How Melrose Hill became LA’s hottest art district

On a recent sun-kissed afternoon in midtown Los Angeles, around 100 art-lovers gathered for a guided walkthrough of the new Diane Arbus retrospective at blue chip dealer David Zwirner’s flagship 30,000 sq ft gallery. When the event was over, they spilled out in every direction into the heart of one of the most exciting and fast-developing art districts anywhere in the world. In just a handful of years, the radical transformation of the blocks around the intersection of Melrose and Western Avenues has proved an old adage wrong. It used to be said that nobody walks in LA. These days, there are few better places to spend a day wandering around than amid the galleries and restaurants of Melrose Hill. 'You can come here, park, have a nice lunch and go see seven different art shows,' says Fernberger gallery owner Emma Fernberger. 'That’s amazing.'

The area’s rapid reinvention didn’t happen by accident. Historically home to rows of furniture warehouses, the neighbourhood was hit hard when online retailers devoured much of the market and those traditional businesses moved out. Actor and developer Zach Lasry, the son of billionaire businessman and former Milwaukee Bucks owner Marc Lasry, noticed the untapped potential whenever he visited his then-girlfriend, now-wife Arianna, who lived on nearby Wilton Place. Beginning in 2019, he and his family bought 18 buildings within a three-block radius.

'The architectural rhythm reminded me of the Bowery in New York, where you have all these old buildings lined up,' says Lasry. 'The Bowery was all restaurant supply stores, so it was a single-use street for a certain industry. This was similar because it was furniture row. It seemed like it had the right mix of location and building stock that it could become something really, really fun.'

That combination was a key part of the draw for Robert Goff, whom David Zwirner had charged with setting up a West Coast outpost. 'When we started looking for a gallery space here in LA, we decided we didn’t want to be in Beverly Hills. That’s not really our brand,' explains Goff. 'David said: "I want to be somewhere artist-facing", meaning convenient to where artists actually live, which is really more on the east side.' Melrose Hill is almost perfectly geographically central in LA, making it an ideal meeting place for those coming from the traditionally wealthier areas in the west of the city and the creative enclaves to the east. 'Everyone always grumbles in LA about crossing the city,' says Goff, 'but we’re pretty easy to get to.'

Then there were the buildings themselves: large-scale former furniture warehouses that were in ideal shape to be converted into galleries. 'At first we thought we’d maybe just do a small gallery,' chuckles Goff, who now oversees a sprawling complex made up of three separate spaces. ‘When David came here, he quickly realised that we could work with our architect Annabelle Selldorf to build a really amazing space that would utilise the great resource we have in LA, which is beautiful light.’

The first Zwirner galleries opened in May 2023, with a larger purpose-built space at 606 Western following a year later. A string of other galleries moved in around the same time, including Morán Morán, Clearing, and contemporary art specialist Château Shatto, which relocated from downtown in September 2024. Emma Fernberger, who’d made her name as an art dealer in New York, opened Fernberger gallery in January 2024 at 747 Western, across a courtyard from Italian restaurant Ètra and its daytime sister establishment Café Telegrama, a popular local hangout.

'Zach had such a good intuition about this neighbourhood, and he developed it with care and good taste and with a real eye towards what people want,' says Fernberger. ‘I couldn’t be luckier to have Ètra and Café Telegrama as neighbours, and they have art by some of my artists installed in the restaurant. At the moment, they have the Phil Davis painting, Boy with a Sun Hat. It’s better that works are out in the world than in my storage racks.’

That sort of collaboration is music to Lasry’s ears, and he argues the blossoming community is a vindication of his philosophy of focusing on small businesses instead of allowing chains and franchises to move in. 'The kernel of that idea came from the fact that my favourite streets I’ve ever experienced all happened to be streets of local businesses,' explains Lasry. 'When the chains come in, when every street starts feeling more like every other street, anywhere you go, it's hard to feel an emotional connection. I don’t think you get things like galleries loaning out art to restaurants unless the actual owners of the businesses are running into each other. When you inspire each other, it becomes a more enriching environment.' He also took steps to ensure each establishment has its own distinct visual identity. 'The goal,' he says, 'was for each tenant to enact their own vision.'

That’s certainly the case at Bar Etoile, the modern, Parisian-inspired bistro on the strip between Zwirner and Fernberger at 632 Western. The new LA restaurant has become another Melrose Hill hotspot since opening in October 2024. 'When we first saw the building, it was just stucco with no charm or character,' remembers co-owner Jill Bernheimer, who also runs revered local wine shop Domaine LA. 'But when you entered the space, you could tell the bones were there. When we started taking off the stucco, we uncovered all these details like cornices and leaded glass windows, which was such a bonus.'

Today the interior space, designed by creative team Lovers Unite, elegantly incorporates a horseshoe-shaped zinc bar, pale blue banquettes and a wall featuring ceramic trays by the artist Anthony Dominici. 'They’re such a unique element,' says Bernheimer’s business partner Julian Kurland of the artworks. 'In such a sleek and beautiful place with all these sensuous lines and curves, we both liked having something a little bit more playful on the wall.'

Lasry’s plan to avoid chain businesses even extends to the local grocery store, which he reimagined after the owners of longtime occupant Produce For Less retired in 2023. The result is LA Grocery and Café, a bespoke market and café that he says has become 'the heart of the neighbourhood'. That’s just a few doors down from the excellent Italian deli Ggiata and fried chicken joint Le Coupe, while the newest arrival to the area, Chef Brian Baik’s fine-dining restaurant Corridor 109, is set to offer something completely different when it opens its doors later this month.

'In that immediate area there aren’t any tasting-menu restaurants,' explains Baik. 'This is going to be a 12-seat fine-dining restaurant offering a 12-course chef’s tasting menu using some of the best seafood in the world.' He’s worked closely with Montalba Architects to design a pair of spaces that complement one another, with the larger Bar 109 offering first-rate cocktails and a small bar menu next door to the more exclusive dining space.

While the restaurant is new, Baik already knows the area well: his parents run Kobawoo House, a Koreatown institution that opened over four decades ago on Beverly Boulevard before moving to its current location just a couple of miles south of his new spot at 641 Western. 'It feels like home, but also like this area is developing so much with the galleries and restaurants bringing in more life and traffic,' he says. He adds that he’s pleased Lasry has shown faith in his experimental menu ideas. 'Basically, the only way the economics work is if the landlord wants you there,' he concedes. 'I’m never going to be the highest-paying tenant with a 12-seater restaurant.'

For Lasry, who has also overseen the arrival of a variety of retail offerings, including luxury jeweller Spinelli Kilcollin and interior designer Marissa Jartcky’s Desmar studio, the eclecticism is the point. 'Growing up in New York, you learn that you can have all kinds of different things next to each other and it makes it more interesting,' he says. 'You don’t need to have a theme for a street, you can just have people with ideas all around each other. Then you can’t predict what’s going to happen next.'

When he first laid eyes on those rows of empty furniture warehouses, Lasry’s vision of a walkable, art-filled community must have seemed like a pipe dream. He planted the seeds anyway, and just a few years later, Melrose Hill is coming into bloom. It isn’t done growing yet.

After Fernberger walks me around her latest exhibit, a striking collection of realist still lifes by the painter turned paramedic Greta Waller, she leaves me with a telling piece of advice for my next visit. 'Always allow a little bit more time than you think you need around here,' she says sagely. 'There’s so much popping up, you always find something new that wasn’t on your itinerary.'