Nestled at the foot of the San Gabriel Mountains (their slopes often obscured by smog, which can be particularly bad here during the summer), Pasadena is easily the most appealing of LA’s neck-to-neck inland suburbs and was founded in 1875 as a winter resort for affluent Easterners. Pasadena was considered far removed from the hurly-burly of LA until 1940, when the two communities, were linked by the city’s earliest freeway – the Arroyo Seco Parkway, now known as the Pasadena Freeway. The architectural firm of Greene & Greene – whose influence on southern Californian dwellings was profound – were responsible for several early Pasadena houses, including the won­derful Gamble House (http://gamblehouse.org), 4 Westmore­land Place, completed in 1908 and as fine an example of the Greenes’ Arts and Crafts style as you’re likely to find. Guided tours of the house, parts of which are used by the University of Southern California’s School of Archi­tecture, are conducted Thursday to Sunday beginning at noon, last one at 3pm.

Besides significant architecture, Pasadena also has one of LA’s most striking art collections, the Norton Simon Museum of Art (http://www.nortonsimon.org), 411 W. Col­orado Boulevard. The museum’s west­ern art is of exceptional quality – works displayed range from Rubens and Rem­brandt to Renoir and Van Gogh, and also include a comprehensive Degas collection and pieces by Picasso. But what sticks in the mind is the muse­um’s tremendous horde of Asian sculpture: a mass of ancient religious pieces chiefly from India, Nepal, Cambodia and Thailand, and often innovatively arranged to combine the museum’s interior space with its outdoor sculp­ture garden.

A few minutes’ walk from the muse­um brings you to the section of Col­orado Boulevard, in the vicinity of the junction with Raymond Avenue, known as Old Pasadena, where many recent­ly-renovated 1910s buildings have been taken over by small, entertaining shops and numerous cafes – a perfect spot to waste an hour or two.

Another place to admire at leisure is the 1927 Pasadena City Hall, a block north of Colorado Boulevard off Garfield Avenue. With its over-wrought Renaissance-style dome, the hall is dif­ficult to miss: walk through the clois­tered archways into the pleasant court­yard garden and try to imagine a more serene setting for local government offices.