Hotel June Malibu

For me, a stay at Hotel June was the last leg of a weeklong tour of LA: a couple days in coffee-shop-strewn Silver Lake for a wedding, a few nights of Westside living in Brentwood, and, at last, a weekend getaway in a locale I’d never visited but have held in my consciousness since I first encountered Malibu Barbie. 

Back then, Malibu might have conjured only the word ‘beach’, but now I know it as a storied surf haven, the escape-from-the-city enclave that was connected to the Pacific Coast Highway in 1929, became the backdrop for the Gidget movies in the Sixties, and has attracted more wave-seekers than I can fathom since. 

Though Hotel June is technically new to the scene, its structure has been an active participant in much of the setting’s charming narrative for some 70 years. 

Soon after it debuted in 1949 as Malibu Riviera Hotel, it blossomed into a hub of local creativity. As proof: one of the co-owners built an on-premises dark room – picture it! – and in 1974, Bob Dylan holed up in bungalow 13 to write Blood on the Tracks. 

When the hideaway got new owners and a chic renovation in 2016, it reopened as Native Hotel and then Hotel June, sister to a West LA spot that’s five minutes from both the beach and LAX.

Pulling off the PCH into the parking lot, I instantly sensed that this place knew its history and how to pay tribute. Tucked back from the road with an inconspicuous painted-brick exterior and unflashy signage, it presented its invitation to chill in a relaxed, come-as-you-are way. 

When I checked in, it doubled down on this laid-back welcome: The grinning guy who greeted us wanted to know how our travel was (his interest seemed genuine!), to tell us his dad grew up in Brooklyn, and to offer us cans of wine to get our stay started.

Settling into our digs, I was impressed that the design managed to achieve a California-modern style with the exact-right amount of polish to suit the setting. There was a king-size Min bed with perfect hotel-white sheets. A built-in bench, a picture ledge, a concrete floor, and ceiling beams framed the space. 

But the considered sleekness also made room for kick-your-shoes-off comfort, like batik robes and the Dutch door – the type where you can open just the top half and let the breeze in – that led out onto our private patio hung with a hammock. Perhaps the portable Menu lamp – ready and waiting if we wanted to take it outside with us for star-gazing – captured the aesthetic sensibility in a nutshell. 

Our plan for our stay was to take in the essence of Malibu (population: 10,000; global recognition: massive) and for our first dinner, there was no question that we’d hit a seafood shack. We had a tough time deciding between Reel Inn, Broad St Oyster Co, and Malibu Seafood, but when we popped our first fried scallops at the latter – founded in 1972 and run by local fishermen since – we had absolutely zero regrets and left with very full stomachs.

The next morning, we fueled up with pastries the hotel brings in from Gjusta, the little Venice café with an outsize reputation, and, despite the day’s lacklustre surf report, tossed one of the loaner boards propped against the building into our rental convertible. It was time for the beach, and we made the eight-minute drive to Zuma to take in the seemingly endless horizon and the impressive lack of crowds (Welcome to Friday in November!). 

Next on the agenda: people-watching and lunch at Lily’s. Though we didn’t have any celebrity sightings – the signs warning off paparazzi ensured they were a regular occurrence – I did eat a grilled mahi mahi burrito bowl that I think deserves to be famous. 

As we were in the land of scenic vistas, we took the opportunity of the early evening setting sun to experience them, navigating to the area’s southern tip to gasp at the cliffs of Point Dume and then winding up to Topanga, amidst the Santa Monica Mountains, to inhale that wooded air and visit local friends. All in all, it’s an environment which made me understand the appeal of driving around for hours, ideally with the top down and the radio blasting. 

Though our weekend proved too crisp for a dunk in any body of water, we circled the Hotel June pool longingly multiple times. All those padded loungers! All that warm wood! Look at the coastal desert foliage peeking up over the hills! Next trip, a dip is high on our list – maybe paired with a re-read of Taylor Jenkins Reid’s Malibu Rising that captures the legendary nature of this destination. 

I’m already starting to log my other return-visit to-dos, too: an afternoon at Getty Villa (just on the other side of the official city limits in the Pacific Palisades), a Tuna Canyon hike, and all the fresh seafood and epic sunsets I can squeeze in.