Melrose Avenue is a shopping, dining, and entertainment destination in Los Angeles that starts at Santa Monica Boulevard – on the border between Beverly Hills and West Hollywood – and stretches to Lucile Avenue in Silver Lake.
Its most famous section, known as the Melrose District, is the West End located between West Hollywood and Hollywood. One of the most famous landmarks on Melrose Avenue as it passes through Hollywood is the historic Paramount Pictures Studios.
In the early 1980s, the eastern end of the district, from Fairfax to Highland Avenue, became a popular underground and alternative shopping area thanks to a new wave of independent retailers and restaurateurs. Melrose Avenue perfectly captured the new currents and Southern California’s punk cultures. The avenue’s rapid notoriety quickly attracted movie stars, tycoons, trend seekers, and those we would today call influencers, leading the press to nickname Melrose Avenue as “the new Rodeo Drive.” Melrose Avenue regularly appeared on television, such as on Jay Leno‘s show and TV series like ‘Entourage‘ and ‘LA Ink‘. However, the district was probably catapulted to popularity by the nineties series of Aaron Spelling, ‘Melrose Place‘.
As an ever-evolving shopping district, the street has hosted legendary stores like Vinyl Fetish, Harvey’s On Melrose Golden Girls Rattan Furniture, and Retail Slut, though all have closed in recent years. In 2005, musician and director Joe Hahn, member of the rock band Linkin Park, opened his conceptual store SURU at 7600 Melrose. Canadian designer John Fluevog also opened a store in 2003. As one of the city’s most pedestrian-friendly neighborhoods, this must-visit destination has maintained its reputation for an original, alternative, and independent experience for over three decades.
Since 1997, the outdoor flea market (Melrose Trading Post) has been held every Sunday, with over 250 local vendors, collectors, craftsmen, and artists gathering in the parking lot at the corner of Melrose and Fairfax Avenues. Local food vendors and live music complete this weekly event.
The Western End, popularly known as Melrose Heights, extends from La Cienega Blvd to Fairfax Avenue and features a variety of upscale restaurants, boutiques like D-A-S-H, owned by the Kardashian sisters, and salons like Elixir (tea house), the Bodhi Tree bookstore (metaphysical and New Age books), Fred Segal, Plush Home, and The Improv. Melrose Heights is also home to several high-end design stores, such as Marc Jacobs, Diane von Fürstenberg, Carolina Herrera, Mulberry, Sergio Rossi, Alexander McQueen, Oscar de la Renta, BCBG Max Azria, Paul Smith, Temperley London, John Varvatos, Balenciaga, Diesel, Vivienne Westwood, and Vera Wang.
North of the intersection with La Cienega Boulevard is Melrose Place, a branch of the main avenue made famous by the soap opera of the same name. In reality, Melrose Place is exclusively composed of shops, boutiques, and cafés, with no private residences, making the namesake series almost a work of science fiction.
The Melrose Avenue area crossing La Cienega Boulevard and its surrounding streets is part of the La Cienega Design Quarter (La Cienega Design Quartet). Its stores and galleries house numerous antiques, furniture, rugs, accessories, and art.
Metro Line 10 (Local Bus) runs along the entire Melrose Avenue. The original facades of Melrose Avenue’s stores (here you can see the complete and updated list of stores) have become a real magnet for Instagrammers, who have made the neighborhood one of their must-visit stops when in Los Angeles.
Today, Melrose Avenue continues to be one of the world’s longest and most famous streets for independent shops.
