After almost two years in Los Angeles, Gin Wigmore has tips for visitors seeking a special spot in her adopted city.
It's coming up two years since I arrived in the urban jungle of dreamers that is Los Angeles. It's a city too big to be contained so it keeps on sprawling; a city where you can almost hear the cogs turning of the people pacing around you, busy writing their first feature film or quietly revising the lyrics to a song built on heartbreak or love.
Metaphorically speaking, the walls of this city are high and the distance to the top is beyond the horizon, but the comforting allure is that each step along the way you are sure to find a warm place to make a memorable moment. Some of these cosy footholds deserve a special mention.
The first on the list is a little coffee spot popular among arty types. Intelligentsia is on the eastern side of Hollywood in the epicentre of creativity and cool, and is the beginning to any artist's day in LA. Long lines wind up the street as the sun rises over the Franklin Hills, which this coffee shop faces. As the sun falls, little Intelligentsia and its caffeine heartbeat are the last ones to sleep, closing at a night owl time of 11pm.
Once the coffee craving is fed, the hunger for breakfast will no doubt be shouting from the rooftops. Stroll up Sunset Boulevard and there you will find another little gem by the name of Flore. It is an authentic, expertly crafted, karma-collecting vegan eatery where you walk out feeling fuller than you could ever imagine. You will tick off your daily five fruit and veges without even realising it. The breakfast burrito that bursts with fake cheese can't be beat. I often wonder how they can make a cheese out of cashews but, gosh darn it, they can and the taste is simply to die for.
