From the State of Michigan historical marker at the temple:
Local Masons organized in 1915 and promptly hired Lansing architect Samuel D. Butterworth, a fellow Mason, to design a meeting hall. Butterworth rejected the practice of designing Masonic halls as elaborate classical temples, and instead blended simple Neoclassical detailing with elements of the popular Commercial style. Upon its completion in 1916, the Masonic Temple was one of only a few buildings in "downtown" East Lansing. The Masons sold the hall in 1986 and the interior was subsequently demolished. In 1998 the Chappelle Development Company purchased and rehabilitated the building as office and residential space. The Masonic Temple remains one of the city's important landmarks and is listed in the National Register of Historic Places.
Current use of the building is for apartments: "The Masonic Temple Apartments feature newly renovated student apartments conveniently within walking distance to Michigan State University. Explore our four, three and one bedroom apartment layouts that offer student-life balance furnished with in-suite bathrooms equipped with two showers, in-suite washer and dryer - or common area laundry available, and in-suite dishwashers."-
Apartments
NRHP Nomination:
The East Lansing Masonic Temple Building is a four-story, rectangular-plan, narrow-fronted and deep building with brick exterior walls. The symmetrical front facade is finished in a dark reddish-brown brick that contracts with the lighter reddish-brown brick ofthe other side and rear facades. It displays an architectural treatment that is an Arts-and-Crafts interpretation of Neoclassicism, with a three-part composition and projecting piers topped by a flat entablature and cornice. The side walls, once blank except for a scattering ofwindows in the lower stories, now display a more regular fenestration of small double-hung windows similar to those originally present. These provide light for the office~ and apartments which now occupy the building's interior.
The temple building fronts west on M.A. C. Avenue at the north edge ofEast Lansing's linear downtown that focuses on Grand River Avenue two blocks to the south. Directly to the north is an early twentieth-century residential neighborhood. Modem low-rise commercial buildings and a church stand directly across the street. To the temple's immediate south, across a narrow parking area from the building's south side wall, stands the modem University Place development containing a Marriott hotel and shops. While the temple's south side wall has some degree ofvisibility because ofthe small parking lot and the tum in M. A. C. Avenue south ofit toward Grand River Avenue, the north facade does not, in that only a narrow driveway separates it from a house next door. The temple's rear facade is entirely hidden behind the University Place complex. The temple building stands at mid-block, and the side and rear facades were clearly intended as secondary; no attempt at an aesthetic treatment was made.
The Masonic Temple Building stands on a lot measuring 66 feet in front by 148.5 feet in depth. The building is positioned near the north lot line and near M. A. C. Avenue, with only a shallow lawn in front ofit. The building is 37.2 feet in width across the front, 81.0 feet long, and approximately 47 feet in height above a concrete foundation that rises about four feet above . grade. A concrete beltcourse above the second story divides the building's symmetrical front facade into upper and lower sections of roughly equal height. Four slightly projecting vertical brick piers subdivide the facade into three sections. The upper piers rise to a broad concrete frieze whose only ornaments are raised circle devices above the caps ofthe piers. Atop the frieze isaprojectingpressed-metalclassicalcornice. Thecentersectionofthefacadecontainsa double-door entrance and triple windows in each story above. The side bays also display triple windows in each story. Transom sash crown the first-floor banks ofwindows, giving those
windows an added height, and triple wooden spandrel panels separate the first- and second-story banks ofwindows. The fourth-floor windows are positioned directly below the frieze and are only half the height of the second- and third-story ones.
The building's brick side walls each have five vertical projecting piers where the interior beams intersect, and the rear ends ofthe side walls are treated the same. Before the recent rehabilitation ofthe building for office and apartment space, the side walls contained an irregular pattern of small square-head window openings in the basement and first stories, generally one window in each section between the adjoining piers. The rear .facade displayed a simple fire entrance and steel fire escape.
The temple's interior was entirely gutted in the early 1980s following the building's sale by the Masons to the first of several developers who planned a rehabilitation project. No plans are available. Theinteriorcontainedabasementlevel,whichhousedakitchenanddiningarea,and fourfullorpartialstories. Staircasesandstairlobbiesoccupiedthesouthwestcornerofeach story. The staircases were simple stained-wood affairs with square-plan newels and square- section balusters. The rear two-thirds ofthe main-floor space was serving as the lodge room before the Masons abandoned the building. It had an acoustical tile drop ceiling and a raised platform and partition behind it that were non-original. The upper two stories contained an auditorium. A three-tier balcony, with folding theater seats, and its lobby across the front ofthe building formed the fourth story. The auditoriuni had a three-step high raised platform in the center third o f its east wall, and a pressed metal ceiling with simply detailed square panels and a coved cornice around the sides. Lobbies on the street side fronted both the auditorium and its balcony.
The temple has recently been rehabilitated for office use on the first floor and residential use aboveafternearlyfifteenyearsofdisuse. Severalredevelopmentschemesovertheintervening years were proposed but never got beyond the planning'stage. The present developers acquired a gutted shell, with no original interior finish remaining. The first or main floor has been rehabilitated to serve as a suite of offices for a single tenant. The second, third, and fourth story eachcontainsapartmentsopeningoffacentralfront-to-backcorridor. Themainstaircaseshave beenpositionedinthebuilding'ssouthwestcomer,inapproximatelytheirhistoriclocations. A stair/elevator tower has been added to the rear to meet code requirements. This rear facade is not visible except from the service area behind the University Place development.
As part ofthe rehabilitation, new window openings were introduced in the building's north and south side walls in order to provide light and air for offices and apartments. This work certainly altered the appearance ofthe side walls. However, the windows themselves are simple one-over- ones that are similar in form and scale to such windows as were previously present in the side elevations. In addition, the sides ofofthis mid-block building were not and are not today primary elevations. What are important as character-defining elements are the building's overall form and bulk and its decorative front facade. The front facade has been restored as is, with the only change being new double doors sympathetic to the building's historic character that replaced steel doors installed by a previous developer (which themselves replaced the original doors). The concrete tablet above these doors is still the original bearing the legend "MASONIC TEMPLE 1916."