The Lucas Museum of Narrative Art - A Star Wars Walkthrough

It took 13 years since it was first announced, but the wait is nearly over. The Lucas Museum of Narrative Art officially opens to the public on September 22, 2026. A building that spans 300,000-square-feet and houses over 30 galleries & more than 1,300 works from the collection. Set inside Exposition Park in Los Angeles, CA, it was a labor of love for George Lucas and his wife Mellody Hobson to complete the 1 Billion dollar project. We recently had the pleasure of visiting the new facility and while we did explore the entire building, for the purpose of this story, we only focused on things that included Star Wars or Indiana Jones.

The tour began in the Park & Gardens where multiple sculptures are on display. Included here are representations of Yoda with Grogu, Jabba the Hutt with Slave Leia & Padme with Nexu.



The exterior of the building features a sleek, futuristic looking design and the landscape matches perfectly.



Once inside the Main Lobby, the Giftshop sits off to the left featuring a large mixture of clothes, books and art.



Upstairs on the 4th floor is a secondary Giftshop that features some additional clothes, books and art, but very few Star Wars related items.



Directly across from the museum entrance is the Education Lobby which features a full-size Naboo N-1 Starfighter that hangs from the ceiling. There are stairs or an elevator that lead up to the Research Library. Inside, there are thousands of books cataloged and available for public use. While we did see a few Star Wars related books, it's a nice mixture of titles including books about the art featured in the museum itself.



One of the best parts of the museum is the Skywalker Grill. This was a very coveted reservation and we were extremely appreciative to have the opportunity to check out the restaurant and menu. We had a larger party, so there were multiple things ordered to try including the Mozzarella Sticks, Pigs in a Blanket, Crispy Calamari, Blue Crab Cake, Lucas Chopped Salad, Club Sandwich, Skywalker Ranch Wagyu Burger, Baked Alaskan Sundae, Dessert Cobbler with Pear & 7-Layer Chocolate Cake. Our waitress explained that the Lucas Chop Salad is George's favorite, which is why it's featured.



Among the many areas is the Cinema Gallery, an all Star Wars section featuring an inaugural exhibit called Star Wars in Motion which has a queue that wraps around the Oculus depending on how many museum goers are trying to view it. This area features works from the Lucas Archives focusing on the land vehicles seen in the first 6 films of the Star Wars saga. You'll see concept designs, props, and costumes associated with the films' racers, transports, and flying vessels, including full-size examples of Luke Skywalker's Landspeeder, General Grevious's Wheel Bike, a Swoop Bike, Speeder Bikes, Anakin Skywalker's Podracer, an XJ-6 Airspeeder & Zam Wesell's Koro-2 Airspeeder. There are also more than a dozen scaled models.



There are numerous other galleries spread around the museum with different themes. We did spot a few additional Star Wars pieces along with a few Indiana Jones related items.



Another gallery features concept art for the museum itself leading up to the final production. There was a beautiful 3-D model of the entire building on display.



We were quite excited to hear that the long lost Star Wars: Detours cartoon series, which was completed and then never released back in 2012, was going to be featured in the Slavko Vorkapich Theater. With every intention of sitting down to watch all of these, unfortunately, the way they are presented makes it quite difficult to do that. For example, according to the official Film Program that is handed out, Episode 1 screens at 9:15am on Saturday & Sunday only. Episode 2 screens at 10:15am on weekdays only followed by Episode 3 about 2.5 hours later followed by Episode 4 about 2.5 hours after that. Episode 5 & 6 are listed in a section under Friday & Saturday and are only separated by about a half hour, so based on that, you would have to visit at least twice to see all 6 episodes. You could absolutely spend more than a single day exploring this museum and still not see everything, but if you are only in town and have the day, it makes it impossible to watch them all. Perhaps at some point, this will change and the series will be shown in its entirety. This would actually make for a very special offer for Founding Members, so we'll keep our fingers crossed for something like that in the future.



The museum is incredible and the effort put into creating it that way does not go unnoticed. There's really something for everyone. Even if you are only interested in Star Wars stuff, it's worth exploring all of the other areas. You never know what might catch your attention and you could become a fan of something else entirely just because of the way it's presented in this space. Thanks to George & Mellody for sharing their passion with the world. In the meantime, we'll look forward to our next visit to the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art!

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