10:00am

Los Angeles is like no other city. The Conservancy’s Walking Tour Program explores the history and heart of our amazing city through interpretation of L.A.’s unique architectural resources. Since 1980, the Los Angeles Conservancy has introduced countless Angelenos to the rich history and culture that downtown’s architecture has to offer.

Each Saturday morning, L.A. Conservancy will hold tours of downtown’s Union Station. The Union Station tour covers architecture, art, culture, and social history as it celebrates one of the great landmarks of Los Angeles, the 1939 Union Station.

Union Station is one of the most beloved landmarks in Los Angeles. Opened in 1939, the station was a gateway to the city. Thousands and thousands of people from other states poured through its gates every day to soak up the famous California sunshine.

The station’s architecture mixes the romance of Los Angeles’ Spanish and Mexican past with the geometric designs of the machine age. Brightly patterned tiles, smooth marble floors, grand arches, and 50-foot-high painted ceilings make the building a treasure trove of color, texture, and shape.

Union Station turned out to be the last of its kind. Train travel began to lose popularity in the 1940s, and no other grand stations were built in America.

After decades of decline, this marvelous building has come to life again as commuter hub for trains, light rail, and buses, and once again tens of thousands of people course through the building every day.

This hour-long tour explores the great Union Station through its beautiful shapes and colors, its relationship to the growth of Los Angeles, and its train history.