The Culver Hotel is a historic boutique hotel in downtown Culver City, California, located at 9400 Culver Boulevard. Opened in 1924, the six-story, wedge-shaped Renaissance Revival building is one of the city’s most recognizable landmarks and contains 46 guest rooms, a restaurant, bar and event spaces. Designed by the architectural firm Curlett & Beelman, the hotel was once promoted as Culver City’s first “skyscraper” and remains closely associated with the city’s motion-picture heritage. Over the years it has hosted numerous actors and entertainment-industry figures, and many of the performers who portrayed the Munchkins in the 1939 film The Wizard of Oz stayed at the hotel while working at the nearby MGM studios. The Culver Hotel was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1997.

The hotel was built by Culver City founder Harry H. Culver and opened on September 4, 1924 as the Hotel Hunt. Culver used the building in part to house his real-estate offices and sales organization, and its prominent location reflected his efforts to establish Culver City as both a commercial center and a hub of the growing motion-picture industry. The hotel subsequently became associated with Hollywood figures including Clark Gable, Greta Garbo, Joan Crawford and Buster Keaton, several of whom maintained apartments there. In 1938, many of the 124 actors cast as Munchkins in The Wizard of Oz were housed at the hotel during production at MGM, a connection that later became one of the hotel’s best-known pieces of Hollywood history. After a period of decline and intermittent use during the late 20th century, the property underwent restoration and revitalization beginning in the 2000s and returned to prominence as a boutique hotel and gathering place in the revitalized downtown Culver City.

Culver Hotel

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