The Lighthouse: A Creative Campus Rooted in Bauhaus Ideals

Venice’s iconic post office is reborn as The Lighthouse - a bold, design-forward hub for creators of every discipline

Tucked one block from the Venice Beach Boardwalk, The Lighthouse is more than just a building - it’s a reimagined landmark and an entirely new concept in creative workspaces. Set within the former 1939 Venice Post Office, this pioneering 22,500-square-foot campus offers an ambitious blend of heritage and innovation, positioning itself as the first dedicated IRL hub built specifically for today’s digitally native creators.

The Lighthouse is more than just a building - it’s a reimagined landmark and an entirely new concept in creative workspaces, Image: Yoshihiro Makino

Designed by Nathan Warkentin of Warkentin Associates, The Lighthouse draws deeply from Bauhaus principles - unifying form and function with simplicity, honesty, and purpose. Brutalist details, industrial finishes, and custom design elements converge in a tactile space where every corridor, stairwell, and surface is part of a larger creative experience. The material palette is restrained but expressive: steel, glass, wood, and concrete appear in their natural states, softened by curated furniture and thoughtfully integrated lighting.

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Nathan Warkentin of Warkentin Associates, Image: Anna Arnet

But it’s what happens within these walls that makes The Lighthouse truly groundbreaking.

Spread across two levels, the campus offers tools and space for every stage of creative production. On the sunlit ground floor, members find open coworking spaces, private offices, meeting rooms, and a cosy central café - a social heart that echoes the intimacy of a living room. There’s also a 72-seat screening theater for performances, talks, and premieres. Below, the more industrial lower level houses state-of-the-art podcasting booths, a music studio, photography and video suites, a test kitchen, and even an analog studio - spaces intentionally designed for frictionless creation and collaboration.

Spread across two levels, the campus offers tools and space for every stage of creative production, Image: Yoshihiro Makino

As founder Jon Goss puts it, The Lighthouse is “a creative playground and ecosystem” where original minds can collide. From concept to production to publication, creators are supported with tools, community, and inspiration under one roof. And that’s intentional. Goss and Warkentin see the campus as a modern evolution of the Bauhaus ideal: not just a place to work, but a place to experiment, gather, and grow.

The space is not just a place to work, but a place to experiment, gather, and grow, Image: Yoshihiro Makino

Design inspiration ranges widely: the circulation-focused architecture of Le Corbusier’s Pavillon, the textural concrete of Paul Rudolph’s Yale A&A Building, the social openness of Japanese libraries, and even a vinyl DJ booth modeled after a college radio station in Grosse Pointe Blank. The result is a layered, living space where creators can feel both energized and at home.

Already, The Lighthouse is attracting a vibrant community of filmmakers, designers, chefs, podcasters, writers, and multi-hyphenate creatives looking to work IRL in meaningful proximity. With expansion underway - Brooklyn’s Greenpoint campus opens later this year, followed by London in 2026 - this Venice location is just the beginning of a global network built for creativity without compromise.

The vinyl DJ booth modeled after a college radio station in Grosse Pointe Blank, Image: Yoshihiro Makino

The Lighthouse proves that with the right vision, even a historic post office can once again become a hub of communication - only now, it's built for the digital age.