You are here
J. P. Morgan Chase Tower (Texas Commerce Tower)
What distinguishes the seventy-five-story, 1,000-foot-tall, and 1.99-million-square-foot Texas Commerce Tower is the authority with which Pei's office detailed its surfaces of stainless steel and polished gray Barre granite. Pei tried to mitigate its aloofness with the broad granite-paved plaza at Capitol and Milam streets, offset on the southeast with a raised terrace, and landscaped as an Islamic water garden. Pei's most inspired decision was to persuade his clients Gerald D. Hines Interests and Texas Commerce Bank to commission Catalán sculptor Joan Miró to produce a giant-scaled, colored version of Personage and Birds (1970) for installation in the plaza. Its boldness and delight play off the slightly repressive good taste of the architecture. Across the street at 601 Travis is the nineteen-story J. P. Morgan Chase Center of 1982 by I. M. Pei and Partners and 3D/International.
Writing Credits
If SAH Archipedia has been useful to you, please consider supporting it.
SAH Archipedia tells the story of the United States through its buildings, landscapes, and cities. This freely available resource empowers the public with authoritative knowledge that deepens their understanding and appreciation of the built environment. But the Society of Architectural Historians, which created SAH Archipedia with University of Virginia Press, needs your support to maintain the high-caliber research, writing, photography, cartography, editing, design, and programming that make SAH Archipedia a trusted online resource available to all who value the history of place, heritage tourism, and learning.