May the Circle be Unbroken

Frank Lloyd Wright's round Guggenhiem Museum in New York opened on October 21, 1959, instantly becoming one of the best known works of modern architecture in the United States. Three years later, in 1962, another round work of modern architecture was built in Orlando with much less fanfare. Today the American Federal Savings and Loan Building is known to many Orlandoans as simply "the Round Building." Perhaps downtown's best surviving piece of mid-century modern architecture, the commercial structure is slated for demolition because it is located on the site of the city's new Dr. Phillips Performing Arts Complex.

The building was completed in two stages – the first two stories were completed with wonderful pre-cast concrete screen wrapping the exterior. Designed to accommodate an expansion upward, the building was later enlarged with five additional stories surrounded by nondescript glass windows. When I moved to Orlando it was known as the Coral Gables Federal Building, and it was an icon before the "renaissance" of Orlando's downtown.

The Central Florida Modern group led by Kevin Schweizer, the son of Frank Lloyd Wright protege Nils Schweizer, has been working to preserve the pre-cast screen, also known as a bris soleil, since 2008.  They sponsored a design competition to find ways of re-using the trapezoidal shapes in a new context. This week they held an event at the round building allowing entry to the unique structure one last time. In addition to offering tours, the award winning designs for the panels were announced and the head of the Cosanti Foundation spoke about Archology, Paolo Saleri's philosophy that combines architecture and ecology.

I spoke with the wife of the round building's architect who shared that the design was influenced by her husband's love of all things nautical. She also said he didn't care for the addition of the glass cylinder to his original design, and I have to agree that it never quite looked cohesive. Originally the executives had offices on the second floor overlooking a central lobby where tellers where placed in the center of the room. A large round skylight overhead let in natural light. Details of the original building still intact were wonderful wood paneling, round ashtrays and small round tiles in the bathroom. The circle motif was carried throughout the building.

The winning concept

Image from the Daily City blog

Image of the expansion from the Orange County Regional History Center

I was glad to have the opportunity to see this building up close one last time, and I was impressed with the turn out. While it is disappointing that it will be demolished, I was assured by city employees that at least some of the bris soleil panels will be preserved for re-use. It will be interesting to see how they are utilized. I left with a new appreciation for this Space Age edifice, and a new awareness of the how manmade environments of the future may look. From today's point of view they look just as futuristic as the round building must have looked in 1962.

A skylight originally adorned the ceiling

Looking towards the new Dr. Phillips Center

Change & constancy in downtown Orlando

When Orlando exploded with growth after the Mouse came to town in the early '70s, much of the of the city's historic architecture was lost in the name of progress. Preservationists never recovered from the loss of an entire downtown block to a wrecking ball minutes after a quick vote in city hall was railroaded through the city council. As I pedaled my bike through downtown Orlando on the bike trip I started documenting on a previous post, I found some great architectural gems in transition, and some enduring despite great odds.

As I approached downtown from the north, I stopped at one of Orlando's best Streamline Moderne structures, the former WDBO building, which has sat vacant for quite some time now. WDBO, which began broadcasting at Rollins College in Winter Park in 1924, built the studio on Ivanhoe Blvd. in 1947 and broadcast there for almost forty years. The AM station continues to broadcast today from another location, while the building sporting its call letters continues to decay.


Who says fur is dead? LaBelle Furs has been in business since in Orlando since 1919. I've never seen the elegant condensed font of their neon sign lit up, but it's one of my favorites and one of very few neon signs left in downtown.


Further south St. James Cathedral is starting to show the original Donovan Dean designed facade after years of being covered up. The modified Romanesque design was completed in January 1952 and the current restoration has a $10 million dollar price tag.


Located nearby is the charming Dr. Phillips Building, a Mediterranean Revival style commercial building named after Dr. Philip P. Phillips. The Dr. Phillips website claims "once considered the largest citrus producer in the world, Dr. Phillips left a legacy that has spanned several generations culminating in the establishment of Dr. Phillips Charities, comprised of The Dr. P. Phillips Foundation and Dr. Phillips Inc." The Dr. Phillips Charities is gigantic force for good in Central Florida, but I can't figure out why their namesake building sits closed up like this.

This building, adjacent to the 1920s Autrey Arcade, (and perhaps part of it), looked destined for demolition last year but now appears to be undergoing renovation.


The Tinker Building, built in 1925 by Hall of Fame baseball player turned developer Joe Tinker, is on the National Register for Historic Places. According to Orlando History in Architecture, it has a "bold, small, highly contrived facade using all the popular building materials of the day: brick, cut and pressed stone, colored glazed tile, stained glass and wood." This beautiful little building, renovated in 1980, is currently for rent.



On Church Street, the former Slemons Department Store, known more recently as Rosie O'Grady's Goodtime Emporium, awaits a buyer. After the attraction known as Church Street Station shut down, the individual buildings comprising the complex were leased out and the one time Dixieland Jazz haven became a comedy club. Despite the apparent success of the tapas restaurant Cerviche in the space formerly occupied by Apple Annie's Courtyard and Lili Marlene's Aviators Pub & Restaurant, Rosies sits vacant. My guess is that as the new zillion dollar basketball arena located just on the the other side of the interstate nears completion, someone will see an opportunity in opening a club or restaurant in the historic space.

UPDATE: Many of the places I wrote about in this 2010 post are again at risk. The City of Orlando's proposed moratorium on historic preservation in the Downtown Historic District once again puts the historic buildings on Church Street at risk for demolition. Visit this webpage for details: https://savechurchstreet.org/.


In addition to the arena, the other project the city wants to build is a new performing arts center and this mid-century masterpiece is in the way. The Central Florida Modern group organized a competition in 2008 "for the preservation of the precast concrete curtain wall of the American Federal building aka the Coral Gables building." There were some incredibly creative entries submitted from all over the world, and the winner received the appropriately round figure of $360. The organization's intent was to "inspire the City Of Orlando, owner of the building, to take care and save the pre-cast brise soleil pieces by removing them off the building prior to demolition so that private funds can be raised to implement one of the winning designs." I have heard no plans by the city to preserve any part of the building, as Orlando's downtown constantly evolves in an ever unpredictable fashion...