Architecture
The 30-story, 405 ft Wells Fargo Building is located on the Avenue of the Arts in Center City, Philadelphia. The building faces Broad Street on the west, Walnut Street on the south, and Sansom Street on the north.[3][4][16] To the east of the building is the 11-story Witherspoon Building, built in 1896. Owned by the same owners, the two buildings are linked together.[4][5][12] Containing 892000 sqft, the Wells Fargo Building's footprint measures 220 ft by 175 ft. Built in the Beaux-Arts style the building's brick curtain wall is made of limestone ashlar on the upper and lower floors and rusticated granite on the 2nd and 3rd floors.[3]
Horizontally the building is divided into three parts. The first two stories and a mezzanine level make up the building's base. The next eighteen floors make up the building's shaft and center. The distinctive features of the center are two 55 ft recesses on the east and west sides of the building. Starting above the fourth floor, the recesses give the building an H-shape. The skyscraper's top section is distinguished from the lower floors by three small setbacks.[3][4]
At street level, three arched entranceways line Broad Street. The central arch is slightly larger than the others to indicate the entrance to the main banking hall. Carved into the facade above the center arch is the building's name. Inside the arches and above the doorways are windows designed by d'Ascenzo Studios. Leaded panes of glass of various shades of amber are surrounded by a Renaissance-style border. Below the windows are bronze doors, each with 24 high-relief panels depicting the history of commerce and civilization. Bas-relief figures decorate each of the arches' spandrels. A male figure with a hammer representing industry and a female figure with a beehive representing thrift decorate the center arch. The arch closest to Sansom Street is decorated by two figures with cornucopias to represent abundance. The arch nearer to Walnut Street is decorated by a painter and a sculptor to represent art.[3]
Next to the two smaller archways are carved medallions, one flanking each spandrel. The medallions closest to Sansom Street represent early American coins, a Pine Tree coin from Massachusetts and Grandi Copper coin from Connecticut. The medallions closest to the Walnut Street side represent the first American coin issued by Congress and the Eye Coin from Vermont. Two medallions on the Walnut Street side depict both sides of the Lafayette Medal. Only one medallion decorates the Samson Street side, depicting another early coin from Vermont.[3]
The Wells Fargo Building's interiors include a 2½-story banking hall featuring six 58-ton steel girders that support the skyscraper's structure. The girders were the largest in the Eastern United States at the time of construction. Among the 150000 sqft of marble inside the Wells Fargo Building is the cream-colored terrazzo marble used throughout the banking hall. At the rear of the hall is a marble sculpture by the Piccirilli Brothers. The statue depicts semi-nude male and female representations of day and night clasping hands under a clock to symbolize eternity.[3][17]
Above the statue and framed by marble pilasters is a window that depicts scenes from Philadelphia history. In the window's tympanum is a depiction of Independence Hall. Below that are pictures showing William Penn's treaty with the Indians, George Washington's Farewell Address to Congress, the proclamation of the Declaration of Independence, the Philadelphia Convention, the drafting of the Declaration of Independence, Benjamin Franklin's printing office, Betsy Ross exhibiting the United States flag, and Caesar Rodney's ride from Delaware. The border of the window contains portrait busts of notable American Revolution-era Philadelphians: John Bartram, George Clymer, Robert Morris, David Rittenhouse, Benjamin Rush, and James Wilson.[3]
The Wells Fargo Building was added to the National Register of Historic Places on November 27, 1978.[1] The skyscraper was listed because it was an excellent example of commercial Beaux-Arts architecture and because it stands "as a glossary of modern skyscraper design, synthesizing the primary features of three phases of skyscraper development reaching back to the 1880s". The building's characteristics are its tripartite system of a base, shaft, and capital, the treatment of the skyscraper as a tower, and the use of setbacks.[3]
