Gourmet Traveller (Australia)

LUXURY AND LIBERTY IN WEST HOLLYWOOD

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If DTLA has the creative and cultural chops, and Santa Monica serves salty seaside R&R, the district of West Hollywood is all about decadence. In the 1960s and 1970s, musicians, hippies and artists gathered here, and acts like The Doors, Elton John and Led Zeppelin won hearts and minds at The Troubadour, The Whisky a Go Go and The Roxy; by the late 1980s it was dressed-for-excess metal acts like Van Halen, Mötley Crüe and Guns N’ Roses treating West Hollywood as a playground. But – sorry Mötley Crüe – the really revolution­ary stuff was going on in courtrooms, when a coalition of gay men, Russian Jews and elderly residents successful­ly held a 1984 vote to incorporat­e the area as the City of West Hollywood, protecting residents from skyrocketi­ng rents. West Hollywood became a self-governed gay-majority city, and an incubator for progressiv­e legislatio­n, LGBTQIA+ culture and social change. There are more fancy restaurant­s and million-dollar condos around today, but West Hollywood still feels forward-thinking, friendly and fabulous.

West Hollywood is where you’ll find the most luxurious hotels in town, from storied grande dame hotels with a rock’n’roll heritage like Chateau Marmont, to sleek new city hotels like Ian Schrager’s West Hollywood Edition and the Pendry West Hollywood. Both of the latter properties have rooftop pools, and the Pendry’s rooftop also houses Wolfgang

Puck’s Merois. Puck’s return to the Sunset Strip, 40 years after he opened his first restaurant, Spago, is a big deal for West Hollywood. Back in the 1980s, fancy restaurant­s had to pretend to be Italian, or French, to be taken seriously. The idea of homegrown Australian, British or American fine dining was scoffed at. The well-connected Puck changed this, putting high-concept California­n cuisine on the culinary map, drawing movie stars and moguls such as Michael Caine, Billy Wilder, Sean Connery and Sidney Poitier, and propelling himself into uncharted celebrity chef territory. Merois is a less flashy affair than the original Spago, but with impeccable service, uninterrup­ted skyline views and a spectacula­r menu focusing on Southeast Asian and Japanese flavours, it’s a more 21st-century hit.

West Hollywood is welcoming veteran chefs back, but it’s also fertile turf for new talent and ideas. “LA is the big stage,” is how Byron Bay-born chef Monty Koludrovic puts it. “And there’s a synergy between Australian and LA’s hospitalit­y scene – it’s all about people, produce and family.” After six years at Bondi’s Icebergs Dining Room and Bar, Monty and his wife, pastry chef Jaci, relocated to LA with their two sons in 2020.

Not exactly an ideal year to launch several hospitalit­y businesses, but the Melbourne-inspired café Strings of Life, rooftop bar and restaurant EP & LP and their brand new 15,000-square-foot restaurant and bar complex Grandmaste­r Recorders have all been roaring successes. “We wanted to take our kids on an adventure, and show them the improbable is possible,” says Monty. “And moving your family to America to set up restaurant­s in the middle of a pandemic, well, that sure did the trick.” We sip a Negroni on the rooftop of Grandmaste­r Recorders, as Monty talks about the menu for Australia Day. There’s a pork and fennel sausage roll and Jaci’s pavolova with passionfru­it, whipped yoghurt and kiwi marinated in rose geranium syrup.

I ask him if he thinks LA is a good place to bring dreams, and if this is why he came here. He nods. “Los Angeles is big energy. It’s easy to have an amazing time here. And, let’s face it, YOLO.”

STAY Chateau Marmont, chateaumar­mont.com;

West Hollywood Edition, editionhot­els.com;

Pendry West Hollywood, pendry.com

EAT Strings of Life, stringsofl­ife.com; EP & LP, eplosangel­es.com DRINK Grandmaste­r Recorders, grandmaste­rrecorders.com

 ?? ?? Clockwise from below: inside Pendry’s Deluxe King Skyline room; liquor storage at Grandmaste­r Recorders’ Studio 71 Bar; tiramisù at Grandmaste­r Recorders. Opposite: the Pendry’s rooftop pool.
Clockwise from below: inside Pendry’s Deluxe King Skyline room; liquor storage at Grandmaste­r Recorders’ Studio 71 Bar; tiramisù at Grandmaste­r Recorders. Opposite: the Pendry’s rooftop pool.
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