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• 1 2017-12-15T16:38:05-08:00 The Seagram and Woolworth Buildings as Architectural Translations of Business Success 9 What brought them to be: The Commission and Patrons plain 2017-12-27T15:37:56-08:00 The commission of the Woolworth and the Seagram buildings was like those of most skyscrapers of their time; they were statements of power, commercially for the corporations they housed, and personally for the patrons whose names were associated with them. The Woolworth Building was constructed to honour its client Frank W. Woolworth. It was meant to showcase his business success while the Seagram Building also had a corporate affiliation with the Seagram company and CEO Samuel Bronfman as the client.
   
  The Woolworth Building was commissioned by Frank Woolworth who became wealthy after founding the well-known chain that was F. W. Woolworth & Co. Five and Ten Cent Stores. His stores were a new development in commerce as he created a chain with a dominant position in a sector of a market.[1] Woolworth stimulated consumer desire and promoted the type of consumerism that reached across many social classes with consistent pricing for desired goods.[2] It was through this talent in merchandizing and a large ego that fueled him that he accumulated such wealth to pay for the Woolworth Building. Woolworth sold goods for amounts that appealed to price-conscious people and yet price consciousness was not on his mind or in his plans while imagining the Woolworth Building. A chain with a particular identity was a new idea, and Woolworth embraced the attention this business model was attracting and was obviously comfortable converting its identity into a head office building which he conceived as an “imposing urban monument.”[3] The Woolworth Building was undoubtedly built with the intention of being a visible reflection of his business success. Frank W. Woolworth was supposedly quite head strong and driven and once he captured an audience economically, he wanted to further extend this gesture with “his seemingly sudden decision to build a gigantic and extremely visible Gothic Skyscraper, the height of which topped all earlier records, and he did.”[4] Woolworth’s head office space only took up one and a half floors in total (floors 23 and 24) while the rest was retail space for tenants. Interestingly, a gigantic structure was not needed for the company’s size but, instead, it was needed to showcase the power of the Woolworth name in the skyline of New York City.
   
  The Seagram Building was built with similar intentions as the Woolworth Building. It was to be an iconic structure in the city of New York, but for a different corporation and patron and designed by a different architect. The Seagram Building was commissioned by Samuel Bronfman, the CEO and founder of the Distillers Corporation Limited which acquired the Seagram Distillery Company and kept its name, both of which having Canadian roots.[5] Bronfman was a business man who valued organization and hard work all the while following the motto he “tried to live by: Integrity—Tradition—Craftsmanship.”[6] In the 1930s, Samuel Bronfman took sole and full control of Seagram from his brothers and continued to ensure its dominant position in the liquor industry of North American.[7] This was possible due to Bronfman’s entrepreneurial skills as he was “an exceptional industrialist and strategist.”[8] The head office space for Bronfman was in downtown Montréal, Québec. Bronfman established the subsidiary Seagram, of parent company Distillers Corporation Limited, in the United States by purchasing distilleries and moving into office space in New York City, which happened not long after Prohibition was repealed in 1933.[9] Bronfman extended his entrepreneurial skills into advertising and marketing as he branded Seagram products while instilling his belief of “valu[ing] quality in all things.”[10] As his company’s success and visibility grew, the single floor it occupied in the Chrysler Building no longer provided enough space. Bronfman, like Woolworth, understood you had to spend money to obtain it, a philosophy that is reflected in the former’s plan for Seagram’s new head office. The intention behind the Seagram Building was to be more than just a head office. Phyllis Lambert captures in her book, Building Seagram, what the Seagram Building truly stood for: “The Seagram building was to be more than a company headquarters: I believe [Samuel Bronfman] came to see it as a monument to the opportunities business afforded in the New World, a monument to his company, which was his own doing, and therefore, ultimately, a monument to himself.”[11]
   
  Although the two buildings were conceived and constructed in very different times and for different corporations, they were, as skyscrapers, “meant to be correlated with the appearance of large-scale enterprise on the American economic scene.”[12] The Woolworth and Seagram Buildings were intended to demonstrate not only business success but actually stand as monuments of power for their privately-held corporations and to act as signatures in the city for their patrons. Their commissions played a large role in the constellation of factors that brought them into being and ensured their lasting impact. The two patrons not only invested a great deal of money but also lent their names to a large structure. They obviously wanted the design of their skyscraper to be in the hands of someone who could carry out and translate their vision into reality with impact, power, and skill.
   

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  [1] Fenske, Gail, and Deryck Holdsworth. "Corporate Identity and the New York Office Building: 1895-1915." In The Landscape of Modernity: Essays on New York City, 1900-1940, 129-59. JHU Press, 1997.

