Phoenix's Art Deco gems

Art Deco architecture flowered in America in the 1920s and 1930s, epitomized by New York's Chrysler Building and the Los Angeles City Hall. Phoenix, population 29,053, was too small to gain as much as Deco fans like me would have wished. But it managed to preserve most of its masterpieces of the era.

Here they are (click on the photo for a larger image):

The Luhrs Tower:

When most people think of Phoenix Deco they think of this 14-story masterpiece, the brain child of George Luhrs Jr. and connected to the Luhrs Building by an arcade. Located at First Avenue and Jefferson Street, it was designed by Trost & Trost of El Paso.

 

The Phoenix Title and Trust Building:

Completed in 1931, the 11-story building was the largest in Arizona and was topped by a neon sign. Located at First Avenue and Adams Street, Title and Trust was the work of local architects Lescher & Mahoney. The second photo is the barber shop in the lobby. The he building is now the Orpheum Lofts.

The Professional Building:

Located at Central and Monroe Street, this was the headquarters of Valley National Bank from its completion in 1932 until the early 1970s. Morgan, Walls & Clements of Los Angeles was the architect of the 12-story building, which was recently restored as a Hilton Garden Inn. Starting in 1958, the tower was topped by a large, rotating Valley National Bank sign.

The same year another floor with large windows was added to the western wing for the Arizona Club. It had an elaborate bank lobby, below:

The lobby restored as part of the building's rebirth as a Hilton Garden Hotel (Brad Hall collection).

Maricopa County Courthouse/Phoenix City Hall:

Completed in 1929, this work of Lescher & Mahoney and Edward Neild combined deco with Mission Revival and Spanish Colonial Revival (especially on the interior lobby). In addition to courtrooms and city/county administration, it held a new police headquarters and city and county jails. My fictional detective David Mapstone works here. It was more beautiful when surrounded by shade trees and grass.

The City Hall side with carved Phoenix birds. The ornate City Council chambers are preserved along with most of the building's interior.

 

The Orpheum Theater:

Another Lescher &Mahoney creation, the Orpheum (later the Paramount and Palace West) was completed in 1929. It hosted Vaudeville acts before settling in as a movie theater. The city preserved and restored it, reopening in 1997. The Orpheum is at Second Avenue and Adams.

 

The Fox Theater:

Not purely Deco, Phoenix's only real movie palace employed the "sharp-edged, abstract zig-zag Moderne style" of architect S. Charles Lee. Located at First Street and Washington, the Fox opened in 1931 and seated 1,796. Demolished in 1975, it was Phoenix's greatest historic loss.

 

The Arizona Biltmore:

Completed in 1929, the Biltmore was designed by Frank Lloyd Wright protege Albert Chase McArthur (McCulloch Bros. Collection/ASU Archives).

Movie stars frequented the Biltmore (along with the Hotel San Carlos). Above are Harpo Marx and his wife, Susan "Girl With the Million-Dollar Legs" Fleming.

 

State Fair Building:

Built as the Ordnance Service Command Shop at 18th Avenue and McDowell by the WPA, this Deco/Streamline Moderne building opened in 1938. In 2014, preservationists successfully turned back an effort to demolish the building (McCulloch Bros. Collection/ASU Archive).

 

The Newberry/Kress Commercial Block:

Located on the north side of the First Avenue and Washington Street, these stood until the 1980s, when they were replaced by the twin Renaissance towers (McCulloch Bros./ASU Archives).

 

I’m omitting a few products of the 1920s boom — Union Station, old Main Post Office, Hotel San Carlos, Hotel Westward Ho, and the Security Building — because their vernacular wasn’t Deco  But they’re still beloved  

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My book, A Brief History of Phoenix, is available to buy or order at your local independent bookstore, or from Amazon.

Read more Phoenix history in Rogue's Phoenix 101 archive.

 

 

 

 

Comments

[Mariam Cheshire]

And then there is the Westward Ho. I don't know how to put a picture here, but this link will take you to my book "Stories About the Hotel Westward Ho" which is full of pictures, old and new. History, Mystery and Love is the theme. I lived there for twelve years and the Westward Ho Historic Group roamed it from basement to forgotten attic rooms. I even gave Jon a tour when we gave both individual and group tours. And a lot of Jon's history helped to show those early beginning 1928 years.

Mariam Cheshire Or just go to Amazaon/Kindle and put in my name and all of my books will show up.

https://amzn.to/36fWoQO

[Mike Doughty]

Went to Fox to see “Sound of Music” in the late 60’s.we didn’t realize they were going to demolish it. Should have been a Historical building designation.

[jms]

A delightful post, Jon! Your roundup includes some of my favorite buildings, not only in Phoenix but anywhere. The Luhrs Tower in particular is a real dazzler. One tiny quibble, however....

Zig Zag Moderne is most precisely a subset of — and least precisely a synonym for — Art Deco. What is ZZM is by definition also Art Deco, although the reverse isn't true. ZZM is what one called that typically sharp-edged, often colorful, highly geometrical style, often including such motifs as octagons, zigzags, styled floral forms, and chevrons, before the term Art Deco was coined (in 1968!) to cover not only that but also the later Streamline Moderne style, which, inspired by the aerodynamic curves of airplanes, automobiles, etc., smoothed out those sharp edges. To my eye, all the buildings you list qualify as essentially ZZM, although a few — the Luhrs Tower, the County-City Building, the Orpheum — could also be described by Carla Breeze's useful term Pueblo Deco; check out her wonderful 1990 book of that title.

