Wachovia Bank Building, Raleigh, N.C.
This week for Flashback Friday we feature a photochrome postcard depicting the former Wachovia Bank building on Fayetteville St. First introduced in the the late 1930s, ‘chromes’ have dominated American postcard production since the mid-1950s.
Wachovia Bank Building, Raleigh, N.C.
The nine-story home of Wachovia Bank and Trust Company in Raleigh is a striking feature of the Capital City skyline. Its 210-foot length and the panels accenting its height make it distinctive among bank and office buildings. This modern structure offers an inviting and attractive atmosphere for customers of the Southeast’s largest bank.
Designed in 1961 by Odell & Associates of Charlotte, with associate architect Guy Crampton of Raleigh, the Wachovia building features a street-level glass curtain wall, and an elegant, below street-level banking lobby. Slender precast concrete panels on the exterior accentuate the building’s verticality. The Internationalist-styled bank opened its doors in 1965, and has been a Fayetteville St. landmark ever since.
Another important (and now long-lost) Fayetteville St. landmark, straddling the 19th and 20th centuries, once occupied the site for more than 50 years. We included a write-up of that building in a Goodnight, Raleigh! post about a year ago. If any of our readers know what building I am referring to, we will publish a historic photo of it here next week in an update.
The Wachovia building is part of the Fayetteville Street Historic District* and is on the National Register of Historic Places.
*See document section number 7, page 2.
The publisher of this week’s postcard is unknown. The image is not an actual photograph, but appears to have been reproduced from an architectural rendering, as a signature appears in the lower right hand corner.
“Flashback Friday†is a weekly feature of Goodnight, Raleigh! in which we showcase vintage postcards depicting our historic capital city. We hope you enjoy this week end treat!
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11/09/2012
Another horrible, horrible building by Odell that should have never been built. Depressing seems to be this company’s mantra, and this building is no exception. In the building’s upper floors the low ceilings and minimal windows create a depressing work environment that requires much artificial lighting even on the brightest summer day. The restrooms are located with the publicly accessible elevator core, and the problems of vagrants using these facilities was so bad that Wachovia had to keep the bathrooms locked in order to keep the restrooms clean.
The vast branch space is sunken from street level, blocking most natural light and requiring elevation for handicap access. This negates nearly all of the advantages of this potentially pedestrian-accessible space.
The exterior facade panels are rough, rock panels that easily grow mold, yellow in irregular patterns, and are extremely expensive to maintain. Luckily Odell didn’t build in a pattern of pigeon crap-covered cubbies (as they did in so many of their window designs).
Overall, it is just a depressing facility that will take more than it is worth to correct.
I’ll join former Wachovia employees in taking a whack at this one when it eventually and mercifully comes down.
11/12/2012
In those days we used to say “Odell & Associates equals architecture by the yard”