Sunday, October 23, 2005

The Penobscot Building


When I was a kid we use to visit Dieppe Park in Windsor overlooking the Detroit River and the Detroit skyline. I remember thinking the Penobscot Building was the biggest building I had ever seen. I thought it was the building King Kong climbed, lol!!!!!

The building was designed by Wirt C. Rowland of the leading Detroit architectural firm Smith, Hinchman & Grylls.
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Clad in Indiana limestone with a granite base, it rises like a shear cliff for thirty stories, then has a series of setbacks culminating in a red neon beacon tower.
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Ornamentation follows American Indian motifs, particularly in the entrance archway and in metalwork found in the lobby.
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The Penobscot Building was Detroit's tallest building for nearly half a century until the Marriott Renaissance Center overtook it in 1977.
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Once the tallest building outside New York and Chicago
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8th tallest building in the world, when it was completed.
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The old framing elevation drawing of this building list is as being 560'-10" to the highest roof, 563'-10" to the parapet wall around the roof, and 652'-10" to the top of the warning beacon atop the antenna.

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