As for the distinction between ZZM and Streamline Moderne, consider a few NYC buildings all designed by Raymond Hood: the former RCA (30 Rockefeller Plaza) & McGraw-Hill Buildings as examples of Art Moderne, and the Daily News & American Radiator Buildings as ZZM. Of course there can be hybrids, too: the fluted columns flanking the main entrance to the Phoenix Title and Trust Building almost suggest Art Moderne, though the rest of it is ZZM.

All hail Lescher & Mahoney! They had the magic touch.

_____

Mariam: true, there is the Westward Ho ... but I spot nothing on it I'd call Art Deco. Spanish Colonial Revival, maybe? Granted, the form of the building exhibits what one might call "Art Deco massing", but that's a whole different beast and a topic in its own right.

[Marti McVey]

Please post to ART DECO..they would LOVE it..this is so tiny on my phone, can't see if there's a SHARE button

[Jill Ginsburg]

Oh, this is a lovely article!

[Kathi Derevan]

I was born in the old St. Joseph Hospital on Christmas Eve, 1949, and lived in Phoenix until my marriage in 1971. All your stories and photos bring back so many great memories. I’ve been inside most of these buildings. My older brother met John F. Kennedy at the Westward Ho during his presidential campaign. My dad loved to tell the story that the Westward Ho guaranteed sunny days, and if the sun didn’t show, your room for that day was free. I don’t know if that’s true, but I loved hearing him tell it.

I went to Phoenix Union HS for just over a year, until East High opened. My older siblings all graduated from PUHS.

[Cal Lash]

I like Harpos hat.

[jms]

Cal: you're right, that is a most impressive hat. Somehow I had hardly noticed.
_____

It's a pity there weren't a lot more Art Deco beauties built in Phoenix in the 1920s/30s. Still, racking my brain to think of any others, I managed to come up with a few that probably belong on the list: the J.J. Newberry, S.H. Kress, and F.W. Woolworth stores on Washington. Indeed, the first two have come up here before. As for the Woolworth, I refer to its original form, before it was messed with. (If they were aiming for Streamline Moderne, I'd say they missed and hit dreary.) Of course they're all gone now, but then so is the Fox.

[Rogue Columnist]

Thanks for the reminder, jms.

[Cal Lash]

JMS, the Hat?
You have to look past the legs.
There is a vacant Sprouse Reitz store in Superior Arizona. And the old MAGA hotel has been refurbished.The old Dairy Queen is now an Italian eatery with a James Dean, Marylin Monroe and Humphrey Bogart without a Hat in a wall picture.

Regarding the Luhrs, my CPA's uncle, also a CPA went off the 11th floor. That was back when some of Phoenix's questionables occupied some space. I had an office in the Luhrs as a result of a business i bought. I never used it due to the obvious mold issues.
JMS, thanks for all that explanation. But it was beyond my comprehension.
Today was a good day as when i turned on the faucet, water came forth and it was only 114.

[Mariam Cheshire]

O.K., I give up. Please explain to a dumb blonde. Harpo's Hat -- I'm lost. And I looked at Harpo's hat in reality and I can't find anything that compares to art deco.
Tomorrow will be better - only 112 out your way. It's worse in downtown Phoenix.

[jms]

Mariam: First of all, it's quite impossible that Fred's mom could be any sort of “dumb blonde” — 100% out of the question. Case closed, okay? It's just a cool hat. Not an Art Deco hat, mind you, simply a cool hat. And it appears not to be Harpo's standard top hat but rather his suave hat, the sort one would want to wear around the Biltmore. Beyond that ... I'll let Jon explain it. ;)

Jon: Thanks, glad to have been of service. But surely there must be ... nah, I can't think of any others. Folks, if you love Art Deco, Phoenix is not the ideal place to look.

But for fans of the Luhrs Tower (and who isn't?), one other building deserves mention, even though it's not in Phoenix: the O. T. Bassett Tower in El Paso, a cousin by the same architects, Trost & Trost. It's another gem.

(Speaking of doubling, two of my very favorite Manhattan skyscrapers are “cousin buildings” by the team of Cross & Cross: the City Bank–Farmers Trust Building and the RCA Victor Building. Same general massing, same year of construction (1931), similar height, and although their styles differ, both come under Art Deco's broad umbrella. The glorious RCA Victor is about as zigzaggy as it gets.)

Don't puddle, people!

[Cal Lash]

The Historic Saint James Hotel to be a parking lot for the Phoenix Suns????

[Mariam Cheshire]

jms - How do you know Fred? Back in the days when Fred was taking me to lunch, no matter where, downtown, Encanto, Peoria, Tempe and anyplace around, someone would come up and say, "Dr. Cheshire, I was in your class, or you taught me Archery or we went to church/school together. I used to get exasperated that someone else would take my time with him. But I never expected to see my son on the Rogue. And it was so like old times, I wanted to cry. Email is [email protected]

[jms]

Mariam: the name-check is in the mail!
_____

The St. James may not have been a Paradise, but still ... sorry to see it go. Pretty much the same inglorious fate befell one of my favorite Phoenix buildings, the unique Blue Cross–Blue Shield HQ.

But of course Phoenix has a history — much of it now in landfill.

[Cal Lash]

Was there a tunnel from the
Saint James to the Singh High?