Fountain Place
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Fountain Place is a 60-story late-modernist
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-ris ...
in
downtown Dallas Downtown Dallas is the central business district (CBD) of Dallas, Dallas, Texas, United States, located in the geographic center of the city. It is the second-largest business district in the state of Texas. The area termed "Downtown" has tradit ...
,
Texas Texas (, ; Spanish language, Spanish: ''Texas'', ''Tejas'') is a state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States. At 268,596 square miles (695,662 km2), and with more than 29.1 million residents in 2 ...
. Standing at a structural height of , it is the fifth-tallest building in Dallas, and the 15th-tallest in Texas. (If the antennas and spires of the Renaissance Tower were excluded, Fountain Place would be the fourth-tallest building in Dallas, and the 14th-tallest in Texas). A new 45-story sibling tower, AMLI Fountain Place, has been built to its northwest on an adjacent lot.


Design

Original plans for the project called for twin towers, with the second tower rotated 90 degrees from the original, to be built across the garden on an adjacent lot, but with the collapse of the Texas oil, banking and real estate industry and the savings and loan scandal of the 1980s, the project was never completed. The building was designed by the Pei Cobb Freed & Partners, Henry N. Cobb, Harry Weese Associates, and
WZMH Architects WZMH Architects is an architectural firm established in 1961 and based in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Originally known as Webb Zerafa Menkès Housden (after Peter Webb, Boris Zerafa, René Menkès, and Warwick Housden) the company's name was changed t ...
, and was completed in 1986. The building was named for the array of 172 dancing fountains in the plaza at its base with a fully automated water show as the centerpiece. The fountains were an extreme undertaking and the first concept of their kind on such a large scale. WET Design company was brought in to facilitate the project; it was the company's first major project since the founders left Disney to team up. WET collaborated with the firm of
I. M. Pei Ieoh Ming Pei
– website of Pei Cobb Freed & Partners
( ; ; April 26, 1917 – May 16, 2019) was ...
as well as landscape architects Dan Kiley and Peter Ker Walker to create the waterscape of Fountain Place (at Allied Bank Tower) in
Dallas Dallas () is the List of municipalities in Texas, third largest city in Texas and the largest city in the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex, the List of metropolitan statistical areas, fourth-largest metropolitan area in the United States at 7.5 ...
,
Texas Texas (, ; Spanish language, Spanish: ''Texas'', ''Tejas'') is a state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States. At 268,596 square miles (695,662 km2), and with more than 29.1 million residents in 2 ...
. The project showed the first use of WET's patented open-jointed paving in a fountain where shots of water appear from the openings in the plaza's surface. After completion of Fountain Place, WET went on to design other notable fountains such as the
Bellagio Bellagio may refer to: * Bellagio, Lombardy, an Italian town * Bellagio (resort), a luxury resort and casino in Las Vegas * Bellagio (Hong Kong), a private housing building * Bellagio declaration, an intellectual copyright resolution * 79271 Bellag ...
fountains in Las Vegas and
The Dubai Fountain The Dubai Fountain is a choreographed fountain system located on the 12 hectare (30 acre) artificial Burj Khalifa Lake, at the center of the Downtown Dubai development in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. It was designed by WET Design, a California-ba ...
. The building was designed as a large, multi-faceted prism. Its various slanted sides cause the building to have a completely different profile from all directions. The sibling tower, AMLI Fountain Place, consists of 367 residential units above nine stories of parking. Its architect, Page Southerland Page, Inc., intended its exterior design to echo that of the original office tower, calling to mind the planned but never realized twin tower. Upon its completion, it was the tallest skyscraper built in Dallas since the Chase Building.


History

At the time of its opening, it was the second tallest building in the city, behind Bank of America Plaza. However, upon completion of the Comerica Bank Tower and the Chase Tower, it fell to fourth-tallest. The post-completion addition of an antenna spire to the Renaissance Tower relegated Fountain Place to its current spot at fifth on the list. On September 24, 2009, the FBI arrested 19-year-old
Hosam Maher Husein Smadi Hosam Maher Husein Smadi (born 1990) is a citizen of Jordan who was arrested on suspicion of planning a terrorist bombing of Fountain Place, a building in Dallas, Texas, on September 24, 2009. Smadi was in the United States illegally, and unawar ...
of
Jordan Jordan ( ar, الأردن; tr. ' ), officially the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan,; tr. ' is a country in Western Asia. It is situated at the crossroads of Asia, Africa, and Europe, within the Levant region, on the East Bank of the Jordan Rive ...
for an alleged attempt to bomb the skyscraper. Smadi was living and working in Italy, Texas, and had been under FBI investigation for some time.


