Ruins of Jacksonville: The Florida Life Building
(http://photos.metrojacksonville.com/photos/648531657_rsqKB-M.jpg)
It has been called Jacksonville's purest statement of a "skyscraper" and was one of Jacksonville's earliest 'green' buildings. Today, many feel this neglected architectural masterpiece may be better off tumbling to the ground.
Full Article
http://www.metrojacksonville.com/article/2009-sep-ruins-of-jacksonville-the-florida-life-building
The state of these buildings is tragic and speaks volumes about our leadership's lack of commitment to Jacksonville's architectural history.
A gem of a building. It's a shame our City has let it go the way of housing Bird Nests instead of businesses and companies. Hopefully someone will puchase this building, along with the trio, and the heart of our core will beat right once again.
Heights Unknown
that sucks they are great looking buildings
When was the building last occupied (didn't see it in the article)? Looks to have been empty many years.
Standing near this building might be a bad idea...
http://photos.metrojacksonville.com/gallery/9623339_Erq4V#648531740_Wp4YZ-A-LB
In light of the cities woes with buildings, I would look elsewhere for a buyer.
Who owns this building and the other ones? The sign says Addison but that is just the agent, right?
My second time saying this: The city historic preservation department needs a marketing division. It would save these fine buildings and bring revenue back into a needed area of town.
This could be a beautiful building if it were renovated.
Love the diamond copper pattern in the cornice. Thanks for being the fill in on the memory gap there Mr. Dare. What authority did Corim Company have at that time, if their findings were disputable?
That's probably laughable to the Swiss or most of Western Europe for that matter when considering that our "historical" structures mostly fall within the last 2-3 centuries & that wasn't even at the 100 year mark at the time.
In a city that really cared about saving it's historic structures whiles also revitalizing it's urban core. The city could reach inside it's preverbal trousers to see if it still has a pair and use it's emanate domain powers to save these building.
Simply give the current owners building a limited time frame to bring the buildings up to a usable/inhabitable condition or the city will take ownership. Should (and when) the city takes ownership of any of the buildings. They should then give (yes I said give) them to pre-qualified persons/corporations that can follow thru to restoring these buildings. The city will get so much more out these types of dealing than they would ever get by sitting on their ass and watching these building crumble.
I can't help but think about what happened to the Rhodes Furniture building a few blocks away.
(http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1101/605029944_ee8385b7f0.jpg)
For a few months it was Florida's tallest.
http://www.metrojacksonville.com/article/2008-mar-a-century-of-floridas-tallest-skyscrapers
This is my favorite building in the world. Not much depresses me more than not being able to save it.
Stephen, I'm fascinated to learn this information about Corim because Bob Broward's Klutho book put the blame for the cornice destruction squarely on Bank of America. Was BoA actually involved to any meaningful degree?
From all the vegtables growing out of the joints and the stains I'd say that most everything up top has water intrusion problems. A lot of that would have to be removed and new support structure and ties installed. An "open" building can have a lot of hidden damage.
Man this site is depressing sometimes:(
The change to fix that building up was during the boom, now I fear it may be lost, mother nature is claiming it again!
I'm all for trying to save things that can be saved but would you ever really be able to bring this one back? I don't even want to try and imagine the costs of having the cornices replaced, if it's even possible. Some places have been so irreparably disgraced and disfigured that I think it'd be better to just try and move on. Seeing it in its current state is almost nauseating, especially when you examine the details.
Yeah, I wasn't sure if it would be cost effective considering what other issues the building may have, no way to know unless someone's able to get into the building, especially the upper floors and properly survey what needs to be done. I'm usually an optimist but this place just looks bad.
I have toured the trio within the last year and all the buildings have been gutted down to the "bones", which appeared sound. I think the best use for the buildings would be some combination of restaurant/boutique hotel/retail but therein lies the real problem for investors. Not enough available parking. It's more the cost of constructing yet another garage that makes the project financially unappealing than the rehab. Unfortunately the existing garages nearby do not have enough vacant space.
