Celebrating 150 Years Of Santa Monica: A Local's Guide To Hidden Gems
Santa Monica, California, is celebrating its 150th anniversary this month, which is impressive for a town that still has the energy and exuberance of a restless teenager. After a year shaped by fires, closures and tons of uncertainty, I'm happy to share some hidden spots in my absolute favorite part of Los Angeles.
The paper plane cocktail is one of six drinks on the menu at Shutters on the Beach that celebrate Santa Monica's 150th anniversary. Shutters on the Beach
Inside the redesigned Living Room at Shutters on the Beach, a new cocktail menu honors Santa Monica's sesquicentennial with six drinks that each mark a chapter in the city's evolution. The Gold Rush blends bourbon, lemon, and honey, finished with gold leaf. It's less flashy than it sounds (okay, it's actually kinda flashy but you're at Shutters! Enjoy!). The Paper Plane mixes bourbon and Amaro Nonino, garnished with an adorable miniature paper airplane on the coupe rim. Around you is museum-grade art, including three new works (curated by fine art advisor Cynthia Greenwald), including a striking new screenprint called LA Uncovered #5 by Robert Rauschenberg. That adds to an already impressive lobby collection that features works by David Hockney, Ellsworth Kelly and Alex Katz.
The Crow Comedy Club in Santa Monica's Bergamot Station has comedy for all ages but you'll need to search a little to find it. The Crow Comedy Club
Hidden behind Building E in the Bergamot Station Arts Center complex, The Crow Comedy Club sits behind Birdie G's restaurant (just walk past, turn left, and you'll find it). This woman-owned, mom-operated venue feels like a locals-only sanctuary for stand-up, improv and storytelling, including regular shows, open mic nights, kid- and teen-friendly sets, and parent-and-baby brunch comedy for that's actually kinda funny (to wit, the second B in BYOB stands for boob).
The dramatic caramel ice cream dome at Fia restaurant in Santa Monica. Wonho Frank Lee
Tucked behind an unmarked gate off Wilshire, Fia's garden feels more like a private villa than a restaurant, with string lights twinkling in the trees, fire pits blazing, and an atmospheric al fresco bar you can't believe is a block from the New Balance store. It's here that new chef Tim Cardenas, formerly of Suzanne Goin's Lucques Group, is pushing past the same-old same old with a bold coastal-Cal Italian menu featuring hand-cut pastas, woodfire-grilled steaks and a caramelized dark chocolate mousse 'dome' of ice cream that arrives at the table and—yes—is set dramatically ablaze.
Frank Gehry's 1978 residence in Santa Monica remains a hidden gem for architecture buffs. LA Conservancy
You don't fully understand Frank Gehry until you've stood in front of the house the architect built in 1978 for himself and his wife, Berta. Although you won't be able to get inside, the building at 1002 22nd Street in Santa Monica redefined what architecture could do to a neighborhood, and to the very idea of a house. Gehry began with a modest Dutch Colonial from the 1920s, then built around it using industrial materials, including corrugated metal, raw plywood, glass, and chain-link fencing. This layered, angular shell lets parts of the original structure peek through, so you're almost peering through time, architecturally speaking. Tweaked as recently as 1992, the house deliberately blurs boundaries between interior and exterior, public and private, finished and unfinished. And while it might irk the neighbors if you're standing around just gawking, for anyone interested in art, space, or the limits of convention, it's a Santa Monica pilgrimage worth making.
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