11 S. Meridian St., Indianapolis, Merchants Bank Building, D. H. Burnham & Co.: Architects

Description:	Merchants Bank Building, 11 S. Meridian St., Indianapolis, D.H. Burnham & Co.: Architects[HISTORY: Founded in 1865, Merchants National Bank built its headquarters building in sections, with the first four floors of the southern half built in 1907-1908 and the rest constructed in 1912. Once completed, it was the tallest building in the city until 1962. When the bank finally moved in 1977 it maintained the monumental two-story banking lobby on the ground floor as a branch until its absorption into National City Bank in 1992. Law firm Barnes, Hickam, Pantzer and Boyd, a major tenant of the building since the 1940s, purchased it in 1981. Attorney Tom Charles Huston stated the firms’ purchase showed its “commitment to the downtown area.” The building was listed in the National Register in 1982. BUILDING DESCRIPTION: Merchants Bank Building is a prime example of an early twentieth-century skyscraper and the only surviving commission in the city by a member of the Chicago School of Architecture. The seventeen-story building has a steel structural frame with concrete floors and roof. It is designed in the tripartite formula of many of the skyscrapers of the period, with a base, shaft, and capital. The first three floors of the base are clad with limestone, the thirteen-story shaft is clad in brick, and the one-story capital is clad with terra cotta. SIGNIFICANT FEATURES: The basic unaltered character of the building as well as the refined use of materials including brick, terra cotta and limestone are significant. This structure has been a mainstay of the city’s skyline since its construction and held the distinguished title of tallest building for decades. Although the first floor storefront windows are replacements, all other details creating the building’s “base” are original. The doors, second floor storefront windows and embellished frames, and third floor Chicago-style windows remain intact. The Doric pilasters, entablature, and cornices are extravagantly decorated with limestone moldings including roundels, foliar motifs, egg-and-dart, bead-and-reel, and Greek fret patterns. In contrast, the shaft is composed of simple brick with identical one-over-one window patterns on each floor. Crowning the top of the building, the capital repeats the Chicago-style fenestration of the third floor. Decorative motifs are also repeated in the terra cotta cladding with the addition of medallions resembling shields situated between the windows. -Monument Circle District Historic Preservation Plan, Indianapolis Historic Preservation Commission p. 187] Yes
Created By:	McLaughlin, H. Roll
Source:	http://iuidigital.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/ref/collection/p17312coll4/id/341
Collection:	Indiana Landmarks H. Roll McLaughlin Collection
Rights:	http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC-EDU/1.0/
Copyright:	Copyright Indiana Landmarks. Copyright permissions granted for educational use by Indiana Landmarks
Geography:	Monument Circle District Indianapolis, Marion County, Indiana, United States, http://sws.geonames.org/4259418/, 39.7670238 -86.1581322 Indianapolis Marion Indiana 39.7670238 -86.1581322
Subjects:	Built Environment Historic buildings -- Indiana Architecture -- Indiana commercial Chicago School

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