Natural History Museum of Los Angeles

Los Angeles has so many great museums!
The Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County is one of the oldest cultural institutions in L.A. and is housed in a beautiful building that was built in 1913.
We spent a day there on our most recent trip to L.A., and the whole family just loved every minute of it!
There is SO much to see here!

One of the highlights of the museum is, of course, dinosaurs, and there are two impressive skeletons in the grand rotunda right in the middle of the museum.

As soon as you walk in, you know this is going to be great!
The historical building itself is such a treat to take in and makes the perfect setting for the amazing collections that are housed here.

There are also some more modern building additions to the original building.
All of the galleries and displays are beautiful.

The museum has room after room of amazing specimens covering the whole history of the natural world.

There are also many interactive, hands-on exhibits that draw kids into learning.

Our favorite exhibits were the Diorama Halls where African and North American animals are in realistic scenes of their natural habitats.

The kids were so enchanted and wanted to look at them again and again.
They also insisted on taking a picture of every single one!

They are really so well done.

Other exhibits included the Hall of Birds,

an incredible Gem and Mineral Hall,

and Becoming Los Angeles, which covered the whole history of the L.A. area.

The museum is so large and has so much to see, that we had to stop for a lunch break.
Fortunately, there is a great cafe on-site that provided healthy and delicious food, and great kids options.

After we got refueled, we visited the Nature Lab where there are some live animals and interactive exhibits geared towards kids and focused on the biodiversity of the Los Angeles area.

We spent a long time in the Lab and were all learning a lot and having fun!

There’s also another kid-focused area – the Discovery Center, where there are some fun ways to play with nature,

and you can get a selfie with the L.A. Dodgers’ polar bear! 

We finished our visit by watching a 3D movie in the museum’s theater about dinosaurs.
It was just the right length for our children’s attention spans.

We would definitely, 100% recommend the Natural History Museum as part of your family’s trip to the L.A. area!
We would also definitely recommend to plan to spend almost a whole day there.
The museum is located in Exposition Park, right across from USC and next door to the California Science Center – another fabulous museum that we highlighted in another post.