Los Angeles in the fall awakens the senses. From immersive exhibitions and fresh retail concepts to intimate dining experiences, here’s a look at new art, shopping, cocktails and culinary spots — each offering warm, inviting spaces to linger and take it all in.
Art
The Hammer Museum unveils Made in L.A. 2025, the seventh edition of its biennial spotlighting artists across L.A. Running Oct. 5 through March 1, the exhibition features 28 creatives working in painting, sculpture, video, installation, music and performance. The show, curated by Essence Harden and Paulina Pobocha, examines how artists engage with the city’s layered history and architecture. Highlights include new works by multigenerational painters including Greg Breda, Ali Eyal, Hanna Hur, Beaux Mendes and Patrick Martinez, and a stage play by Leilah Weinraub in collaboration with New Theater Hollywood. As always, admission to the Hammer is free.
“While there are as many ideas circulating through the show as there are materials, an inquiry into one’s relationship to the city of Los Angeles animates much of the work we will present,” the curators said in a joint statement. “Neither myth nor monolith, this city is many things to many people, and its cacophonous disorder is, perhaps, its most distinguishing feature.”
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Made in L.A. 2025
10899 Wilshire Boulevard, Los Angeles
Tel.: 310-443-7000
Tavares Strachan is presenting his largest L.A. exhibition at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, opening Oct. 12 and running through March 29. The show features more than 20 new works, including the artist’s most ambitious neon piece, and a series of carefully constructed environments; across seven galleries, audiences encounter a laundromat, a barbershop and a rice field as part of a multisensory experience. Through his work, Strachan examines histories often overlooked in mainstream narratives, particularly those connected to the Black diaspora, encouraging viewers to reconsider which histories are celebrated and how they are represented.
Tavares Strachan’s solo show at LACMA
5905 Wilshire Boulevard, Los Angeles, BCAM Level 2
Tel.: 323-857-6000
Shopping
New Th!ngs, an 800-square-foot concept store in L.A.’s Highland Park blending art, design, music and fashion, opened its doors with a preopening gallery show, “Goofy Foot,” on Sept. 25 by photographer Tobin Yelland, attracting guests including Spike Jonze. For founders Brody Baker and Kon Trubkovich, who run the global creative agency and venture studio BEZ, it’s a shop designed to cultivate community.
“I think ultimately it boils down to just creating a physical place to celebrate the BEZ collective’s creativity, creative execution through various mediums and being able to create a community in a physical world again,” said Baker, a multidisciplinary creative director, filmmaker, curator and marketing strategist. “I think we’re exhausted by the digital space. People are hungry for community in real life.”
The space, which also houses BEZ’s L.A. headquarters and the offices of indie label +1 — with Baker and Trubkovich serving as creative partners — will offer a mix of art, home decor, fashion, jewelry, accessories and a broad “objects” section featuring books, zines and curiosities.
“We want people to feel like they belong,” added Trubkovich, a visual artist working across painting, drawing and video.
The founders envision the store evolving organically as a blank canvas shaped by the neighborhood and scene.
“It is vibrant, and it has a very rich creative history,” Baker said of Highland Park. “It really does remind me of Brooklyn, like, 20 years ago. That’s interesting to me, because I feel like it’s right at the cusp. Down the block La Labo is opening, but also next to us is a bootleg flower shop out of this woman’s home. We are New Yorkers so Highland Park feels very new. It’s the perfect spot at the perfect time.”
New Th!ngs
6095 York Boulevard, Los Angeles
newthingsla.com
The cofounder of vegan spot Monty’s Good Burger, Lexie Jiaras, teams up with designer Elizabeth Weinstock on a new retail destination called Cleo. The 1,400-square-foot store is located in Beverly Grove on West 3rd Street, a building owned by Weinstock since 2012 and previously used as the headquarters for her exotic-skin accessories label.
Opened in September, Cleo is focused on bringing buzzy, digital-first fashion and accessory brands into a physical space.
