Miami Beach Post Office - New Deal Rotunda

Photo: Daniel Di Palma, CC BY-SA 4.0 (cropped)

A stop on Miami Beach: Art Deco District Walk, a free self-guided tour.

Mail call was never this stylish. Miami native Howard Lovewell Cheney designed this post office, finished in 1937 during the New Deal building boom. Its heart is the round, domed rotunda on the corner, with a stone eagle over the entrance and the rest of the building stretching along Washington Avenue and 13th Street.

Step inside during business hours and look up. A sunburst light fixture shines against a brilliant teal ceiling above a small round fountain and walls of gold-colored post office boxes. Around the room runs a three-panel mural by Florida painter Charles Hardman, commissioned in 1940 by the Treasury's Section of Fine Arts. It shows Ponce de Leon's arrival in 1513, Hernando de Soto's battles with Native people in 1539, and General Thomas Jesup negotiating with Seminole leaders in 1837. The scenes reflect how Florida's history was told in 1940, so look at them with a critical eye.

This is still a working post office, so keep your voice down and your visit short.

Getting here: Walk north on Collins Avenue to 13th Street, then west one block to Washington Avenue; the rotunda faces the corner.

Did you know?: The rotunda's dome is covered in blue tiles from Ludowici Celadon, an American company famous for its clay roof tiles.

Photo op: From the opposite corner of Washington Avenue and 13th Street, frame the rotunda and its eagle head on.

More on Wikipedia: Miami Beach Post Office · Juan Ponce de Leon · Hernando de Soto · Thomas Jesup

Miami Beach Post Office - New Deal Rotunda

Stops on this tour