Los AngelesLos Angeles is a city of endless paradoxes and possibilities. Within a short drive, you can be in the desert, the mountains, or at the beach. Every neighborhood has its own layers—culture, flavor, and style. Diversity is woven into the people, the food, the architecture. Glamour meets grit. Innovation collides with inequity. Sunshine and smog. And somehow, it all works.
Late 1800s: The Birth of the City
1900s–1920s: The Streetcar Suburbs
1920s–30s: The Era of Elegance & Planning
1940s–1960s: The Suburban Expansion
1970s–1990s: Rediscovery & Creative Living
2000s–Today: Revitalization & Custom Living
Downtown LA: The city started here as a tiny pueblo in 1781. By the late 1800s, it grew into a bustling business district with streetcars, hotels, and Victorian homes.
Angelino Heights: LA’s first true neighborhood grew out from the Pueblo center. It remains one of LA’s oldest residential areas with iconic Victorian homes.
West Adams: An early home to LA’s wealthiest, filled with Craftsman and Classical Revival mansions.
Pasadena: Grew as a wealthy retreat from DTLA — had luxury resorts and early rail lines.
Highland Park, Echo Park, Silver Lake: Built up as streetcar suburbs; a lot of early Craftsman and Spanish-style homes.
Boyle Heights: A multicultural neighborhood with early 20th-century homes and thriving community life.
Venice: Founded in 1905 as a beachside amusement resort, modeled after Venice, Italy, with canals and a pier.
Santa Monica: Evolved from a Victorian beach resort into a residential beach city — its northern edge became the exclusive “Gold Coast,” with Mediterranean and Spanish-style estates.
This was LA’s golden age of neighborhood planning, when the city’s iconic identity really took root. As the film industry exploded and fortunes grew, new neighborhoods were meticulously planned to reflect wealth, beauty, and exclusivity.
Hollywood: Was still farmland in the early 1900s! Exploded in the 1910s–20s with the rise of the film industry. Hollywoodland (founded in 1923) was one of LA’s first planned hillside developments, selling fairy-tale cottages and grand hillside estates — advertised under the iconic Hollywood Sign.
Los Feliz: blossomed with Spanish Colonial Revival estates, Mediterranean villas, and early Modernist homes (like Frank Lloyd Wright’s Ennis House, 1924).
Hancock Park: Carefully master-planned by developer George Allan Hancock. Wide boulevards, deep setbacks, and oversized lots framed grand estates built in styles like Tudor Revival, Mediterranean, and Italian Renaissance. It became one of LA’s most prestigious addresses — but at the time, was formally segregated, with racially restrictive covenants.
Beverly Hills:Incorporated in 1914, Beverly Hills was originally intended as an upscale garden suburb for affluent Angelenos. After Hollywood royalty like Douglas Fairbanks and Mary Pickford built their famous Pickfair estate, Beverly Hills exploded in popularity during the 1920s. Grand mansions in Spanish Colonial, Georgian Revival, and Mediterranean styles lined new streets like Rodeo Drive and Sunset Boulevard. Exclusive country clubs and glamorous hotels, like the Beverly Hills Hotel, further anchored its reputation as the crown jewel of Westside luxury.
Westwood: emerged in tandem with the founding of UCLA in 1919. The neighborhood was designed with a vision of walkability and prestige, featuring Spanish Revival apartments, elegant homes, and a now-iconic village commercial center.
Leimert Park: Developed in 1928 by the Olmsted Brothers (famed landscape architects), Leimert Park was a model of early suburban planning. Characterized by beautiful Spanish Revival homes, wide, tree-lined boulevards, and community parks. Although initially restricted by race-based covenants, Leimert Park later became a vital hub for Black culture, art, and music — sometimes called the "cultural heartbeat" of Black Los Angeles.
Pacific Palisades: Founded in 1922 by a group of Methodist ministers as a utopian religious retreat. Early structures were modest cabins and cottages clustered near the bluffs. By the late 1920s and 1930s, Pacific Palisades evolved into a sophisticated seaside community, with Spanish-style estates, storybook cottages with whimsical detailing and later, grand luxury homes in neighborhoods like The Riviera, attracting artists, academics, and celebrities seeking a quiet, scenic escape.
Brentwood: Once rural, blossomed into an elegant enclave with ranch-style homes, classic Colonials, and Mediterranean villas nestled into leafy hillsides.transitioned from rural farmland to an elegant suburban retreat, offering leafy streets, sprawling lots, and architectural variety — from Ranch homes and classic Colonials to Mediterranean villas.
Freeway construction and the postwar boom opened up new land for development.
San Fernando Valley: Transformed into classic suburbia with tract homes, open floor plans, and front lawns. Massive expansion after WWII. Tract homes, strip malls, and car culture defined areas like Sherman Oaks, Encino, and Van Nuys.
Mar Vista saw a burst of residential development, including now-iconic Mid-Century Modern homes in areas like the Mar Vista Tract by Gregory Ain.
Culver City & Palms: Developed as studio-adjacent suburbs — home to MGM, now Sony Pictures.
Westchester: Grew around LAX, part of the postwar boom.
Pico-Robertson, Mar Vista, and Palms: Became more accessible with freeway construction (405, 10, etc.).
South LA (formerly South Central): Boomed with Black migration from the South, then disinvested in during redlining and freeway construction.
Venice became a magnet for artists, skaters, and creatives. Many small homes were updated or replaced with custom modern builds.
Santa Monica and Brentwood maintained their prestige but saw thoughtful remodels and architectural preservation efforts grow.
Venice: Artists, counterculture, and then slow gentrification. Venice was once a low-income beach town!
The Hollywood Hills and Mount Washington became prized for their Mid-Century gems, hillside views, and bohemian feel.
Koreatown, Little Armenia, Thai Town: Boomed with immigration after the 1965 Immigration Act. Mid-Wilshire apartments, historic buildings adapted to new communities.
Mount Washington, Atwater Village: Hidden gems with early 20th-century homes, started attracting artists in the '80s–90s.
Studio City, North Hollywood: Gentrified pockets in the Valley, appealing to entertainment industry folks.
Downtown LA experienced a major revival with industrial lofts, new towers, and adaptive reuse projects.
Playa Vista rose as a master-planned tech-driven community with sleek townhomes and LEED-certified builds.
In the Pacific Palisades, The Village revitalized the neighborhood’s commercial heart while canyon homes saw high-end remodels and new contemporary builds. With the devastating 2024 Palisades Wildfire, the neighborhood is in the midst of a complete rebuild.
Brentwood and Santa Monica continue to blend historic preservation with innovative new construction — from ultra-modern glass homes to timeless Spanish Revival estates.
Silver Lake, Highland Park, Echo Park: Became symbols of gentrification — creative professionals and investors moved in.
Inglewood & Crenshaw: Experiencing a new wave of attention due to the SoFi Stadium and metro expansion.
Frogtown (Elysian Valley): Industrial zone turned into riverside hangout with modernist infill.
South LA & East LA: Still affordable-ish but rapidly changing; big investor interest.
West Adams, once LA’s historic Black neighborhood, has seen rapid gentrification and home restoration.
Baldwin Hills and surrounding areas have gained renewed interest for their location, views, and Mid-Century character — while also experiencing rising prices and demographic shifts.
Beverly Hills and Brentwood continue to evolve, with custom estates, hillside moderns, and ongoing architectural preservation.