Griffith Park & Observatory

On the south slope of Mount Hollywood, within Griffith Park—the largest urban-wilderness municipal park in the United States—sits Griffith Observatory. Griffith J. Griffith, who had given the park's land to the city in 1896, donated the 1935 building to Los Angeles, and a $93-million renovation closed it from January 6, 2002 until it reopened on November 2, 2006. Fall 2026 brings two evenings of outdoor screenings of the 1955 film "Rebel Without a Cause" held under the stars at the site.

Griffith Observatory, an Art Deco landmark built in the 1930s on the north slope of Mt. Hollywood, has appeared in films including La La Land, Rebel Without a Cause, The Terminator, Charlie's Angels: Full Throttle, and Transformers. The Mt. Hollywood Trail running near the building offers clear-day sightlines from Downtown Los Angeles past Century City and Santa Monica to Palos Verdes and Catalina Island on the horizon. Within the same park, the stone structures and weathered cages of the old Los Angeles Zoo, closed and gutted in the mid-1960s, stand as ruins, and the Travel Town Museum displays equipment from the first transcontinental railroad completed about 150 years ago.

Griffith Park, donated to the city by Griffith J. Griffith, contains the Bronson Caves, which served as filming locations for the 1960s Batman series, Bonanza, Fantasy Island, and Little House on the Prairie. Hikers can approach the observatory via the Boy Scout Trail, formerly known as the East Observatory or East Griffith Observatory Trail. The building's Historic Level holds the centrepiece pendulum, the rotunda murals, and the Edge of Space exhibit, while the four levels—Historic, Mezzanine, Middle, and Lower—are linked by short corridors with lifts and ramps. The view of the observatory itself gained wider recognition after being featured in the film La La Land.