AN INSIDER'S GUIDE TO DOWNTOWN L.A.

Once a no-go zone, Downtown L.A. is now the most happening place in California. Regular visitor Mike MacEacheran takes a tour of the can’t miss, new-look spectacle that is DTLA.

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Los Angeles has so much mind-boggling ambition it’s hard to know where to start. The dream-like hotels, malls and stucco hilltop mansions of Beverly Hills and the Hollywood Hills? The seemingly-impossible rides and theme park attractions of Universal City? How about the lip gloss-pink Pacific-coast sunsets of Venice Beach or Santa Monica? Or consider the movie star hangouts of Los Feliz or Silver Lake? These are all worthy places to check out during a visit to the City of Angels, but nowadays, there’s only one game in town that everyone is talking about. It’s Downtown Los Angeles, or DTLA.

In a city that loves a box office remake, DTLA has been given a Hollywood-style reboot over the past few years. From the outside, it looks like a hazy Manhattan of sun-glazed skyscrapers, housing little more than banks and insurance companies — a world apart from the L.A. of palm-lined boulevards and coupes beetling down the Sunset Strip.

But to not delve into Downtown’s streets is to miss a trick. To wander — or Uber, this is still L.A. after all — from Pershing Square to the Fashion District, or from the Staples Center to the Arts District, is to experience somewhere resolutely local. Somewhere fresh and changing. Somewhere veg-centric and concerned with microbreweries and street art. Somewhere to be savoured, rather than rushed. You can almost hear the whumpf and feel the change on the streets yourself.

Before hitting the sights, fuel up at Bottega Louie (bottegalouie.com), an upmarket patisserie with big-picture windows on