Located on opposite sides of Sawtelle Boulevard – the main street of LA’s Japanese-American Sawtelle neighborhood – Giant Robot Store and Giant Robot 2 (GR2) sell and exhibit art from largely but not exclusively Asian artists. Founded in 2001, the original Giant Robot allows eight guests at a time to shop for art prints, stickers, books, puzzles, bookshelf-sized miniatures, t-shirts, and hats. The less cramped Giant Robot 2 opened as a gallery in 2003, and alternates between solo and group exhibitions, typically at a rate of one or two each month. All of the exhibited items are available for sale, most as one-offs but some as prints, currently at prices ranging from under $20 to $800; stickers, magazines, toys, posters, skateboard decks, and other collectibles are also sold there.
Parking on Sawtelle near Giant Robot typically involves either feeding a meter or using a public garage. As each store offers a 15- to 30-minute experience, plan to use your visit to explore Sawtelle’s restaurants – well-known Japanese chains including Beard Papa’s, CoCo Ichibanya, FuRaiBo, Kura Sushi, and Tsujita, plus others such as a coffee/gelato location of Bacio di Latte, Hawaiian-style Brian’s Shave Ice, Japanese crepe shop Millet Crepe, and charcoal chicken ramen shop Sumiya.
