The Ruan Center is a high-rise office building located at 666 Grand Avenue in
Des Moines
Des Moines () is the capital and the most populous city in the U.S. state of Iowa. It is also the county seat of Polk County. A small part of the city extends into Warren County. It was incorporated on September 22, 1851, as Fort Des Moines, ...
,
Iowa, which was built by
Ruan Transportation
Ruan may refer to:
Buildings
*Ruan Center, office building in Des Moines, Iowa
*John Ruan House, historic mansion in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Places
*Ruan, County Clare, Ireland
*Ruan, Loiret, France
*Mont Ruan, Switzerland
*Ruan Major and Ru ...
. The building was completed in 1975 and stands at a height of 459.68 ft (140m), and was the tallest building in Iowa until the completion of
801 Grand
801 Grand High Rise Building (referred to as the 801 Grand Building and previously known as The Principal Building), is a 45-story skyscraper in Des Moines, Iowa, Des Moines, Iowa, United States, operated and managed by JLL (company), JLL America ...
in 1991. The south side of the building's site was formerly occupied by The Chamberlain Hotel.
The Ruan Center is locally known as the "rusty skyscraper", for its
Cor-Ten steel
Weathering steel, often referred to by the genericised trademark COR-TEN steel and sometimes written without the hyphen as corten steel, is a group of steel alloys which were developed to eliminate the need for painting, and form a stable rus ...
cladding that sheds rust.
[Bizz Buzz. ''Des Moines Register'', April 21, 2009, http://m.dmregister.com/news.jsp?key=448716] The exterior skin is composed of 1,600 US tons of Cor-Ten steel, and 4,700 tons of structural steel were used in the building's frame.
The building consists mainly of office space and is connected to Des Moines' skywalk system. The 33rd and 34th floors are home to the Des Moines Club, a private members-only restaurant.
The Ruan Center was named one of the 50 Most Significant Iowa Buildings of the 20th Century by the Iowa chapter of the
American Institute of Architects.
See also
*
List of tallest buildings in Iowa
This list of tallest buildings in Iowa ranks skyscrapers in the US state of Iowa by height for existing and proposed structures.
Tallest buildings
Note: Churches have been omitted from this list.
Tall buildings prior to 1884
There does not ...
References
External links
Ruan Website
Office buildings completed in 1975
Skyscraper office buildings in Des Moines, Iowa
Modernist architecture in Iowa
1975 establishments in Iowa
{{DesMoinesIA-stub