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There were two Globe buildings in the Twin Cities – one in St. Paul, one in Minneapolis, each erected to house the staff of a long-forgotten newspaper. This one went up in 1889, and has that crazy rusticated pile-it-high style that looked creaky and creepy to the postwar eye, but struck its contemporaries as exuberant and strong. It was also remarkably colorful, something these old pictures never capture - although given the smog and smoke of Minneapolis in those days, it probably looked like this by the 30s.
Note the way the building pauses on its ascent – above the first floor, above the fourth, above the seventh – a line is drawn to portion off the bulk, but they’re pierced by the pilaster-chimneys and undercut by the upward effect of the repeating columns in the turret. The final effect is a building that leaps out of its constraints, culminating in the point of the witch’s hat tower: ding! |