The Times Square Building - Rochester, NY - Art Deco - Art Nouveau on Waymarking.com

Ironically, the cornerstone of the Genesee Valley Trust bank building (now The Times Square Building), was laid on October 29, 1929 - the day the stock market crashed and harolded in the Great Depression. It was completed in the summer of 1930 and Genesee Valley Trust Company survived The Depression, and continued to operate in this building until 1955.

The architects were the noted New York City firm Voorhees, Gmelin and Walker, best remembered for designing the Barclary-Vesey Bank, which, in 1923, was the first signigicant Art Deco building in New York City.

The most distinctive feature of this twelve-story tall building are the large cast aluminum wings on its signal tower, known as "the wings of progress", symbolizing the age of aviation. The tower, after all, was intended to serve as a night beacon to aviators, and "to symbolize modernity in the age of electricity. The wings are 42 feet high, fourteen and one-half feet wide at center, and weigh seven thousand pounds each. They are pinioned to their base through a perforated metal screen. The screen is decorated with a bent stalk of wheat motif, and was designed to be illuminated from within, while the wings were intended to be flood-lit from below.

This building sits on a granite foundation, constructed of steel fram sheathed in buff colored Indiana limestone. There are distinctive Bas Relief scultures over the two-facing windows flanking the Exchange Blvd entrance and over the five first floor windows on the south-facing facade are carved overlapping arches suggestive of bent stalks of wheat (symbolic of prosperity, which, given the importance of wheat in Rochester's history as the "Flour City", everyone would be vamiliar with). This is a unifiying theme of both exterior and interior decoration. Palisters rise from the third floor to the top, emphasising the building's height and linear quality.

The bas-relief sculptures were designed by Leo Friedlander of New York City. The northern panel is entitled "Trust": allegoric figures of a woman and child represent the qualities of "guiding influence" and "dependence. In the background of this panel are images of buildings, boats, historic structures and other forms associated with history and industry. The southern panel is entitled "Security": a woman defended by two dogs protects the bank.

The lobby walls are sheathed in red Altico and Levanto marbles. The ceiling is covered in hand painted paper decorated with geometric shapes, trompe-l'oeil faceting and the stylized wheat motif. Hanging from the center of this octagonal lobey is a light fixture of characteristic geometric Ar Deco form, which radiates light through a circle of narrow plates of translucent glass. Other classic Art Deco adornment can be found in the adjacent elevator lobby and concession booth, most notably on the mailbox.

Alterations to the interior of the building, in the original banking rooms took place in 1957 (most notably a new entrance was cut in the Broad Street side), 1968 and 1974. At one time this was Rochester's tallest building, and it continues to dominate the skyline.

Style: Art Deco Structure Type: Commercial/Retail Architect: Voorhes, Gmelin and Walker Date Built: Oct 29, 1929 Supporting references: Not listed

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