Bunker Hill, affluent residential neighborhood of Victorian Los Angeles, famously fell victim to redevelopment in the postwar era. In its place, over the decades, rose commercial high rises and cultural centers, plazas and pedways. And nobody seems to love modern Bunker Hill—except for the lost neighborhood’s historian, Nathan Marsak.

Join Esotouric and Nathan Marsak for a guided tour through the redeveloped Bunker Hill, to get to know Downtown’s open-air Museum of Modernism, featuring remarkable examples of Late Moderne, New Formalist, Postmodernism and more. All of them are featured in his brand new guidebook, which will be available for purchase and signing.

Featured landmarks include the Los Angeles County Court House (1958), Union Bank Plaza (1967), the Bonaventure Hotel (1976) and Walt Disney Concert Hall (2003), along with rare survivors from the pre-redevelopment era, which offer a peep into the past from our futuristic vantage.

On this tour, you’ll not only learn about architectural developments, but get to know the Hill’s rich history, from initial development to decline, displacement and reinvention, and the colorful characters who transformed the landscape, for better or worse.

As declining office occupancy makes Bunker Hill’s role as a business center uncertain, it’s time to look deeply at the useful and beautiful relics of redevelopment and imagine a future that is the best Bunker Hill of them all.

This walking tour is illustrated with rare photos you can view on your smartphone.