Bangs & Bridges: Downtown LA Photo Shoot

My friend, Anica, got bangs this year, and we did a downtown LA photo shoot to document this era!

If you live in LA, you know that downtown isn’t really the place to be. It’s dirty, parking is tough, and it can be lowkey dangerous at night. Of course, like anywhere in this city, some parts of downtown are nicer than others. I feel like I go more often than most people living in West LA since there are cool locations for photo shoots and restaurants.

I hadn’t been to DTLA for a long time, but there were some places I wanted to try out and photograph. Anica’s friend Cole and my roommate Jordan also modeled for me. We started in Pershing Square, which is definitely not where I’d hang out alone, but we got some fun photos. Parking isn’t great around there, but we found some open meters at S Olive St & 4th St. Pro tip: I only go to DTLA on Sundays because most street parking is free.

Our second spot was somewhere I was excited to explore. The construction of Sixth Street Bridge was finished and it opened in 2022. I saw photos of it online and heard sometimes it got closed due to street takeovers at night. Parking was fairly easy and it was in an area that I was familiar with, near some great restaurants like Girl and the Goat and Manuela, as well as the Spotify LA office. We walked onto the bridge and saw other photo shoots going on.

For sunset, we drove to a place that I had shot at once before. It has a great view of the city skyline in the background. I don’t gatekeep many spots, but I did a lot of research to find this spot and it’s a residential neighborhood street and I don’t want it to get crowded, so I’m going to keep it to myself. If you really want to know the location, send me a DM on Instagram @livelybylaura.