Detroit Free Press from Detroit, Michigan • Page 112

BUHL BUILDING AS SEEN FROM THE RIVER All the Electrical Installation in the Buhl" Building tj A ft 4 i as used for the Entire Exterior 1 -Hi 1 i I I '7 'hii if 1 of the new Buhl Building. The desirability and value of office space in this building is greatly increased by its beautiful exterior. JJ; .3 I kill Ji, I I I I 't Building owners and architects i everywhere should consider seriously the commercial value of structures such as this that 'i embody both beauty and dignity. ANOTHER SAMPLE OF OUR SERVICE AND FACILITIES' iV Tlie Northwestern VpyTerra Cotta Company UHlUAliU 'Miehigsa Detroit "TJ Western PUnt Denw Tsrrs Celt Ompsnjr i Danver, Colo, 7 Southwestern PUnt 6t Leuli Tsrra Cetts Company i 8t tut, Mn. The Buhl Building, taken from the upper deck of a river boat This unusual view ihowi what the Buhl Building has done in reshaping Detroit skyline.

Thii building serves to establish more firmly than ever the permanency of the financial district in lower Gnswold street. mechanics and management could make them. Utility is the keynote of the New Buhl Building Represents Experience of Nation's Experts equipment Every mechanical factor that will make office space more usable haa been Introduced. Then comes the attention and care of a staff of able Janitors, elevator operators, electricians, carpenters and ft National Aitociation of Own- ert, Managers Aided in Selecting Plan. In the new Buhl building, which opened for orctipanry Mny 1, De others who look after the welfare of tenants.

Elevator service is one of the utilities in an office building that can cause untold irritation or can completely satisfy occupants and visitors. In this building every precaution has apparently been taken not only to assure adequate All the passenger carrying capacity, but to see that passengers are taken care wold street entrance are archways connecting with the central entrance but only as deep aa the revolving doors at the inner entrance. On the Congress street aide is aa entrance leading into the other end of the L-shaped lobby. Lobby la Handsome, The lobby Itself is 18 feet wide and 18 feet high beneath a coffered celling decorated in polychrome and gold. The walls of tbls corridor are of travertine, a richly colored Italian marble.

Upper floors have a seven-foot wainscoting of cream Alabama marble with a four-inch strip of green marble at the base. Office entrances and elevator doors in the main lobby are finished In ornamental bronze. of with the greatest dispatch and the least annoyance. Twelve Otis passenger elevators troit poewKsfs one of the most unique offlre buildlngi in the Cnlt-ed Siatpn. Not only the Buhl building iinUiua hut It in distinctly different from ny othor pulilto building here or pluewhere in Its Itln croaB floor plan.

I'nlqne Form Is Advantage, Thtit the building Is unusual Is only Incidental, according to the arrhltectM, Smith, Hlnchman Kittanning have been Installed, half for local and half for express service. These elevators are a new, gearless, multi voltage type. They are absolutely noiseless, and they start and stop without To avoid confusion or Face Brick congestion on a single exchange floor the service has been arranged so that transfer from local to ex Everywhere throughout the building are evidences of advanced press elevators may le made on both the fifteenth and sixteenth features worked out with a view in the floors. A thirteenth elevator will be devoted to freight Barber Shoe For Waraon. lOrylls.

What the builders, tho Puhl Ijnd aimed at were three fundamental advantages, and thene three things determined the form of tho building. I First of all came utility; then I came the matter of harmonizing the jshape and character of the building with modern tendencies In city planning: then cams beauty, i Much study has been devoted In recent years to ridding large cities of tho "canyon" effects of streets bordered by perpendicular aides of 'towering office buildings. More to making utility to tenants and to their visitors a factor of unusual Importance. And this has been accomplished in the Buhl building along with many other desirable results. agers, the largest organization of Its kind in the world, was taken advantage of.

This organization made a thorough study of the plans and tho aspects of tha site before lending their approval to the final plans. Bulletins "as 2 Rtorlra. Fronting 120 feet on Griswold street and ISO on Congress, the Buhl building stands 365 feet high 16 stories. It rests on a combination steel and concrete floor slab which is supported on caissons sunk TO feet Into tha hard blue clay. The general form of the building permits of a central column which houses the various service units, such as conduits for electrical wires, fire towers, water pipes in other words this Is the "spinal column" of the building.

The four wings of the building extend from this central column, thug furnishing the choicest space for rental. Dark corners and waste space are eliminated from rental areas. All space units are outside locations, having the advantages of light, air and sunshine, beside fine views of the surrounding rivers and lakes. Looking down on the hundreds of water craft treading their ways up and down the main channels of these la1es and rivers, the spectator gazes upon a panorama the like of which is to be found nowhere else in the world. More ships and more tonnage pass beneath the shadow of this structure than through both the Panama and Rues canals.

