Petersen Automotive Museum 2017

tzeitel

Toadi Acceleratio Semper Absurda
Joined
Aug 28, 2008
Whenever we go to DLR I try to do at least one day outside of Disney. We have done Sea World, La Brea Tar Pits, LA Farmer's Market followed by a movie at El Capitan (Nightmare Before Christmas 4D which they do in October). This past trip we did the Petersen Automotive Museum (after going to lunch at the Farmer's Market!).

https://petersen.org/

Even if you are not a big fan of cars (me), or museums (DH) this place is incredibly cool. I have been to many museums and I love art, history, and shiny things - the Petersen Museum has it all. Our group was 2 40-somethings, 14 year old girl, and 2 70-somethings. My phone ran out of battery after the first 2 floors, good thing they had chargers throughout the exhibits - maybe this happens more than I thought.

We also did the Vault Tour. Of that I have no photos since they are not allowed. Basically it is their underground storage and garage (were the cars are fixed, not just parked). It is about 90 minutes and is a heck of a automotive history lesson. They have so many unique cars - like one of only 3 gold plated DeLoreans! Love the story behind it - it was actually a credit card point reward :) There are Presidential limos and Saddam Hussein's limo too. There are many hot rods - they get the winner of a big hot rod design competition every year (sorry I do not remember the name!) I loved the Fiat with wicker seats. After the main tour - you do not get to cover the whole garage, there were cars in other parts that we could see from a distance - you go to the garage where you see the mechanics working on cars. There they also keep the cars they leave in their original state, for educational purposes.

We did the tour for DH's dad who loves cars - he was like a kid in a candy store! - but we all ended up loving the tour and felt is was so worth it. I almost took DD to the Art Museum across the street since I thought we might enjoy that more - so glad I did not.
Here is a little (preview?) video of the vault -
http://petersen.org/vault/



 
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There was quite a bit of construction on the street and inside the parking garage. The outside is very cool and modern, red wave design - sorry I did not get better pics of the outside but we actually came in from the garage side so I took the photos from the car. I think you go through the street doors if you do not park in their garage - like if you park across the street at the LA Museum of Art or the La Brea tar pits.




The garage is pretty spacious and we did not have trouble finding a spot on the main floor, close to the doors. There was even a museum guest services agent in the garage directing people (not sure if this is the norm or just because of the construction). In the garage are several cars from their collection. I took a photo of Jack Nicholson's car -


The lobby is pretty big and is on the first floor with some exhibits. Walls are glass so you can see the Keith Haring cars on the right as you come in, then is the elevator, bathrooms, tickets desk. After the ticket desk is the big exhibit for this year - The Art of Bugatti (until Oct 2017). This is the view of the lobby as you come in from the garage -




Ferraris in the lobby - they are part of the Seeing Red: 70 years of Ferrari exhibit (until April 2018)





Gift shop behind the Ferraris -


In the second Ferrari photo you can see the construction tape in the parking garage - and how impressive it looks when you can see those cars from the garage. Love all the glass!
The gift shop has things for all budgets, there were magnets, books, model cars (budget and not-so-budget friendly), etc etc. They also had some really nice shirts (museum and car/motorcycle brands) for a reasonable price ($18-25).
 
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From the street doors -





From the lobby you can see the Bugatti exhibit behind the glass-



 


There are touch screens that let you learn more about the exhibit. What I liked about this particular exhibit (and hope it is like this for all rotating exhibits) is that they did not just focus on the car side f the family. They really went into their history, and even included some items from their homes. There are also several art pieces made by the Bugatti family.

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3rd floor is about history, includes several movie cars, and even the first baby car seats!

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2nd floor is mostly motorcycles, there is a kids area that has a Disney Cars theme. We actually went in and DD took some time to color ;)

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Is there a dragster section? You know,,,the Swamp rat and such?
 
Is there a dragster section? You know,,,the Swamp rat and such?
Not a full section but they did have a quite a few, the dragsters we saw were actually in the vault (the special underground garage that requires a separate ticket). They do have rotating exhibits so they might be moved to the regular floors at times. Even in the vault they rotate the cars depending on what they are working on at the moment. There were huge sections of the vault we could not go into because the vehicles there were new to the museum and still needed work, or they were privately owned (and I guess ppl pay a lot of $$$ to get the museum mechanics to work on their cars), or they just did not have the room at the moment.
 
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