour out of LA if you are passionate about library artifacts and walking through beautiful botanical gardens.

Map of The Huntington's main entrance with parking lot. — Map of The Huntington’s main entrance with parking lot.

Tips

The Huntington campus is on 207 acres, which means you might want to check out their online map first and figure out what you want to see while there.
Tickets are cheaper on the weekdays.
This could easily be an all day adventure.
Make sure you bring water in your bag since you will be outside most the time… and like I mentioned I was there on an almost 100 degree day.
There’s not a ton to eat at the café and you are looking at paying museum prices, so I recommend packing some snacks to hold you over until you can eat outside The Huntington.
As with any museum, check out their website to see what exhibits might be closed since this might impact your decision to visit.
There are beautiful areas for resting and/or pulling out your sketchbook.

Japanese Garden at The Huntington. Beautiful garden with a café to buy ginger watermelon lemonade and relax.

A Taste of What You Can See

The library is home to amazing original prints, like a Gutenberg Bible and works by John James Audubon and Andreas Vesalius. There will be a future post where I geek out about the Natural History and Medicine hall!

Remember this campus is on 207 acres of beautifully maintained botanical gardens and everywhere you turn is a photo opportunity.

Desert garden - look at all those cute cacti! — Desert garden – look at all those cute cacti!

If I’m being honest the art galleries were my least favorite. They were nice to explore, but my focus was on the gardens and libraries.

I couldn't resist taking a pic of a cat centric painting! "McSorely's Cats" by John Sloan — I couldn’t resist taking a pic of a cat centric painting! “McSorely’s Cats” by John Sloan

I would visit again in a heartbeat and highly recommend. The only thing I would do differently was bring a sketchbook and allow time to relax and draw the gorgeous gardens.

Happy Travels,

Laura

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