The Best Date Spots in Culver City in Los Angeles

Share a French dinner at Juliet, a contemporary bistro with a patio nearly as large as the dining room. The wine list stays entirely French, with a strong Champagne selection.

Duck confit cigars and sea bream are among the dishes to look for, with brown butter madeleines to finish.

Hatchet Hall is a Southern-leaning, wood-fired restaurant and bar with a pergola-covered patio and a vintage-inspired dining room. Choose a tufted leather banquette or one of the smaller wooden tables for a more tucked-away dinner.

The cooking follows the California seasons. Cornbread comes in a cast-iron skillet with a scoop of butter, and shrimp and grits is another to try. Add biscuits to the table. The team holds space for walk-ins, and either bar is a spot for a drink while you wait.

Gold lighting, a grand piano and patio fire pits give Laurel Grill a polished setting for dinner. The American grill centers its menu on a wood-fired hearth.

The kitchen cooks over a wood-fired hearth. Mozzarella bread makes a good first order, with the seared ribeye or baby back ribs to follow.

Head to Margot for sunset drinks on the rooftop of Platform. The coastal Mediterranean restaurant draws on Spain and Italy, with a patio that works especially well around golden hour.

Start with one of the crudos, made with hamachi, tuna or kampachi and finished with Calabrian kosho, then settle in on the patio. The cocktail menu leans botanical, and weekend brunch is another option.

Settle in over a drink or a longer meal at Simonette, an all-day French-style cafe, restaurant and bar inside Palihotel.

Dinner brings beef bourguignon and ratatouille, lunch brings mussels and beer, and the bar pours house cocktails including World Famous, Saint Fume, and Petit Merle. Between 3pm and 6pm every day, burgers are half price and drinks are on special.

Spend the evening over cocktails and live jazz in the grand lobby of The Culver Hotel, a local landmark dating to 1924. Piano-bar standards set the soundtrack.

The hotel also has a garden patio and a speakeasy-style Velvet Lounge.

Blind Barber operates as a barbershop by day and turns into a speakeasy after dark, making it an easy place to meet over a drink.

It is open Tuesday and Wednesday from 6pm to 1am and Thursday through Saturday from 6pm to 2am. A cover is typical after 10pm on weekends.

Spend a few hours wandering the Museum of Jurassic Technology, a self-guided collection of curiosities hidden behind a windowless storefront. Upstairs, the Tula Tea Room and Borzoi Kabinet Theater are open during museum hours.

Phones and photography are not allowed inside. The museum is open Thursday and Friday from 2pm to 8pm and Saturday and Sunday from noon to 6pm.

Spend an afternoon at the Wende Museum, where Stasi artifacts, propaganda posters, East German counterculture objects and sections of the Berlin Wall trace the history of the Cold War. Admission is free.

Free public tours cover the exhibitions, the open storage, and the outdoor sculpture garden, usually held Fridays at 11:30am and Saturdays and Sundays at 2:30pm. The museum is open Friday through Sunday from 10am to 5pm, and there is seating in the galleries and gardens. Parking is free in the adjacent city lots.

Wander the shops and restaurants at Platform, directly across from the Culver City Metro stop. Blue Bottle Coffee and Van Leeuwen give you easy stops along the way, while Margot's rooftop is there if you want to add drinks.

Most shops open at 11am and close at 6pm. Two parking garages serve the complex: one all-day self-park and one valet from 8am to 11pm.