It's the 'living room of Culver City'

GLORYA KAUFMAN'S FINAL GIFT TO L.A.? A $17-MILLION WELLNESS HUB WHERE EVERYTHING IS FREE.

- DEBORAH VANKIN

WE WHINE AND PURR and howl, a collective release. About 20 of us are huddled in a patch of shade, beneath a cluster of palm trees, in a sleepy Culver City garden. Paired up, we face our partners, cup our hands behind our ears and let out loud, primal noises.

And we laugh. We're participating in a "tuning exercise" led by the performing arts group Cantilever Collective. It's part of a movement workshop meant to facilitate connection between individuals and help regulate our central nervous systems so as to release stress and promote a sense of overall well-being. Where are we, exactly? At one of Los Angeles' newest and most robust wellness hubs - held, perhaps counterintuitively, inside the Wende Museum of the Cold War. The Culver City museum, which opened its doors in 2017, debuted its Glorya Kaufman Community Center in early September, a 7,500-squarefoot space for cultural programming and wellness activities. The three-story modernist concrete building, which sits across the sculpture garden from the museum's exhibition hall, was made possible with funding from the late philanthropist Glorya Kaufman, who died in August. Her foundation provided the lead gift toward the $17-million new building and committed $6 million toward programming.

The new community center includes a 150-seat theater inside a refurbished, centuryold A-frame structure, an old MGM prop house. It hosts all the expected cultural programming such as screenings, live talks and dance performances, among other events. But it also offers yoga classes, guided meditations, sound baths, dance and movement classes, and healing writing workshops for L.A. wildfire victims, as well as herb and incense-making workshops and matcha teamaking classes.

Most notably? All of these wellness activities are free to the public. The center will also offer about 100 hours of free therapy a year, with licensed psychologists, as well as lifecoaching sessions.