These are about the coolest buildings I have toured in Jacksonville. A lot of the architectural detail inside the bank building has been lost but much of it remains. The bank vault in the huge basement the bank building and the Florida Life building share is pretty neat. Hopefully someone smarter than me can figure out a way to make something work.
^^
Regarding the parking, wouldn't a NEW building have the same issue? A parking garage next to a new building, doesn't cost any more than the same garage next to an old one.
Is the difference that a new building could be larger, and thus could spread the cost of the garage over more rentable square footage?
This building can be restored, but it may require a public investment to justify what market economics can't. Personally, I'd rather spend $2mm of public money to give to an investor to make this deal work, than spend it on a surburban-style Seafood restaurant in LaVilla that was doomed from the start.
The thing is, given the current economy, even if the plan made sense on paper, the banks likely won't lend the money. That may change eventually, but will the buildings continue to deteriorate? Are they in 'stop-loss' condition currently? I seriously doubt it.
Other than the Marble Bank, they are not properly enclosed to slow down the rate of deterioration.
the skinny klutho was used in 2001-02 in a military exercise involving soldiers repelling off a helicopter and kicking in windows during their "maneuver". (the Rhodes building and the Roosevelt also had synchronized assaults).
how do i attach a photo to a post??
Quote from: stephendare on September 15, 2009, 01:14:11 AM
The original cornispeices were glazed terracotta, of the type that adorn the St. James Building. I cant imagine that it would be any more expensive than demolition and starting over from scratch again.
Nor any more difficult.
And even without the cornice, which is a terrible loss, there is plenty of fantastic detail in the facade, especially around the main entrance.
Quote from: stephendare on September 14, 2009, 02:17:50 PM
Well there is sometimes a difference between 'historic' and 'antique'. The building of Skyscrapers was something that it never occurred to the swiss to do for a few thousand years, after all.
I believe this might have been amongst the first skyscrapers built in Florida.
I think this was probably the third office skyscraper built in FL? The Bisbee, another component of the Trio, was the first to break ground (1909), and the first Atlantic Bank building on Forsyth came not long afterward. Both were completed in 1910 if I remember right. I am pretty sure the Florida Life broke ground in 1912, as it was under construction concurrently with the St. James Building. A couple of the high-rise hotels (Seminole, Mason/Mayflower), if we want to count them as skyscrapers, may have predated it, but those of course have been demolished. I don't think the Rhodes building went up until 1914 and I want to say 1915 on the Heard Building that was then Jax's tallest at 15 stories. I think that's it on the pre-1920 high rises with the next wave having come in around 1926 (Barnett, Atlantic Bank annex building on Adams, George Washington Hotel, Park Lane Apts., Carling, 11E).
Here is a list of all the old towers, when they were completed and when a few were demolished. It looks like Jacksonville's demolition party was pretty live and well in the 1970s.
1909 - Bisbee Building (10)
1909 - Atlantic National Bank Building (10)
1910 - Seminole Hotel (10) - demolished 1974
1912 - Florida Life Building (11)
1912 - Mason Hotel (12) - demolished 1978
1913 - Heard National Bank Building (15) - demolished 1981
1914 - Rhodes-Futch-Collins Building (10) - demolished 2002
Quote"At 7 a.m. tomorrow, Jacksonville will implode the 10-story Rhodes-Futch-Collins Building on Main Street. The demolition is scheduled to bring the 88-year-old building crashing down in a matter of seconds, making way for construction of the new main library.
The city acquired the Rhodes building after voters approved a half-cent sales tax hike for the Better Jacksonville Plan in 2000."
Demolition clears way for new library - Times Union 8/16/02
1926 - George Washington Hotel (13) - demolished 1976
1926 - Carling Hotel (13)
1926 - Barnett National Bank (18)
1926 - Atlantic National Bank Annex (10)
1926 - Lynch Building "11 East" (17)
1927 - Greenleaf & Crosby Building (12)
http://www.flickr.com/photos/posrus/3165586182/in/photostream/
On the upper right side of the page linked to above there is a slide show feature that has tons of great Jax pictures. I would add some of them to this page but sadly, I am unqualified in that respect.
