The Great American Tower at Queen City Square, is a 41-story,
skyscraper
A skyscraper is a tall continuously habitable building having multiple floors. Modern sources currently define skyscrapers as being at least or in height, though there is no universally accepted definition. Skyscrapers are very tall high-ri ...
in
Cincinnati, Ohio
Cincinnati ( ) is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Hamilton County. Settled in 1788, the city is located at the northern side of the confluence of the Licking and Ohio rivers, the latter of which marks the state line w ...
which opened in January 2011. The tower was built by
Western & Southern Financial Group at a cost of $322 million including $65 million of taxpayer-funded subsidies.
Construction on the tower had begun in July 2008. Half the building is occupied by the headquarters of the
Great American Insurance Company. It is currently the third tallest building in the state of Ohio, and the tallest outside of
Cleveland
Cleveland ( ), officially the City of Cleveland, is a city in the United States, U.S. U.S. state, state of Ohio and the county seat of Cuyahoga County, Ohio, Cuyahoga County. Located in the northeastern part of the state, it is situated along ...
.
Background
Western & Southern floated the idea of constructing a tower for twenty years following the last construction boom in
Downtown Cincinnati
Downtown Cincinnati is the central business district of Cincinnati, Ohio, as well the economic and symbiotic center of the Cincinnati metropolitan area. It also contains a number of urban neighborhoods in the low land area between the Ohio Ri ...
. In 2002 the project was revived. Plans called for a tower with over of office space. When the tower opened in 2011, it was , ending the
Carew Tower's 81-year reign as the tallest building in Cincinnati. While the Great American Tower is taller than the Carew Tower, the latter building's roof is taller than the roof of the Great American Tower.
The building was reviewed and approved by the Port of Greater Cincinnati Development Authority which determined whether its parameters conformed to the outline in the Cincinnati 2000 plan for downtown including a final approval by
Cincinnati City Council
The Cincinnati City Council is the lawmaking body of Cincinnati, Ohio. The nine-member city council is elected at-large in a single election in which each voter chooses nine candidates from the field. The nine top vote-getters win seats on the cou ...
on May 30, 2014.
Tenants in the building include American Financial Group, law firm Frost Brown Todd, law firm Vorys, Sater, Seymore and Pease and Western & Southern Financial Group. As of December 8, 2012, the tower itself is 90 percent leased.
The majority of Western & Southern's space is located in the 303 Broadway portion of the complex.
Design
The building's architect,
Gyo Obata, designed the building to include a top inspired by
Diana, Princess of Wales's tiara
A tiara (from la, tiara, from grc, τιάρα) is a jeweled head ornament. Its origins date back to ancient Greece and Rome. In the late 18th century, the tiara came into fashion in Europe as a prestigious piece of jewelry to be worn by women ...
. Gyo was flipping through books when he came upon a picture of Diana wearing a crown. "That's perfect. Here we have the crown of the building, and the nickname for the city is Queen City," said Joe Robertson of
Hellmuth, Obata and Kassabaum
HOK, formerly Hellmuth, Obata + Kassabaum and legally HOK Group, Inc., is an American design, architecture, engineering, and urban planning firm, founded in 1955.
As of 2018, HOK is the largest U.S.-based architecture-engineering ...
remarking to Gyo when he first saw the picture.
The building is constructed of glass and aluminum.
The ground floor lobby interiors were designed by
FRCH Design Worldwide
FRCH Design Worldwide (currently FRCH Nelson) is an American architectural and design firm headquartered in Cincinnati, Ohio with regional offices in Los Angeles and New York City. Founded in 1968, it provided architectural, interior design, grap ...
. It has met with approval from Sue Ann Painter, author of ''Architecture in Cincinnati'' (
Ohio University Press
Ohio University Press (OUP), founded in 1947, is the oldest and largest scholarly press in the state of Ohio. It is a department of Ohio University that publishes under its own name and the imprint Swallow Press.
History
The press publishes ap ...
, 2006), who believes the skyscraper's headdress recalls the iconic
Chrysler Building
The Chrysler Building is an Art Deco skyscraper on the East Side of Manhattan in New York City, at the intersection of 42nd Street and Lexington Avenue in Midtown Manhattan. At , it is the tallest brick building in the world with a steel fra ...
. She says that the building is somewhat conservative, but pays homage to the other skyscrapers in Cincinnati.
Jay Chatterjee, a former dean of the
University of Cincinnati College of Design, Architecture, Art, and Planning
The University of Cincinnati College of Design, Architecture, Art, and Planning, commonly referred to as DAAP, is a college of the University of Cincinnati. Located in the university's main campus in Cincinnati, Ohio, DAAP is consistently ranked ...
says that the design is similar to buildings constructed in the United States during the 1980s, that it does not break any new ground at all.
References
External links
Queen City Squareat Building Cincinnati
Queen City Squareat UrbanUp
{{Buildings in Cincinnati timeline
Office buildings completed in 2011
Skyscraper office buildings in Cincinnati
Insurance company headquarters in the United States
Postmodern architecture in the United States
2011 establishments in Ohio
Gyo Obata buildings