And when the Great Lakes to-sea route Is completed and giant ocean vessels plow these waters the scenes that will then be witnessed can be pictured only in the imagination of the romanticist. Room Tor Small OAeea. A further advantage of the cross formation is the opportunity It permits for dividing the space units into various combinations to provide both large and small offices with only slight changes of the interior plsns. Buhl Building One of the special arrangements of the building will be barber shop service In connection with the women's rest room on the sixteenth floor. The barber shop haa eight Compliments of The Jaeger Studios chairs, of which two are in connection with the rest room being devoted to women's use for a beauty and bobbing shop.

Wash stands in offices are provid light, more air, greater range of view from upper floors were sought By adopting the Ijitln cross form, the builders of this structure assert they hnve ohtalned every BUILDING GIVES UNIQUE SERVICE Central Column Houses Elevators, Conduits, Leaves Best Space For Offices. Office building service bas been imbued with a new meaning by the extraordinary facilities Incorporat ed with running hot and cold water through faucets without cut-off valves. The building will take care of its own towel supply. General service headquarters is in the basement where also are to be found safe deposit vaults for the convenience of tenants after bank' thing desirable in an office bundling and at the same time made It (conform to the most modem city plan. These results have been accomplished without sacrificing i ground space, and with several disjunct advantages to tenants of the building.

And. happily, the I-atln cross form has given the builders opportunities nut open to architectural treatment in buildings of other Ishapes. It apparent that full iadvantase hn been taken of these opportunities with the result that the new Hubl building may be termed a real masterpiece of archi lng house hours and storage space FURNISHED BY. Jtftt. ed in the Buhl building, which was for files and other office records not in constant use by tenants.

But above and beyond the details opened for occupancy May 1. Something of an unusual character has been added by the latin of office arrangement and equipment something more significant has emerged. One is impressed cross floor plan of this, Detroit's with an indefinable Influence that may best be expressed by the term "hospltability" in the Buhl newest office building. At the center of the building, where the "beams" of this figurative cross intersect, rises to the full height of the building what has been spoken tecture. All Amdahl Spare la Vaed.

Space is so arranged that where Primarily, of course, an office building is not meant to cater to hospitality, but to have occupants As a result of Its cross-shaped i tenant occupies an entire floor floor plan the building allows thej'he elevator lobby becomes the re-smalteht perimeter that Is possible room. Where two or more of as a service "backbone," from and their clients and visitors feel wings are occupied by a single ten for the ground space It occupies slid at home in the building is a dis tinct asset. And In this respect the general ensemble of architectural and decorative motifs has ac which the principal service facilities are supplied. Column Forma Housed In this central column are such units as elevators, stairways, water mains, fire towers, janitor closets, toilet rooms, fire complished a 'general effect that It felt immediately one steps within the entrance arch. alarm fixtures, electrical conduits, Therefore, as a contribution to Detroit's metropolitan dignity and ant they may be completely connected without using the public elevator lobby for getting from one wing to the other.

Steel and concrete comprise the main structural framework of the building. Exterior walls are of granite, terra cotta laid in blocks of random size. This arrangement, blending wflh the exterior decorative and color scheme makes up an artistic composition of unusual attractiveness. The main entrance of the building on Griswold street leads into yet full advantage is taken of th available space. In effect, therefore, the floors above the third story are set back from the street, that is, they allow i for greater unoccupied space around ho outer portion instead of calling ifor light courts and air spaces jwithln the outer walls.

The effect Is the same as would be obtained widening the streets on which the building stands and the alloy to the south. There have been many office building floor plans worked out mail chutes, hose cabinets and meter rooms. This brings these necessary utilities in compact form at the center of the building, Puritan Brick Tile Co. 710 Farwell Building DETROIT Mlcfclcaa. priced, the Buhl building haa unquestionably marked a distinct forward step.

Building- Silo la Hlaiortr. where they occupy space which cannot be so advantageously adapt ed to the use of offices. This economical arrangement of For more than 75 years the site at Griswold and Congress streets on which Detroit's newest and most beautiful office structure, the during the development of office jthe main stem of the L-shaped building architecture, such as the (lobby through a recessed orna- 233 Forest Avenue, East Detroit, Michigan L. 1, U. and shapes, but all arch flanked on each side Buhl building, stands, has been i other plans considered were dis by a stately granite pillar Detroit's financial and legal center.

From the days of Sieur Antoine service facilities has made possible many conveniences not always to be found In office buildings. For instance, there are toilet rooms both for men and women on every floor and wash rooms in all offices. As business becomes more complex, office facilities must meet a heavier service demand. It Is with this in view that the builders of This entrance Is distinctly an office building entrance, placed In the exact middle of the Griswold street de la Mothe Cadillac it has been a carded in favor of the Latin cross plan. i It is stntod that more than plans were studied and given tip strategic spot.

front, and neither entrance nor According to maps of 1796 this A I 1 1., K.i A A 1, site was Just below the southeast aud in this work the accumulated 'convenience of any one tenant of Experience of the National Assocla-itbe building. ern rampart of old Fort Shelby, partly inside and partly outside of the esplanade or parade ground. this structure provided service factors that are as complete as modern On either side of the main Grls-1 tlon of Building Owners and Man-1 -7.