Can anyone provide a picture of this building when the Cornices were present? I MUST have walked by this building as a child, but I just cannot remember what they looked like.
What was the purpose behind tearing down the George Washington Hotel?
What is that Hotel Jefferson pictured in the Kloeppel postcard? I've never heard of it. That's not the Florence Court building, is it?
It is just sickening what we allowed to be razed to be replaced by some of the (IMO) Hideous structures they were replaced by. I remember the GW , Mayflower, Robert Meyer ...also well remember them coming down :(
Albert Speer ""Hitler's architect" came up with The Ruin Value Theory ,Die Ruinenwerttheorie. It argues that buildings should be designed so that should a civilization fall, it's building will decay elegantly like the coliseum in Rome or the Parthenon in Greece. These would be buildings made of stone not iron. Our buildings today are steel, glass and aluminum. When "peak oil" comes all these glass towers will crumble because we wont be able to heat and cool them passively. When the rebar in concrete slabs get exposed to water they rust and loose their tensile strength causing floors to sag. Even if it's 80 years away we have start making buildings to last. Throw away buildings that are designed to last a few decades are a waste of our resources (big box stores, fast food joints, cheap suburban McMansions) are irresponsible to build. I could care less about aesthetic buildings. But buildings need to last long enough to justify their creation.
QuoteCurrently, the site is occupied by the new federal court building in downtown Jacksonville.
I noted this once before about this Wikipedia artilce. This is incorrect. (Maybe a Wikipedia expert could edit it correctly.) The Federal courthouse sits where the Robert Meyer Hotel, Penneys, and Woolworth were. The GW's lot is vacant (big surprise) and owned by the City as part of the 7 blocks tied to the courthouse project. Its future use appears to be unidentified at present.
It's the blue lot sandwiched between the Ed Ball building and the Historic Federal Courthouse in the picture below:(http://www.metrojacksonville.com/photos/thumbs/lrg-8203-dec_08_ddrb_agenda_for_web_page_30.jpg)
I remember seeing a "circus on ice" in the GW's auditorium as a kid. Was THE place for what was going on in Jax. Nothing like it here today.
So in reality, the Hotel really did not "NEED" to come down. How typical and unfortunate :(
The hotel was torn down for a parking lot. I wasn't around then but I wonder if the demolition was a result of the owner not wanting to pay for it's upkeep or taxes associated with a structure that large?
Quote from: thelakelander on July 02, 2010, 05:48:16 AM
The hotel was torn down for a parking lot. I wasn't around then but I wonder if the demolition was a result of the owner not wanting to pay for it's upkeep or taxes associated with a structure that large?
I think owners are motivated, in part, to tear down buildings to avoid paying property taxes on the value of "improvements" when such improvements have little likelihood of producing returns in their then-current condition. We need to have policies that allow owners of older structures to carry them on the tax rolls at greatly reduced values that reflect the time and money it will take to bring them back to an economically feasible structure.
Another concern for building owners could be carrying liability and property insurance on condemned structures. The cost may be prohibitive or the insurance not available. No property owner wants to be exposed to naked liability. Again, it would be helpful for preservationists to find a solution to this issue as well.
Maybe MJ should do a survey of historic property owners and learn what their issues and motivations are. The results could be instructive in how to appeal to them to restore the buildings rather than tear them down.
The GW sure was torn down in a hurry. Out of service 1971, torn down 1973? To think I used to get mad over the Seminole's 7-year lapse before teardown. This one's even worse.
Anyone know if any part of the motivation for tearing down the Seminole had to do with Barnett's desire for additional parking for its employees? That seemed to have something to do with the teardown of the Heard, Ritzwoller, and Jackson buildings.