  [2] Fenske, Gail. The Skyscraper and the City: the Woolworth Building and the Making of Modern New York. University of Chicago Press, 2008

  [3] Fenske, Gail, and Deryck Holdsworth. "Corporate Identity and the New York Office Building: 1895-1915." In The Landscape of Modernity: Essays on New York City, 1900-1940, 129-59. JHU Press, 1997, 143.

  [4] Fenske, Gail, and Deryck Holdsworth. "Corporate Identity and the New York Office Building: 1895-1915." In The Landscape of Modernity: Essays on New York City, 1900-1940, 129-59. JHU Press, 1997, 143.

  [5] Ibid., 143.

  [6] Lambert, Phyllis, and Barry Bergdoll. Building Seagram. New York: Yale University Press, 2013.

  [7] Lambert, Phyllis, and Barry Bergdoll. Building Seagram. New York: Yale University Press, 2013, 2.

  [8] Taylor, Graham D. "“From Shirtsleeves to Shirtless”: The Bronfman Dynasty and the Seagram Empire." Business and Economic History Online 4, no. 1 (2006): 1-36.

  [9] Lambert, Phyllis, and Barry Bergdoll. Building Seagram. New York: Yale University Press, 2013, 7.

  [10] Lambert, Phyllis, and Barry Bergdoll. Building Seagram. New York: Yale University Press, 2013.

  [11] Ibid., 2.

  [12] Fenske, Gail, and Deryck Holdsworth. "Corporate Identity and the New York Office Building: 1895-1915." In The Landscape of Modernity: Essays on New York City, 1900-1940, 129-59. JHU Press, 1997, 130.
  
  Nina Christianson
• 1 2017-12-15T21:17:10-08:00 State of the F. W. Woolworth Company: An Analysis of the Different Positions of the F. W. Woolworth Company, Seagram Company, and AT&T Surrounding the Development of Their Signature Skyscrapers 6 An Analysis of the Different Positions of the F. W. Woolworth Company, Seagram Company, and the American Telephone and Telegraph Company Surrounding the Development of Their Signature Skyscrapers plain 2017-12-27T17:18:03-08:00

  F. W. Woolworth Company

  Before having commissioned and moved into the Woolworth Building, F. W. Woolworth had offices for his company in a building directly facing the plot that would eventually become his namesake company’s signature office building. (1) This meant that he had a thorough understanding of the area and the other businesses that were tenants in neighboring buildings, which he could eventually use to his advantage as he tried to lure them into what was then the tallest building in the world. (2) Furthermore, the continued push towards urbanization and rising land prices and rents meant that some businesses were beginning to think of making an investment and developing their own bespoke skyscraper project. (3) Cass Gilbert, architect of the renowned Woolworth Building in New York, once said that a skyscraper was “a machine that makes the land pay.” (4) In 1910, the Woolworth Company ended up commissioning Gilbert to design the Woolworth Building, meant to be the new headquarters for the company and a symbol of their success. (5) Woolworth commissioned this structure following the incorporation of his company, the opening of its first international store location, and the beginning of merger talks (which ended up being completed with four major competitors in 1911). (6) By commissioning their own sixty story building, of which they only used around two stories for themselves, Woolworth suddenly became a major player in the New York real estate market. All of the speculative space in the building was meant to capitalize on the Woolworth Company’s partners and neighboring businesses wanting to be in such a signature building and become an additional revenue stream for the company. (7)

  Seagram Company

  Contrary to the common school of thought regarding the construction of skyscrapers, the Seagram Building was not commissioned during a great time for the company. Seagram had become one of Canada’s largest distillers prior to moving their headquarters from Montreal to New York City, where they first occupied space in the Chrysler Building, in 1934. (8) The Seagram Company that ended up commissioning the famous building that shares its name actually came about when Samuel Bronfman, owner of family business Distiller’s Corporation Limited, purchased the Seagram distillery that was floundering during Prohibition in 1928. (9) As a result of the concerns about the Seagram Company’s involvement with illegal alcohol production and distribution during the Prohibition era, the company’s reputation, along with Bronfman’s own, was getting dragged through the mud. Understanding that his company was occupying the headlines far too often for negative reasons and criminal activity speculation, Bronfman set about taking control of the narrative in the press. Contrary to the common perception that the typical company would commission the development of a signature building project during a time of economic success and strong public relations, Bronfman clearly did not follow that model. (10)
  
  In order to take back the narrative and manipulate the press surrounding his company in a more positive light, Bronfman commissioned the Seagram Building in 1954. (11) In the past, companies like the F. W. Woolworth Company commissioned their signature namesake building as they were expanding internationally and merging with competitors domestically to expand their reach. (12) Yet, the Seagram Building was meant to make a statement in the same way that the Woolworth Building was. Both buildings served two main purposes: displaying the power of the corporation and serving as a real estate investment in a hot market. (13) Every new skyscraper construction was a speculative activity to a certain extent. The company commissioning the building very rarely, if ever, used up all of the space in the building. For example, the Woolworth Company only used around two stories out of their sixty story tower and the Seagram Company used under 200,000 square feet of the roughly half million square feet Seagram Building. (14) (15)

