The Metropolitan Center for High Technology, formerly S. S. Kresge World Headquarters, is an office building located at 2727 Second Avenue in Midtown

Detroit Detroit ( , ; , ) is the largest city in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is also the largest U.S. city on the United States–Canada border, and the seat of government of Wayne County. The City of Detroit had a population of 639,111 at t ...

Michigan Michigan () is a U.S. state, state in the Great Lakes region, Great Lakes region of the Upper Midwest, upper Midwestern United States. With a population of nearly 10.12 million and an area of nearly , Michigan is the List of U.S. states and ...

. It was listed on the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance or "great artistic ...

and designated a Michigan State Historic Site in 1979. The office building is now part of

Wayne State University Wayne State University (WSU) is a public research university in Detroit, Michigan. It is Michigan's third-largest university. Founded in 1868, Wayne State consists of 13 schools and colleges offering approximately 350 programs to nearly 25,000 ...

and used as a

business incubator Business incubator is an organization that helps startup companies and individual entrepreneurs to develop their businesses by providing a fullscale range of services starting with management training and office space and ending with venture c ...

for

startup companies A startup or start-up is a company or project undertaken by an entrepreneur to seek, develop, and validate a scalable business model. While entrepreneurship refers to all new businesses, including self-employment and businesses that never intend t ...

History

Sebastian S. Kresge was a prosperous traveling salesman when, in 1884, he purchased a part interest in two retail stores.S. S. Kresge World Headquarters Building
from Detroit1701.org One of them was located in Detroit; Kresge moved to the city and soon gained control of a five and dime retail store on Woodward. Kresge applied his own name to the store, and by 1899 was beginning to build a chain of five-and-dimes. By 1912, the chain had expanded to 85 Kresge stores. Kresge incorporated his business, and set about constructing an impressive office building as its headquarters. He commissioned Albert Kahn to design an 18-story building, now known as the

Kales Building The Kales Building is a high-rise apartment building in downtown Detroit, Michigan. It is located 76 West Adams at the northeast corner of Adams Avenue West and Park Avenue, across from Grand Circus Park, in the Foxtown neighborhood, just north ...

, at Adams and Park. Kresge's prospered during

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

, and after the war it had begun to outgrow its home. Kresge again hired Kahn to design a larger headquarters, this time located on Second at Cass Park, spacious enough to provide office facilities for 1,200 Kresge employees. The resulting building, completed in 1927, P. 128. is unique for its horizontal massing as opposed to the vertical lines of the more common skyscraper, and won awards for its outstanding architecture.

Description

The Kresge World Headquarters is a limestone-faced building, constructed in the shape of a large E with the wings pointing away from the park. It covers a city block, and has of office space.Kresge, S. S., World Headquarters
from the state of Michigan The central pavilion facing Cass Park is five-and-a-half stories; the wings are only four stories. The building is a mix of styles, with the standing-seam copper Mansard roof decorated with terra cotta cresting reminiscent of

Second Empire Second Empire may refer to: * Second British Empire, used by some historians to describe the British Empire after 1783 * Second Bulgarian Empire (1185–1396) * Second French Empire (1852–1870) ** Second Empire architecture, an architectural styl ...

style, and the clean lines of the facade clearly

Art Deco Art Deco, short for the French ''Arts Décoratifs'', and sometimes just called Deco, is a style of visual arts, architecture, and product design, that first appeared in France in the 1910s (just before World War I), and flourished in the Unite ...

in origin. The ordered rows of windows emphasize the horizontal, while the classical Doric pilasters at the entrance emphasize the vertical. A bandcourse separates the fourth floor from the lower levels, and the floors above have smaller windows that nevertheless resemble the lower-tier windows. The interior uses polished granite for the entrance with inlaid walnut paneling. Kresge used these offices until the firm moved to suburban

Troy Troy ( el, Τροία and Latin: Troia, Hittite: 𒋫𒊒𒄿𒊭 ''Truwiša'') or Ilion ( el, Ίλιον and Latin: Ilium, Hittite: 𒃾𒇻𒊭 ''Wiluša'') was an ancient city located at Hisarlik in present-day Turkey, south-west of Ç ...

in 1972. For some years after that, the building was used by the

Detroit Institute of Technology The Detroit Institute of Technology was a private four-year technical college in Detroit, Michigan that closed operations in 1981. History First called the Association Institute, the private school was founded in 1891 as a YMCA evening school ...

. The building is part of

, and has been used in part as an incubator for tech start-up firms known as the Metropolitan Center for High Technology. Offices for some Wayne State departments are located in this building.Metro Center for High Technology
from Woodward Avenue

References

{{National Register of Historic Places in Michigan Wayne State University Office buildings in Detroit Office buildings on the National Register of Historic Places in Michigan Buildings and structures completed in 1928 Retail company headquarters in the United States Art Deco architecture in Michigan Michigan State Historic Sites Historic district contributing properties in Michigan 1928 establishments in Michigan Sears Holdings buildings and structures Detroit Institute of Technology National Register of Historic Places in Detroit Albert Kahn (architect) buildings