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| The "neo-Georgian" façade of the Buffalo Wild Wings Building from Google Street View |
Last month, Buffalo Wild Wings announced that they would be closing their 202 S State Street location. As we say goodbye to this business, it's a great opportunity to for us to reflect on the architectural significance of the BW3 Building, formally referred to as Corner House Apartments.
Looking at it now, it's hard to imagine the modest, 9-story building could be of much architectural significance. To understand the importance of the BW3 Building, we need to jump back to 2003.
There were no tall buildings built in downtown Ann Arbor in the 1990s. Hobbs & Black's 101 N Main, erected in 1989, was the last "high rise" built downtown before that stagnant decade. Indeed, the dearth of multi-family construction during that time can be seen in permitting data for the city.
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| Permitting data by year and building unit count. |
Though short compared to many of the downtown buildings that succeeded it, the "Beautiful Georgian-style building with such subtle, understated decorations" became the first of several downtown "high rises" in the 2000s. These new buildings caused a some to decry that building was out of control and that Ann Arbor was bing overrun by tall buildings. Though, as we can see in the above chart, there was little multi-family permitting in the aughts and almost none in the teens.
While it seems insignificant today, the BW3 Building has played an important role shaping Ann Arbor's physical and indeed, political, landscape. Though the rate of downtown construction was relatively modest in the first two decades of the millennium, the perception of out of control development has driven a great deal of political discourse in Ann Arbor. So as we say goodbye to Ann Arbor's downtown Buffalo Wild Wings, let us pause an acknowledge a building that ushered in the contemporary age of #a2Council politics.
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| Zoe Clark and Lester Graham from Michigan Public's 2012 election night party at Buffalo Wild Wings |