Casa del Rey Apartments

When the Casa Del Rey Apartments were built in early 1929 at a cost of over $400,000, at the southeast corner of Oneida Road and Algonquin Road, the four-and-one-half story brick structure contained the finest apartments in the City of Pontiac. With forty-one individual units, ranging in size from two to six rooms, the Casa Del Rey was also the largest apartment building in Pontiac. Because of its very large size by Pontiac standards, its picturesque massing and roof line, and its elaborate use of ceramic tiling as decorative accents, the Casa Del Rey is Pontiac's finest example of Spanish Eclectic design. The Casa Del Rey apartments were built just prior to the Great Depression in the United States, which began in October, 1929. Pontiac was continuing to experience tremendous growth as the automotive industry continued to grow and expand. Housing was scarce throughout the city as workers came from all over the state and country, particularly the southern states, to find work in the automobile factories and related industries located just west of and on the fringe of Downtown Pontiac.

The Spanish Eclectic Casa Del Rey Apartments building, built in 1929, is a four-and-one-half-story, yellow and orange brick structure located south of Huron Street on the southeast corner of Oneida and Algonquin Streets. The front facade faces Oneida on the west, with the rear of the structure facing vacant lots (now used for hospital parking) to the east on Seminole Avenue. Originally built with forty-one units, it was the largest apartment building in the city of Pontiac at the time. Interior walls are done in antique plaster. Natural oak trim is found throughout the building while elaborate use of colorful clay tile is found throughout public spaces and on fireplaces in many of the individual apartments. The overall plan of the building is a C shape. The main entry is off of the courtyard which faces Oneida Street, in the center of the structure. Matching low lying curvilinear walls, approximately five feet tall at the building wall, sloping to about three feet height at the main entry opening are topped with a cast iron ornamental arch holding a lantern at the top of the arch. Two, matching entrance porches, sometimes referred to as loggias, are found on the front facade to the right and left of the courtyard opening. These one-story porches each have a low rise of steps on the right and left side, parallel with Oneida Street. Each has corner buttresses originally topped with red clay tiles and a flat roof with battlements which serve as a balcony railing. Originally designed to have a canvas awning over each balcony above these two entry porches, they now have aluminum awnings which are out of character with the materials and style elements of the exterior. These porches each have a single, wide, round arched opening facing Oneida, with narrower round arched openings over the steps on the north and south sides. On the third level of the front facade, over the awnings above the balconies just described, there are three panels, side by side, filled with sky blue and pale green ceramic tiles in a checkerboard pattern above and below the third-floor windows in this location. These same, blue and green ceramic tiles are found again on the third level above the main entry on the courtyard, but here they are laid in a diamond pattern.