Michigan in Pictures is hosted at WordPress.com. They are beginning to phase out posts written in their old format, so I am going to be re-sharing some so they don’t disappear forever. I always loved this photo that I shared 17 years ago today in 2009. I love the building too, and although it was one of many abandoned skyscrapers in downtown Detroit, it (like much of downtown) has returned to its former glory as one of the city’s most stunning buildings.
In a typically excellent article, Historic Detroit’s Dan Austin says (in part) of Book Tower:
She’s one of a kind. Some might even say beautiful in its ugliness. But regardless how you feel about its exterior, no one can deny that a seven-year, $300 million renovation has polished the Book Tower and Book Building into an absolute gem in the city’s skyline.
No skyscraper in Detroit, let alone the Midwest, looks quite like the Book Tower on Washington Boulevard. It’s a rather awkward-looking building, whether you look at its unusual maze of an external fire escape or the intricate, over-the-top details on its crown that are tough to appreciate without a pair of binoculars. It’s an undeniably unique piece of the city’s skyline and a rare breed of classical Renaissance-style architecture and skyscraper. As an added bonus, joined at its hip is one of the city’s oldest surviving office buildings.
…Starting in 1916, J. Burgess Book Jr. and his brothers embarked on trying to turn the rundown and ragged Washington Boulevard into an upscale and fashionable destination, similar to Fifth Avenue in New York. The first major building they had constructed was the Book Building, a rather simple 13-story Italian Renaissance office building that opened in 1917. The stately stone-faced structure, like most of the buildings on the boulevard, was designed by Louis Kamper, the Books’ architect of choice. While the Book brothers were the men behind Washington Boulevard, Kamper was the man who would build it.
While distinguished, the Book Building was hardly the architectural conversation starter or hint of what was to come. It was Kamper’s first major commercial design. The ground floor spaces were for shops; the floors above were for office space. Along the Washington Boulevard side, the Book Building has 12 sculptures of nude women, known as caryatids, which seem to be holding up the building’s cornice. Back in the 1970s, the priests across the street at St. Aloysius Catholic Church used to call them the wives of the 12 Apostles. The building’s U-shaped design allowed for ample sunlight in more offices.
Click through for much more about the Book including some dynamite photos of interior & exterior renovations by Helmut Ziewers.
See it bigger in Christian’s About Detroit gallery
