Ally Detroit Center, formerly One Detroit Center, is a

skyscraper A skyscraper is a tall continuously habitable building having multiple floors. Most modern sources define skyscrapers as being at least or in height, though there is no universally accepted definition, other than being very tall high-rise bui ...

and class-A

office building An office is a space where the employees of an organization perform administrative work in order to support and realize the various goals of the organization. The word "office" may also denote a position within an organization with specific du ...

located in

Downtown Detroit Downtown Detroit is the central business district and a Neighborhoods in Detroit, residential area of the city of Detroit, Michigan, United States. Locally, "downtown" tends to refer to the 1.4 square mile region bordered by M-10 (Michigan high ...

, overlooking the Detroit Financial District. Rising , the 43-story tower is the tallest office building in

Michigan Michigan ( ) is a peninsular U.S. state, state in the Great Lakes region, Great Lakes region of the Upper Midwest, Upper Midwestern United States. It shares water and land boundaries with Minnesota to the northwest, Wisconsin to the west, ...

and the second tallest building overall in the state behind the central hotel tower of the

Renaissance Center The Renaissance Center, commonly known as the RenCen, is a complex of seven connected skyscrapers in downtown Detroit, Michigan, United States. Located on the Detroit International Riverfront, the RenCen is owned and used by General Motors ...

, located a few blocks away. Although the

Penobscot Building The Greater Penobscot Building, commonly known as the Penobscot Building, is a class-A office tower in Downtown Detroit, Michigan. Constructed in 1928, the Art Deco building is located in the heart of the Detroit Financial District. The Peno ...

has more floors above ground (45), those of Ally Detroit Center are taller, with its roof sitting roughly taller than that of the Penobscot. It has a floor area of .

Architecture

The building was designed by noted architects

John Burgee __NOTOC__ John Burgee (born August 28, 1933) is an American architect noted for his contributions to Postmodern architecture. He was a partner of Philip Johnson from 1967 to 1991, creating together the partnership firm Johnson/Burgee Architects ...

and

Philip Johnson Philip Cortelyou Johnson (July 8, 1906 – January 25, 2005) was an American architect who designed modern and postmodern architecture. Among his best-known designs are his modernist Glass House in New Canaan, Connecticut; the postmodern 550 ...

, partners influential in

postmodern architecture Postmodern architecture is a style or movement which emerged in the 1960s as a reaction against the austerity, formality, and lack of variety of modern architecture, particularly in the International Style (architecture), international style adv ...

. Ally Detroit Center was constructed from 1991 to 1993. It houses numerous tenants, including many prominent Detroit law firms and

PricewaterhouseCoopers PricewaterhouseCoopers, also known as PwC, is a multinational professional services network based in London, United Kingdom. It is the second-largest professional services network in the world and is one of the Big Four accounting firms, alon ...

. In addition to

retail Retail is the sale of goods and services to consumers, in contrast to wholesaling, which is the sale to business or institutional customers. A retailer purchases goods in large quantities from manufacturers, directly or through a wholes ...

, the building also contains a

restaurant A restaurant is an establishment that prepares and serves food and drinks to customers. Meals are generally served and eaten on the premises, but many restaurants also offer take-out and Delivery (commerce), food delivery services. Restaurants ...

and a

gym A gym, short for gymnasium (: gymnasiums or gymnasia), is an indoor venue for exercise and sports. The word is derived from the ancient Greek term " gymnasion". They are commonly found in athletic and fitness centres, and as activity and learn ...

. The building is famous for its postmodern architectural design topped with

Flemish Flemish may refer to: * Flemish, adjective for Flanders, Belgium * Flemish region, one of the three regions of Belgium *Flemish Community, one of the three constitutionally defined language communities of Belgium * Flemish dialects, a Dutch dialec ...

-inspired

neo-gothic Gothic Revival (also referred to as Victorian Gothic or neo-Gothic) is an architectural movement that after a gradual build-up beginning in the second half of the 17th century became a widespread movement in the first half of the 19th century ...

spire A spire is a tall, slender, pointed structure on top of a roof of a building or tower, especially at the summit of church steeples. A spire may have a square, circular, or polygonal plan, with a roughly conical or pyramidal shape. Spire ...

s which blend architecturally with the city's historic skyline. It is constructed mainly of

granite Granite ( ) is a coarse-grained (phanerite, phaneritic) intrusive rock, intrusive igneous rock composed mostly of quartz, alkali feldspar, and plagioclase. It forms from magma with a high content of silica and alkali metal oxides that slowly coo ...

. Sometimes called a "twin gothic structure", for its pairs of spires, it is oriented North-South and East-West (as named on a plaque along the Windsor waterfront park). Ally Detroit Center won an Award of Excellence for its design in 1996. Ally Detroit Center replicas have become a souvenir item along with those of other Detroit skyscrapers.InFocusTech skyscrapers
Retrieved on July 16, 2009. Project plans for a twin tower directly to the east, Two Detroit Center, were placed indefinitely on hold. Two Detroit Center parking garage was constructed on the site in 2002.

Tenants

The law firm Dickinson Wright (formerly Dickinson, Wright, Moon, Van Dusen & Freeman) has its headquarters in Ally Detroit Center.Dickinson Wright renews Ally Detroit Center lease
" ''Crain's Detroit Business''. December 3, 2007. Retrieved on November 23, 2013. The company moved into the building when it opened in 1992. In 2007, when it renewed its lease, the company occupied almost of space in the building. Additionally, the international law firm of Clark Hill, PLC operates its headquarters on three floors of the building. The building was previously occupied by

Comerica Bank Comerica Incorporated is an American financial services company, headquartered in Dallas, Dallas, Texas. It is the parent of Comerica Bank, a regional commercial bank with 413 branches in the U.S. states of Texas, Michigan, California, Florida an ...

. The bank's lease on then Comerica Tower at Detroit Center ran through 2012, and in December 2009, Comerica announced it would vacate One Detroit Center at the end of the lease, consolidating its Michigan operations at 411 West Lafayette Boulevard. In March 2015, following the purchase of the building by Dan Gilbert through his Bedrock Real Estate Services, Bedrock and

Ally Financial Ally Financial Inc. (known as GMAC until 2010) is an American bank holding company incorporated in Delaware and headquartered at Ally Detroit Center in Detroit, Michigan. The company provides financial services including car finance, online bank ...

announced a 12-year lease under which it would move its main office into the building from the nearby

as well consolidate all employees in suburban Detroit to the building, occupying 20 floors or approximately . The tower was renamed Ally Detroit Center. In 2015, a full service restaurant, Townhouse, opened in the first floor of the Ally Detroit Center, situated on the corner of Woodward and Congress. In 2019, a Plum Market grocery store was opened in the first floor, with an entrance at the corner of Woodward and Larned.

Gallery

File:ComericaTowerand1stnationaldetroit.jpg, View from Cadillac Square File:Courtyard by Marriott - Downtown Detroit.jpg, View from the Courtyard Marriott File:DowntownDetroit.jpg, One Detroit Center in the city skyline

References

External links

One Detroit Center website
{{Authority control Bank buildings in Michigan Downtown Detroit Woodward Avenue Skyscraper office buildings in Detroit Office buildings completed in 1993 1993 establishments in Michigan Rock Ventures John Burgee buildings Philip Johnson buildings Postmodern architecture in the United States Gothic Revival skyscrapers 1990s architecture in the United States

Architecture

Tenants

Gallery

References

Further reading

External links