6 Arlington Street (Junior League Building)

Six Arlington Street (Marlborough Street) is not only one of the Back Bay's newer historic buildings but it is also its largest and most elaborate example of the Moderne style. Although similar in massing to Strickland, Blodgett and Law's nearby Taj Hotel (BB3; 1927, 15 Arlington Street), the architects here abjured that building's limestone and red brick skin in favor of a somber palette of buff and black brick, accented with black granite. Gone, too, is the hotel's delicate Adamesque detailing, supplanted by an array of jagged geometric motifs, partly pre-Columbian, partly abstract in origin, representative of Art Deco ornament. Built for the Junior League, the building now serves Emerson College as a dormitory (6 Arlington) and cafeteria (Marlborough Street).