Clock Tower Building, Santa Monica, Art Deco office tower in Santa Monica, United States

The Clock Tower Building is a 12-story Art Deco office tower at 225 Santa Monica Boulevard, faced in white stone slabs. Its base holds retail space, the second through twelfth floors are offices, and an off-center stepped tower with clock faces on each side rises above. A crenellated border with zigzag relief tops the office floors.

Commissioned by the Bay Cities Guaranty and Loan Association, the Clock Tower Building was designed by the Los Angeles firm Walker & Eisen and built between 1929 and 1930. For about 40 years it held the title of tallest building in Santa Monica. The Sorgente Group of America bought the skyscraper in May 2013.

The building's massing and wall decoration draw on pre-Columbian architecture, as the source describes. Look for the zigzag pattern in relief on the sides and around the edge of the summit, and the crenellated border above the twelve office floors, where the cladding's most ornate decoration is concentrated.

The tower sits directly on Santa Monica Boulevard with accessible ground-floor retail spaces visible from the street. The upper office floors are not open to public access, but the full architectural features and clock tower are viewable from sidewalk level.

The stepped four-story clock tower sits deliberately off-center at the roof rather than centered, creating visual asymmetry. This intentional design choice gives the facade a sense of dynamic movement that breaks from typical Art Deco symmetry.