old pasadena

Grat area to wine/ dine and people watch! Loved walking Colorado street and the side streets in old Pasadena.

As a Pasadena resident, I love this area. I do not love the parking situation here which can be difficult, as some others here have noted. And yes, the cops love to ticket here.Here are a few of the places to try. All are within walking distance of the center of Old Town which is Colorado Blvd and Fair Oaks.Mi Piace - very good italian food. The wait for a table can be long here sometimes. I like the mussels with angel hair pasta.Cheescake Factory - very good food and awesome desserts. Also very crowded.21 Flavors (frozen yogurt) - unique yogurt shop which draws huge crowds on weekend evenings. Give it a try. Just look for the long line.Ixtapa - a Mexican Cantina. Nice to watch a game or just people watch.Salt Lounge (in Miller Alley between Colorado Blvd and Union) really nice underground lounge with some pretty good Monday Night Football specials. Not as inexpensive other times. This place is below the iPic Movie Theatre near Sushi Roku.IL Fornaio - good Italian food. This restaurant has both indoor and outdoor seating. My mom loves this place for any meal. Nice courtyard to sit and have coffee.Barney's Beanery - nice bar with some decent food. Good for people watching. I hope you don't need much space, because you won't have much on Friday and Saturday nights.Kings Row Gastropub - the live bands make this place attractive. I have not eaten here so I can't comment on the food. Nice beer selection here.Please note that I would have given Old Town 5 stars (or circles) instead of 4 if the parking situation were better. Plenty of parking lots but all crowded on the weekends!

Old Pasadena is a fun place to visit. There is ample, relatively inexpensive parking, up to $5.00 or $6.00 per day or by the hour, and one can indulge their palate in virtually any international taste with an abundance of choices in cafes, restaurants, tea shops, bistros and the like, and all with a lovely, almost retro feel. The town is replete with a multitude of shopping opportunities from smaller boutique-style shops to larger stores like Crate and Barrel. If one simply chooses to take in the essence of Old Town, one can simply stroll along the streets and enjoy the sights, smells and sounds of this quaint, lovely, relic of a place.It's a great way to spend an afternoon or an evening and appreciate the community's efforts in maintaining a significant piece of their history.

This is a great area. Lots and lots of restaurants, cute shops, and people. If you leave this area hungry, it's your own fault! Everything is close together and you can just hop around at will. Great way to spend an evening.

Walking is easy but feels a little like an open air mall. They have all the expensive shops,restaurants and tourists. The parking is every where but expensive. I prefer State street in Santa Barbara. Spend your time at the City Hall, the Gamble house and the Huntington Garden area.

Coming from Vienna you can’t help to feel and appreciate the effort and the pride a community takes in its being.Tranquil just on the verge of deserted on a Tuesday afternoon one still appreciates the holding on to old facades and traditional lifestyle. Lots of public buses running up and down Colorado and the upper floors apartment housing bringing back live into downtown. – There is even a modern “Old World” light rail running down to downtown L.A.The Paseo Colorado shopping district was slightly disappointing though. Shops on the ground floor and apartments above – like at home. Still the commercial level lacks landscaping, green, attractive sidewalk cafés. “New World” re-taking of the outdoors and preserving the past I have seen better here. I like what Santa Barbara did with its old main street and paseos and even Palm Desert – with no “history” at all marries shopping- and living-space with more “gemuetlichkeit”. Still, I feel some carefulness in Pasadena’s inner city projects and that makes one feel good here.

This is the most iconic part of Pasadena. If you have never been, stop by. Lots of expensive restaurants and shops. Because it is so well-known there is not a time of day when it is not filled with traffic. As I am in Pasadena frequently, I would rather get away from this tourist street and enjoy the hidden gems.

From the antique stores and thrift shops to the upscale clothing and specialty stores there is something for everyone. Plenty of food and drink for every taste. Bring your walking shoes... you can easily spend 3 to 4 hours walking around. I love Old Town!

Too many panhandlers on every block, a lot of upscale stores with many eateries and bars/pubs. Not far from Norton Simon museum.

Old Pasadena has a lot of nice shops and restaurants. Very well worth visiting, an evening stroll was most enjoyable for me and wife

Heavily patrolled by police. Major parking enforcement (no free parking) Park 1/2 inch over a line and you will have a $40-$50 ticket on your windshield. Don't drink Pasadena prides themselves on DUI from this part of the city. Go to Alhambra, Montrose or Monrovia where there is free parking plenty nite-life less hassle from the police. Pasadena is broke and revenuing like mad.If you insist on going go in the day and PAY for parking.Stay away from the nite-life or take a cab and say Yes sir when approached by the police. Oh ya, stay out of the dark alleys!PS. I live in the area and never go there anymore.

The 100-plus year old buildings were preserved in the heart of the original city center, which is a good thing. But the character was taken away by chain clothing stores and restaurants and uniformly unimaginative occupiers. There are no bookshops, music venues or artist galleries, but there is a multitude of mobile phone stories and teenager clothing shops. Rather than charging onerous parking fees, the city should have had the foresight to close the streets to automobile traffic. Ask the independent entrepreneurs who are slowly, or quickly, squeezed out and they will rail against the greedy landlords, many of whom live in far away lands.

This is the place where all the young people are and some of the best restaurants. It is a happening place.The City spent a lot of money years ago to change the look of old Pasadena.

Old Pasadena is a terrific several-block-long area of gentrified shops and relatively informal restaurants where it's easy to spend a couple of hours. And, the City has several nearby parking structures where the first 2 hours are free. But, don't tell everyone, as they fill up quickly.

Old town Pasadena is probably meant for the weekend tourist and the under 30 crowd. As a resident of Pasadena, it is generally too crowded and has too many national chains to make this a place for me to shop.