About Us

The Dunes Center was founded in 1999 in a storefront in Guadalupe, CA and moved into its current location in a restored 1910 Craftsman home in 2005. The Dunes Center hosts thousands of visitors and reached over 3,000 students in 2011 through education programs. The mission statement of the Dunes Center is to promote the conservation and restoration of the Guadalupe-Nipomo Dunes Complex through education, research and the support of cooperative stewardship. The dunes complex is comprised of 18 miles of coastline and is one of the most biodiverse and ecologically significant coastal dune-lagoon ecosystems on earth. Approximately half of the 22,000 acres is permanently protected for habitat and passive recreation. Through education, we seek daily to encourage our visitors, young and old alike, to be good stewards of the environment by understanding their role and impact in it.