Tenants

Fountain Place was the headquarters of
Tenet Healthcare Tenet Healthcare Corporation is a for-profit multinational healthcare services company based in Dallas, Texas, United States. Through its brands, subsidiaries, joint ventures, and partnerships, including United Surgical Partners International (U ...
until 2020. Tenet Healthcare announced in 2008 that it was moving from the northern suburban areas of Dallas to Fountain Place due to high gasoline prices and the revitalization of
downtown Dallas Downtown Dallas is the central business district (CBD) of Dallas, Dallas, Texas, United States, located in the geographic center of the city. It is the second-largest business district in the state of Texas. The area termed "Downtown" has tradit ...
. Trevor Fetter, the company's then president and chief executive, credited the
Dallas Area Rapid Transit Dallas Area Rapid Transit (DART) is a transit agency serving the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex of Texas. It operates buses, light rail, commuter rail, and high-occupancy vehicle lanes in Dallas and twelve of its suburbs. In , the system had a ...
light rail and the concept of an urban location for his decision to move to Downtown Dallas. Fountain Place contains many financial institutions and offices including Wells Fargo. Originally cited as First Interstate Tower or Allied Bank Tower, it was after the 1988 merger of Wells Fargo that the building became known as Fountain Place, becoming the only major skyscraper in Dallas not to lend its name to the occupying bank. The top two levels of Fountain Place are occupied by Dallas Architecture Firm, Rouch Architects. Fountain Place also serves as Region 6 headquarters for the
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is an independent executive agency of the United States federal government tasked with environmental protection matters. President Richard Nixon proposed the establishment of EPA on July 9, 1970; it be ...
.
Hunt Oil Hunt Oil Co. is an independent oil and gas company headquartered in Dallas, Texas. It conducts its main oil production activities in the United States, Canada and, as of 1984, in Yemen. In the past, the company was owned by american oil tycoon ...
operated out of Fountain Place until they built new headquarters across the street in 2007.


In popular culture

In seasons 10–14 of ''
Dallas Dallas () is the List of municipalities in Texas, third largest city in Texas and the largest city in the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex, the List of metropolitan statistical areas, fourth-largest metropolitan area in the United States at 7.5 ...
'', exterior shots of the building were used for the offices of Bobby Ewing's Petro Group Dallas, which later became
Ewing Oil The Ewing family is the fictional family of the American prime time soap opera ''Dallas'' and its 2012 revival, as well as the foundation of the spin-off series ''Knots Landing''. In the original series of ''Dallas'', the Ewings own and run S ...
. The building can be seen in some scenes in the 1987 science fiction movie ''
RoboCop ''RoboCop'' is a 1987 American science fiction action film directed by Paul Verhoeven and written by Edward Neumeier and Michael Miner. The film stars Peter Weller, Nancy Allen, Daniel O'Herlihy, Ronny Cox, Kurtwood Smith, and Miguel Ferre ...
''. The building's dancing fountains were used for scenes in the movie '' Blank Check''. Exterior shots of the building are seen in the
USA Network USA Network (simply USA) is an American basic cable television channel owned by the NBCUniversal Television and Streaming division of Comcast's NBCUniversal through NBCUniversal Cable Entertainment. It was originally launched in 1977 as Madison ...
TV series '' Queen of the South''.


AMLI Fountain Place

AMLI Fountain Place is a 562 ft. (171 m) residential skyscraper that neighbors Fountain Place. It was designed by architecture firm Page. In 2019 it was under construction, and had been projected to be completed in 2020. The project was first proposed in 2016, to remove the parking space on Fountain Place's west side. The project will also be the first project since the proposed Ross Perot Tower to occupy the parking lot. The original design called for twin buildings of Fountain Place, however because of the oil crisis/decline, the twin was never built. The twin building was projected to be built parallel to the parking lot. AMLI Fountain Place has brought in 367 apartments that rise 46 stories. AMLI Fountain Place also uses the same glass of its sibling.


See also

*
List of tallest buildings in Dallas File:View of Dallas from Reunion Tower August 2015 05.jpg, 350px, Skyline of Dallas (use cursor to identify buildings) poly 2376 388 2608 372 2784 432 2788 596 2836 616 2844 2604 2668 2644 2544 2668 2420 2704 2420 2740 2310 2720 2310 640 2352 64 ...
*
Tallest buildings in Texas This list of tallest buildings in Texas ranks skyscrapers in the U.S. state of Texas by height. The tallest structure in the state, excluding radio towers, is the JP Morgan Chase Tower, in Houston, which contains 75 floors and is tall. The seco ...
* List of tallest buildings in the United States


References


Further reading

*


External links


Fountain Place official website




{{Dallas skyscrapers Skyscraper office buildings in Dallas Downtown Dallas Office buildings completed in 1986 WZMH Architects buildings Modernist architecture in Texas 1980s architecture in the United States