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Louis Sullivan's Guaranty Building

Louis Sullivan’s Guaranty Building
1895-1896

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The Design
The Guaranty Building, completed in 1895, is recognized as one of the masterpieces of Louis Sullivan, probably the most important American architect of the 19th century and acknowledged today as the “Father of the Skyscraper.” In the 1890s the skyscraper was a new and uniquely American building type. Most early skyscrapers, including the Guaranty Building’s neighbor, the Ellicott Square Building, borrowed heavily from classical European design and used strong horizontal lines to de-emphasize their verticality. Familiar styles were used for what were new, and often overwhelmingly large, structures.

Sullivan wanted a bold new architectural style for the new building type that would express the confidence and prosperity of the United States at the end of the 19th century. He rejected traditional designs and celebrated the skyscraper’s verticality. The Guaranty Building is an outstanding example of Sullivan’s innovations.

The Guaranty Building stunningly illustrates Sullivan’s famous statement that “form follows function.” The building’s intricate terra cotta ornamentation, for example, accentuates its structure. The piers between the windows form strong vertical lines that draw the eye upward to the dominant cornice. Yet, despite the technological advancements that made the skyscraper possible (such as structural steel and elevators), Sullivan strove to connect it with the natural world. His ornamentation for the Guaranty Building was inspired by flowers, seedpods, and even, at the top of the building, the spreading branches of a tree.

The Guaranty Building represents the pinnacle of Sullivan’s forward thinking design. It marks the beginning of a distinctly American style of architecture and would even influence a young Frank Lloyd Wright, who joined Sullivan’s firm in 1888.

Sullivan himself was born in Boston in 1856 and started his architectural schooling at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. After working under architects Frank Furness and William LeBaron Jenney, he finished his training at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris. He returned to the United States in 1881 and settled in Chicago, forming the firm of Adler and Sullivan. Sullivan was the design partner, while Dankmar Adler was the engineer. Adler and Sullivan’s buildings, including the Auditorium Building and Stock Exchange Building in Chicago, the Wainwright Building in St. Louis, and the Guaranty Building in Buffalo, were at the leading edge of American architecture and skyscraper design. The Guaranty Building, often described as a ‘sister’ to the Wainwright Building in St. Louis, is widely regarded as a refinement of that earlier design.

The Guaranty was Sullivan and Adler’s last collaboration. Sullivan withdrew from the firm in 1895, and turned his practice from skyscrapers to small buildings in small towns. Prevailing styles, led by the Columbian Exposition of 1893, began to turn away from Sullivan’s innovations for a more traditional neoclassicism. His career declined, and Sullivan died in obscurity and poverty in Chicago in 1924.

The Building
The Guaranty Building’s story dates back to approximately 1890, when several wooden frame structures stood on the corner of Pearl and Church Streets. Hascal L. Taylor, a local oil magnate, purchased the site with a dream to build the “finest office building in the country.”

Taylor died before the plans were completed, and the Guaranty Construction Company acquired the plans and built the building between March 1895 and March 1896. At 152 feet, the building was the tallest in the city when it was built. Its 13 stories suggest the builders’ confident defiance of superstition. The structure originally had a “U” shape, with an open court to the south to provide natural light. The facades along Pearl and Church Streets were covered in intricately designed terra cotta tiles incorporating floral and geometric motifs. The light court was faced in white glazed tiles to reflect as much light as possible.

The Guaranty Building was renamed the Prudential Building soon after it was completed to acknowledge refinancing provided by the Prudential Insurance Company. Both names can be seen above the entrances. For decades, the structure was one of Buffalo’s finest business addresses.

The Great Depression brought hard times for the Guaranty Building. Although recognized as an architectural masterpiece as early as 1940, the building suffered through the next several decades. By the mid 1950s, the building was being described as “old and dirty.” In 1955, an ill-judged “modernization” project added a fiberglass exterior to the lower floors and a dropped ceiling in the lobby. Later cleaning efforts damaged the intricate terra cotta with harsh sandblasting.

The decline accelerated with a fire in 1974 that damaged the interior. Occupancy dropped, and the building was sold at auction. Despite a growing appreciation for the building, and its designation in 1975 as a National Historic Landmark, by 1977 the building's out-of-town owners were planning to demolish it to make the site more marketable.

Strenuous objections from preservationists, in Buffalo and around the country, thwarted the demolition plans. Civic leaders, most notably Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan, secured a series of grants and loans to restore the building. By September 1982, the $12.4 million project was complete, and the officially re-named Guaranty Building again took its rightful place among Buffalo’s premier office buildings.

The building’s future was again imperiled in 1998 when its owner went into bankruptcy. The law firm of Hodgson Russ LLP, which had been a leading force in the earlier effort to preserve the building, purchased it in 2002 at a foreclosure sale for use as its principal offices, thus ensuring that the Guaranty Building will continue as one of America’s most important architectural landmarks.

Terra Cotta
Terra cotta (Italian for ‘baked earth’) is a building material that uses clay to form durable, versatile, and fireproof tiles. It can be formed into a variety of shapes, including very intricate designs. Once fired at high temperatures, much like a clay flowerpot or ceramic dinner plate, terra cotta gives the look and feel of stone, but is comparatively lightweight and inexpensive.

Terra cotta was a favorite material of Louis Sullivan and other late 19th century architects. Many notable buildings in Buffalo use terra cotta extensively, including the Niagara Mohawk Building, the Telephone Building, the Calumet Building, the Sidway Building, Shea’s Performing Arts Center, the Catholic Center, and the Ansonia Building.