Los Angeles · Brentwood
The Getty Center
A travertine acropolis above the freeway, free to enter, reached by its own tram
The central garden by Robert Irwin, which is a work rather than landscaping
Richard Meier spent fourteen years and about a billion dollars building a campus on a ridge above the 405, clad in sixteen thousand tonnes of Italian travertine split rather than cut so that the fossils show. It opened in 1997, charges nothing for admission and is reached by a driverless tram from the car park below.
The collection is European painting to 1900, decorative arts, manuscripts and photography, strong rather than encyclopaedic. Most visitors spend as much time outside as in: the central garden, the terraces and the view across the basin to the ocean are the reason the building sits where it does.
The detail
Good to know
- Opened
- 1997, architect Richard Meier
- Admission
- Free, parking charged
- Garden
- Central Garden by Robert Irwin
- Saturday
- Open until 20:00
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