State Mutual Life Assurance Company Building , Worcester, MA, 1895, Peabody & Stearns

State Mutual Life Assurance Company Building , Worcester, MA
Peabody & Stearns, architect(s). From the American Architect and Building News, November 2, 1895. 17.25 by 13 inches. VG+ condition with light browning along the edges and some light crinkling.
Peabody and Stearns' Renaissance Revival, the first skyscrapper of Worcester, built as the second State Mutual Building when the business outgrew the first. It is a nine story, steel-frame structure faced with dressed white marble. The building is of extremely ornate Renaissance Revival design. It was regarded as "the first modern office building in the city" at the time of its construction. Planned as a lavish corporate symbol, it contained a large interior court with a grand staircase and an archaded loggia at the second story. Hand-colored Original Plan. This picture is extremely hard to find, as the American Architect and Building News not only had a very small circulation during that time, but very few were actually preserved or colored as this has been. It measures 17.25 by 13 inches. Has a mat border and foam core backing (not attached to the picture). The whole plan measures approximately 19 by 16.75 inches (with mat border). Finely detailed and beautifully hand-colored. Shrink wrapped.