Cayton Children's Museum — Attraction in Santa Monica

Pretty small on the inside but we usually have an ok time here until recently. I haven’t felt the need to post previous but we had a very uncomfortable exchange with an employee named Carl so I’m leaving this review for other parents to be warned. The facility closes at 5 pm and we arrived and waited in line a few minutes before being seen about 4:15. The 2 families who entered only minutes before us did not have reservations but were admitted. When we approached the counter my nephew made a loud scream and Carl blinked his eyes serval times, made a face and grabbed his ear clearly annoyed. He then rudely stated he could not let us in because they close in 45mins. Confused I asked where online does it state you can not enter within the last hour especially having been in line and witnessed two families enter beforehand. He then proceeded to search online and could not find it (the “policy” does not exist)at which point I asked to speak to a manger. He passively made a matter of fact comment about their policy stating the family before entered at 4:15 and we were at 4:16. OBSURD. I told him it’s unfortunate they have him working the front desk given his nature towards kids and he laughed and said ok. The manager explained they turn away people at closing since kids tend to be disappointed with short time frames? This was never the case at the previous location, and the last I checked 45 mins of o play is better than being turned away because of a matter if a minute. She also mentioned they had several tantrums earlier so it likely got to Carl and she was sorry?? This is horrible and the fact remains that Carls uninviting and prejudice behavior should not be accepted at a children’s museum whatsoever and shame on the manager for allowing him to do so. Moms who’s children have ever yelled or had a tantrum please be warned we are not welcomed here. I would still like to file a formal complaint against...

This was a nice little quaint "museum". It was pretty small but the price wasnt too bad for what it was. When we went there was plenty of staff walking around and they all were nice and seemed to be enjoying their job. The place is more like a big playground than what i would refer to as a Museum and felt quite dirty (as you'd expect for a playground but i can't imagine the last time every thing was sanitized). It seems more fit for toddlers but our 7 year old enjoyed herself, just not as much as our 2 year old.

A few things caught me off guard when we were there though, for starters that it's in the Jewish Federation building so even though parking was free it was weird to be subject to a car search, (we weren't but they're are signs telling us they could if they felt it necessary), the segregated parking for the museum was quite small and even our little Jetta barely fit because the lot was mostly full (the security said we could park in the main structure but we'd have to leave our keys in the car and unlocked). Walking into the building there's a metal detector and bag Xray at the entrance. The museum and majority of patrons were jewish and has a kid sized synagogue with a few games and that was surprising to me, not a bad thing in anyway and I enjoyed the diversity and teaching the kids about different beliefs, but just something I wasn't aware of until we walked in.

Was fun for the kids but probably wouldn't come back to that location simply because of how small it was and it wasn't worth the drive from long beach to visit a playground that we got through in about the same time the round trip...

I've been wanting to bring my niece and nephew here but Covid got in the way. They recently reopened and even waived the entrance fee for LA residents which is awesome of them and I'm giving them an extra star just for that. They had some great free online programs available for kids during lockdown too.

My only other experience with children's museums is Kidspace in Pasadena. Too bad they're so far apart because they complement each other quite well: Kidspace currently only has their outdoor areas open which veer towards educational experiments while Cayton is all indoors and they focus on play.

When we went to the Cayton, the art class was closed so the available activities were basically just a watered down version of an indoor playground. It's a beautiful place but even with reservations it gets crowded fast.

Overall, I was a little disappointed by the lack of activities. If it was just about climbing the netting and playing I would've just taken them to Kids Empire or something. But the staff are great and the organization clearly cares about the community so it's still a good place to visit...