National Historic Landmark listed June 29, 1989
National Register listed October 14, 1980
State Historical Marker erected 1978

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The Fisher Building is an Art Deco masterpiece with a 28-story marble and granite tower and two 11-story wings. William and Alfred Fisher founded the Fisher Body Company and were early developers of the closed automobile. There were seven Fisher brothers though, and it was here that their offices were located. Perhaps the most significant building designed by Detroit architect Albert Kahn, it has been called the largest art object in Detroit. Kahn won the Architectural League’s Silver Medal designating this as the most beautiful commercial structure of the year.

Guardian Building (Union Trust Building), architect Wirt C. Rowland, 1929
National Historic Landmark listed June 29, 1989
National Register listed June 29, 1989

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Nicknamed the “Cathedral of Commerce,” the Guardian Building is one of the most expressive Art Deco skyscrapers ever built. This 485 foot or 40 story building was built for $12 million for the Union Trust Company, but the company was unable to survive the stock market crash of 1929.

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This iconic Detroit building was designed by Wirt C. Rowland in 1927, prior to building the magnificent Guardian Building just a few blocks away.

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Art Deco was not limited to the monumental buildings of downtown Detroit. Architect George J. Haas of St. Clair Shores designed the Macomb County Building in Mt. Clemens. This 12-story skyscraper was in striking contrast to what was still at that time an area rural in character.

National Register listed as (“Capitol Park Historic District”), March 18, 1999

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The 37-story David Stott Building can trace its lineage to Eliel Saarinen’s landmark Chicago Tribune proposal. A reddish granite base is covered by a tan-orange tower that rises to the twenty-third floor. After which the building tapesr back through a series of graceful setbacks at different levels to its terminus.

National Register listed (as “Belle Isle”) February 25, 1974

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This is the only Art Deco lighthouse in the United States. Designed in 1929 by Albert Kahn’s firm as a tribute to William Livingstone, president of the Lake Carriers Association, the lighthouse is sheathed in white Georgia marble.

National Register listed July 7, 1983

The Maccabees Building is a fourteen story tower flanked by four shorter subordinated masses reaching from the center to each corner and with space between these shorter masses and central mass on each side. This is similar to Kahn’s Free Press Building of 1923. The steel-frame construction, reinforced concrete floors, and architectural detailing were also Kahn signatures and later seen in the later Fisher Building.

Detroit Naval Armory, Stratton and Hyde, 1930
State Historical Marker erected April 11, 1983
National Register listed July 1, 1994

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The Detroit Naval Armory (or Brodhead Armory) is a consummately crafted Art Deco building inside and out. Here a harmonious integration of architecture, woodcarving, plasterwork, and murals together make a building as art object – creating a similar effect to the much larger and more grandiose Fisher Building, Penobscot Building, and Guardian Building all constructed a few years earlier.

Construction of the 1,700 seat Wyandotte Theater was completed in 1938 at a cost of $200,000. Associated Theaters, Inc. owned and operated this theater, as well as other in Highland Park, Trenton, Flint, and Three Rivers.

National Register listed May 15, 1985

The Elwood is a one-story, flat-roofed Art Deco style structure. Built in 1937 by Charles Noble, it functioned as Woodward’s roadside diner for decades. It was originally located on the corner of Elizabeth and Woodward streets from which it got its name (for ELizabeth and WOODward).

The phrase “Deco-Echo” has been used to describe buildings constructed in the Art Deco style or with Art Deco features in the period after the 1960’s to present day. This is a phenomena experienced not only in Detroit, but it communities throughout the United States.

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Centaur is an elegant, two-story Art Deco cocktail lounge, located in the heart of Detroit’s theater and entertainment districts. The striking 1920’s French-inspired Art Deco interior has three stories with a chandelier suspended between these through an open space connecting the three floors. Large hand-painted murals are also inside, including a reproduction of Jean Dupas’ 1925 Les Perruches. One might easily mistake this for an interior designed in the 1920’s, though Centaur did not come about until 2005, thus making this an excellent Detroit example of the Deco-Echo.

Photo Credit: Al Trombetta

The phrase “Deco-Echo” has been used to describe buildings constructed in the Art Deco style or with Art Deco features in the period after the 1960’s to present day. This is a phenomena experienced not only in Detroit, but it communities throughout the United States.