It’s 7 AM on a Saturday. Your neighborhood is quiet and still.

But not for long. 

A turn of the keys and suddenly, as your exhaust roars and settles to an idle, your whole block is now awake. Such is life when it’s time to go to a Cars and Coffee. 

What started as a way to see friends and cool cars on the weekend has become a cultural movement in cities all across the world. The beauty of Cars and Coffee is the combination of crisp morning air, hot coffee, and good conversation. You can even be home before the responsibilities of real life settle in. Due to the consistently pleasant weather and a dependence on wheeled transportation, Southern California happens to be the informal capital of these events. If you’re making a voyage to SoCal and want to get your feet wet, here are some top tips for experiencing this cornerstone of car culture. 

If you’re on social media, and specifically Instagram, it’s plausible that you’ve already seen coverage of some of SoCal’s most popular car shows. An easy trick to stay “in the know” about events would be to follow the pages of some of the local car clubs - the BMWCCA’s LA chapter (@bmwccala) and the Porsche Club of America (@porscheclubla) post about their upcoming event calendars well in advance. 

Cars and Coffee Los Angeles (@carsandcoffeelosangeles) hosts monthly gatherings at Griffith Park, and is usually sharing scenes from various car events around the city. Like artisan chocolate? Milla Chocolates occasionally hosts automotive gatherings at their location in Culver City (@5c_club). If you find yourself near Long Beach, be sure to check out the @shoreshifters event which is once a month. Just up the street is Commodity Coffee, a café that’s typically littered with enthusiast cars hanging out on any given weekend, but also hosts a monthly meet called @allmakeswelcome. Further south in Orange County, you’ll discover a small weekly Porsche-centric gathering at the Enderle Center in Tustin which you can then contrast with the extremely large Saturday morning event in San Clemente dubbed “South OC Cars and Coffee.”

One of the more famous and spontaneous gatherings of enthusiast cars occurs at the Malibu Colony Plaza on PCH in Malibu. Every Saturday and Sunday you will encounter an incredible smattering of collector cars that come from all over SoCal. Hell, I’ve been there mid-week for lunch and will still see a few classics and newer Porsches, typically parked outside Malibu Kitchen while owners socialize on the patio. While there’s no “official” event being hosted at this seemingly normal Malibu shopping center, the energy there in 2020 has deemed it an informal automotive culture hub. Visit on a weekend morning and you won’t be disappointed. 

You’ll find these and even some evening meets outlined at www.socalcarculture.com, but expect to find more events through the Instagram accounts linked above. 

So if you’ve been planning a trip to the car capital of the US (no, not you Detroit), consider your weekend booked, because there are enough cars and enough coffee to go around.