Spiegel-May-Stern Company

Category: Demolished

Alfred S. Alschuler makes a specialty of buildings of the utilitarian type. He is the regularly employed architect for the Central Manufacturing District. This must not be inferred to be in the center of the city. It is the corporate name of a land company which controls a district at least six miles from the center of the city and about half a mile square, all of which is to be improved with buildings of a similar character. It extends from 35th to 39th streets and
from Morgan street to Ashland avenue. Already several large buildings have been erected and others are in course of construction.

The illustration of Mr. Alschuler's work here given is the office building of the manufacturing concern known as the Spiegel-May-Stern Company. It is on 35th street between Morgan street and Center avenue, and in the Central Manufacturing District. It is constructed of reinforced concrete with an exterior of paving brick. The building stands free from all connection with others, front is a careful study of brick design, but in the cornice and entrance details, which are of stone, is reminiscent of some of the Renaissance forms, showing that Mr. Alschuler has not abandoned them entirely. The refined taste of the occupants is shown in the flower boxes on all the front window sills. The building
from the first floor up is in one room, with galleries. The lighting of the outside zone is by windows in the first and second stories. But the entire central section as well as the inner part of this zone is lighted from sawtooth skylights ranged across the roof and continued the whole length of the building, giving a north light and excluding all sunlight. This light is transmitted through a glass ceiling. It is shown in Fig. 10 which is a view of the office showing the details of its arrangement. This kind of office building was first used at the Larkin Building at Buffalo, designed by Frank Lloyd Wright. But Mr. Alschuler has made many improvements on it. The piers and girders are all of reinforced concrete.

(Source: Architectural Record, Index-Volume XXVII, January-June 1910. pgs. 195, 197-8)