Santa Barbara Post Office
The main post office in Santa Barbara reflects the local Spanish Mission Revival and Art Deco architectural styles of the Great Depression and is listed in the National Register of Historical Places. As a combined post office-federal office building, it is a significant building in the historic core of Santa Barbara. It was designed by Pasadena architect Reginald Davis Johnson in the mid-1930s, and was completed in 1937. The building retains a high degree of architectural integrity, with minimal changes to the interior and no changes to the exterior, which retains its original landscaping. The Santa Barbara Post Office has a generally Spanish Colonial character that harmonizes with traditional local architecture, using a terra cotta roof and white stuccoed walls. The building was constructed in reinforced concrete. Although the building is composed with Mission Revival elements and massing, the details are Art Deco, with chevron details typically used by Johnson and with complementary relief sculpture. The bronze doors and building hardware are more characteristic of Art Deco than of Mission. (Source: Wikipedia) Six Streamline Moderne interior reliefs are by William Atkinson, using motifs typical of the 1930s. Four panels represent modes of "Carrying the Mail" — Pony Express, Stage Coach, Clipper Ship, and Streamlined Railroad Engine and Airplane. Two panels represent "The Opening of the West"— Settlers breaking the ground to plant their crops and Chinese laborers building the transcontinental railroad.