  American Telephone and Telegraph Company (AT&T)

  In its heyday, AT&T had expanded to be one of, if not the, largest and most powerful corporations in the world. (16) Due to some relatively manipulative business practices in dealing with distributors on a more local level, AT&T had drawn the ire of MCI Communications. Following a skirmish that ended up with Illinois Bell, a subsidiary of AT&T, shutting off access to telecommunications services for MCI Communications in the area. As a result of what they viewed as an unfair competitive advantage stemming from monopolistic practices, MCI Communications began gathering evidence to justify their view of the situation. Having been based out of Washington, D.C. in close proximity to the lawmakers, MCI Communications had a fair bit of sway, and ended up submitting evidence to the Department of Justice that supported the claim that AT&T was in violation of anti-trust laws. In 1974, the Federal Communications Commission formally entertained an antitrust lawsuit against AT&T on suspicions that it was using profits from its technology division to subsidize the costs of its telephone service and leveraging its government-supported monopoly on the telecommunications industry to stifle competition and put its distributors out of business. After a long process, MCI Communications was awarded $1.8 billion to compensate for the monopolistic actions taken by AT&T. Additionally, AT&T agreed to a breakup of the Bell System that had caused the antitrust suit with MCI Communications in 1982. As a result of having divested from the localized Bell Systems, AT&T suddenly was a much weaker and smaller company, no longer needing all of the space being created with the AT&T Building.  

  With construction having started on the AT&T Building in 1980, the design and planning indefinitely were done a few years in advance. However, the antitrust lawsuit brought up against AT&T was filed in 1974, meaning that the company definitely had time to process what was being brought up against them before continuing on with the skyscraper. At a time when the company knew that the possibility existed that the Department of Justice would order that the company splits up to fall in line with monopoly regulations, they continued on with constructing a signature building. Prior to the lawsuit having been brought against them, AT&T had been doing well financially, as their government-sanctioned monopoly meant that they could focus on innovating their products and improving performance for their customers without the fear of competition coming in and undercutting their prices. Nevertheless, by the time the skyscraper was being built, they had been ordered to pay out $1.8 billion to one of their competitors and they had been dealing with the Department of Justice for over six years. Applying the ideology of the prevailing school of thought in skyscraper economics, the conclusion would be made that AT&T was likely faring pretty well in the early 1980s. Yet, this could not have been further from the truth. When considering the full context, it becomes apparent that AT&T commissioned their signature building to make a statement. As a way of showing to the world that the company did not fear the antitrust suit and was still one of the world’s most dominant corporations, AT&T continued on with the construction of this building publicly displaying their might. Similar to the Seagram Building, the AT&T Building in New York is a key counterexample to the notion that skyscrapers are built during times of prosperity and success. 

  By: Daniel Freedland

  Sources

  1. Gail Fenske and Deryck Holdsworth, “Corporate Identity and the New York Office Building: 1895-1915,” In The Landscape of Modernity: Essays on New York City, 1900-1940, ed. David Ward and Olivier Zunz (New York: Russell Sage Foundation, 1992), 145.
  2. Fenske and Holdsworth, “Corporate Identity,” 146-147.
  3. Carol Willis, Form Follows Finance: Skyscrapers and Skylines in New York and Chicago (New York: Princeton Architectural Press, 1995), 146.
  4. Willis, Form Follows Finance, 19.
  5. Gail Fenske, “Medievalism, Mysticism, and Modernity in Early-Twentieth Century New York,” In Skyscraper Gothic, ed. Kevin D. Murphy and Lisa Reilly (Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 2017), 55.
  6. Fenske and Holdsworth, “Corporate Identity,” 145.
  7. Willis, Form Follows Finance, 146-147.
  8. Phyllis Lambert, Building Seagram (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2013), 4.
  9. Jack S. Blocker, David M. Fahey, and Ian R. Tyrrell, Alcohol and Temperance in Modern History (ABC-CLIO, 2003), 554.
  10. Fenske and Holdsworth, “Corporate Identity,” 129-130.
  11. Lambert, Building Seagram, 6.
  12. Fenske and Holdsworth, “Corporate Identity,” 145-146.
  13. Willis, Form Follows Finance, 146.
  14. Fenske and Holdsworth, “Corporate Identity,” 145.
  15. Lambert, Building Seagram, 38.
  16. Steve Coll, The Deal of the Century: The Breakup of AT&T (New York: Atheneum, 1986).