Book Tower

The Washington Boulevard Historic District is significant as an intact streetscape of architecturally distinguished commercial buildings dating from 1901-1930 with a majority built in the 1920s. The buildings individually represent some of the finest early Twentieth Century architecture in Detroit and as a group illustrate the evolution of the commercial style in Detroit as it was practiced by some of Michigan's master architects. The district is also significant as a product of a planned real estate development inspired by the City Beautiful movement and carried out as the private artistic endeavor of one family and their architect, Louis Kamper.

After the success of the magnificent Book-Cadillac Hotel, Kamper designed the 36-story, Book Tower at 1265 Washington Boulevard to adjoin the 1917 Book Building at the corner of Washington Boulevard and Grand River Avenue. Completed in 1926, the Book Tower is a somewhat unsuccessful attempt at a Beaux Arts skyscraper. It harmonizes with the earlier Book Building by utilizing the identical detailing for the first twelve stories. Above the roof of its lower neighbor, the verticality of the Book Tower is relieved by occasional bands of oversized Italian Renaissance detailing. The fenestration of the upper four floors is vertically unified into a penthouse composition by colossal, unfluted, Corinthian pilasters and an incredibly elaborate Beaux Arts Baroque cornice treatment surmounted by a tall peaked cooper roof.