The Last Bookstore and LA!

I meant to write this in November when I actually went but here we are in January and I’m just now writing it. Wonderful timing, Carolyn.

Anyways, The Last Bookstore! And LA! I’ve only been to LA once before this about 4 years ago and even then I only went on the UCLA campus and didn’t get to really explore the city.

I don’t know if the Last Bookstore is just famous here in SoCal or if everyone else knows about it but it’s a pretty big deal here.

Inside, the lighting is fairly dim and the first thing you see, obviously, is just rows of tall bookshelves and stands with books on them. It’s interesting that they sell both used and new books. So far, a fairly typical bookstore. But it gets really interesting as you go up to the second and third floors. It just has a more vintage looking feel to it as you go up. The bookshelves seem dustier, the lighting is a little dimmer. The cool part is that the bookshelves are not perfectly straight and they’re oriented in a way that makes you feel like you’re walking though a maze of bookshelves.

But I guess the Last Bookstore has a lot more to offer than just books, they also have a section rare or special collector books that can be up to $500 and there’s also a lot of coffee table books. They also have a section for vinyl CDs and an art gallery section that showcases a lot of original paintings and art.

And of course, I had to take the iconic book circle picture..

There are so many things to do here (if you can get through all that traffic..heh). There’s parks like Echo and Grand Park.

Echo Park

The water was really cold but you do what you have to for the picture 😉

Grand Park is really cool because there’s little shelves meant to trade books with other people. The types of books in there were another story -_- (ain’t nobody got time for all them history textbooks)

There’s some awesome food places like:

Guisados (tacos)-Really generous with the spice but really good nonetheless.

A Ramen/udon place that I forgot the name of..It was really good though

Coco’s bc boba (do i need to explain myself no i don’t); Korean food at a stand near the Fat Sali’s (also forgot the name of)

Another ramen place where your noodles don’t come with the broth and you have to dip your ramen into the soup and eat it like that (hence the name dipping ramen). I would go here less for the taste than the novelty of it.

Donut place in Little Tokyo (Bacon doughnuts people) I’ll let you think of that what you will..but the combination actually tasted pretty good..

 

From left to right: Me, my friend, my other friend

 

Well that was my day in LA! I actually ended up spending the weekend there but I didn’t get that many pictures (fail) and my friend and I took the bus to Santa Monica and we just went to the beach and the outlet mall. For this trip, I really wanted to go to the Broad Museum and the bench that was featured in 500 Days of Summer but I didn’t end having the chance to..Let me know if you’ve been to LA and what you did there so I have ideas for my next trip 😉