“The inspiration for Cleo came from a personal desire to experience online fashion culture in real life,” Jiaras said. “There are so many incredible brands that have cultivated a community on social media, yet customers still crave an in-person experience. The barrier to entry for an emerging brand to open their own brick-and-mortar is so high. We figured we could solve for two things at once, getting these brands in a retail environment and giving customers the in-person shopping experience they crave.”
Visitors can explore ‘90s and Y2K-inspired labels such as Fanci Club, Bella Venice, Amelie Teje, Angel Moon, Gem Wear, as well as accessory brands Mudd Pearl, Rockii Studios, Emma Pills, Tarina Tarantino and Wildflower Cases, along with Claudia Sulewski’s beauty brand Cyklar.
The space doubles as a hangout, with a café serving Jiaras’s matcha line @good.boy and lounge areas.
Cleo
8159 West 3rd Street, Los Angeles
Tel.: 323-413-2022
Cocktails
The team behind The Benjamin Hollywood — Ben Shenassafar, Jared Meisler and Kate Burr — unveiled a cocktail bar upstairs, with a menu created in collaboration with mixologists Jason Lee (n/soto, Baroo) and Chad Austin (The Mulholland, Bootlegger Tiki). It delivers unexpected twists on classics — like the $19 Campfire, a s’mores-inspired Old Fashioned made with graham cracker-infused bourbon. For martini lovers, there’s the choice between the $24 Dirtier Martini, made with Tito’s vodka and the bar’s signature dirty mix, garnished with olives and capers, or $35 Ben’s Martini, with Monkey 47 gin, Noilly Prat Dry Vermouth and lemon oil, served with a side of chips. But the showstopper is the $20 Inherent Vice, a riff on the Miami Vice that pairs a strawberry daiquiri ice cube with a sidecar of clarified piña colada milk punch, rich with rum and a hint of allspice. Bar snacks complement the drinks, including $190 chips and caviar (1 oz. of Golden Osetra), $24 Mustard’s Bagels steak tartare and $12 almond trio in cool ranch, salt and vinegar and sweet heat.
Bar Benjamin
7174 Melrose Avenue, Los Angeles
Tel.: 323-500-1122
Dinner
Tucked above Cipriani Beverly Hills lies an intimate jazz club that’s easy to miss; but if you know, you know: past the entrance and up the stairs is a whole other vibe. The ambience captures the charm of Hollywood’s Golden Age, as servers glide by in crisp white tuxedo jackets amid a decor of slender palm fronds that curve above zebra-striped banquettes. Much like downstairs, the menu showcases Cipriani’s signature Italian cuisine (including the popular $29 baked eggplant “alla Parmigiana”), alongside decadent seasonal options like oysters, caviar and truffles — with strong cocktails to keep the night going. Wednesday is the night to go: buzzing but not too packed, with a live band that channels the spirit of a 1930s speakeasy.
The Jazz Café at Cipriani Beverly Hills
362 North Camden Drive, Beverly Hills
Tel.: 310-866-5060
Berenjak, the Persian restaurant founded in London by chef Kian Samyani, has unveiled a West Coast outpost at Soho Warehouse in L.A.’s Arts District — its first U.S. location open to the public. (Other restaurants are in Dubai, Sharjah and Doha, along with Soho House residencies at Soho Farmhouse in Oxfordshire and DUMBO House in New York.) Inspired by Tehran’s kabab houses, Berenjak is a warm and candle-lit dining experience built around sharing. The menu features coal-grilled kababs such as the $28 Koobideh (minced lamb shoulder with onions and black pepper), the $34 Jujeh (saffron-marinated chicken) and seasonal specials like the $38 Meygoo Kabab (barbecue prawns with Kashmiri chili), alongside signature small plates including the $15 black chickpea hummus — enjoyed with $8 Taftoon and Sangak flatbreads. Drinks span from traditional Persian sharbats to inventive cocktails, including the $19 Salted Plum and Marigold Margarita, made with Marigold tequila, plum wine, saline, plum jam and lime.
Berenjak
1000 South Santa Fe Avenue, Los Angeles
Tel.: 213-205-1101
