The Stony Island Trust and Savings Bank Building is a historic bank building at 6760 S. Stony Island Avenue in the South Shore neighborhood of Chicago, Illinois. The building opened in 1923 for the Stony Island Trust and Savings Bank, which was founded in 1917 and had outgrown its first building. The bank was one of Chicago's many neighborhood banks in the early twentieth century; as Illinois law at the time barred banks from opening branches, smaller standalone banks provided the residents and businesses of Chicago's outlying neighborhoods with nearby banking services. Architect William Gibbons Uffendell designed the bank in the Neoclassical style, by far the most popular for bank buildings at the time. Uffendell's design features a granite exterior, a temple front with four

Doric column The Doric order was one of the three orders of ancient Greek and later Roman architecture; the other two canonical orders were the Ionic and the Corinthian. The Doric is most easily recognized by the simple circular capitals at the top of col ...

s, and an

entablature An entablature (; nativization of Italian , from "in" and "table") is the superstructure of moldings and bands which lies horizontally above columns, resting on their capitals. Entablatures are major elements of classical architecture, and ...

topped by a parapet. The bank folded in 1931 as the

Great Depression The Great Depression (19291939) was an economic shock that impacted most countries across the world. It was a period of economic depression that became evident after a major fall in stock prices in the United States. The economic contagio ...

disrupted the city's banking industry; for the remainder of the 20th century, the building was alternately used by other banks and left vacant for extended periods. The building was added to the National Register of Historic Places on November 15, 2013. It is now home to the

Stony Island Arts Bank Rebuild Foundation is a non-profit organization dedicated to transforming buildings and neighborhoods in South Side Chicago, sustaining cultural development as well as celebrating art. The Rebuild Foundation was founded in 2009 by Theaster Gates ...

, an art gallery and library.

References

Commercial buildings on the National Register of Historic Places in Chicago Bank buildings on the National Register of Historic Places in Illinois Office buildings completed in 1923 Neoclassical architecture in Illinois {{CookCountyIL-NRHP-stub