Venice Post Office | Los Angeles Conservancy
Venice Post Office
Photo by Greg Szimonisz

Venice Post Office

The 1939 Venice Post Office was one of many post offices built with the support of Federal New Deal-era appropriations throughout the region and nation.

It was designed by Louis A. Simon, who was also the supervising architect of the nearby Santa Monica Post Office, which was dedicated the previous year and also built as part of the New Deal.

Modernist artist Edward Biberman created a mural for the lobby that depicts the early history of Venice, including city founder Abbot Kinney surrounded by the canals he built and a wooden roller coaster representing the Venice Pier that once drew thousands to the seaside community.

Between 1934 and 1943, approximately eight hundred (nearly a third) of historic USPS buildings were adorned with interior murals or sculptures commissioned for post offices as part of the New Deal.

The federally funded arts initiative responded to the Great Depression by creating jobs and boosting morale.

Photo by Adrian Scott Fine/L.A. Conservancy

Santa Monica Post Office

Many post offices were built across the nation with Federal New Deal-era appropriations, including the finely detailed 1938 Santa Monica Post Office.
Photo by Annie Laskey/L.A. Conservancy

Catalina Casino

Constructed for $2 million, the Catalina Casino was hailed as "a monument to the effort of William Wrigley, Jr. to give Catalina the finest and best the world's artisans have to offer."