The twenty-two-story apartment building has been a chic address since its opening as one of Dallas’s first residential high-rises. The building’s pinwheel-shaped plan serves to break down its visual mass and bring light and air into the apartments. Strong piers modulate the facades into narrow bays, with recessed floor plates, spandrel panels, windows, and ornamental grilles providing secondary horizontal lines. The textured tan concrete of the piers contrasts with the rose-colored Mexican brick walls, but the most distinctive feature is the precast concrete sunscreens angled according to the sun’s orientation. The extended flat roof shows Wrightian influence and gives the building a strong finish.
New York–born Howard R. Meyer (1903–1988) worked in the office of William Lescaze, before traveling for a year in Europe with his wife, designer Schon Meyer (1903–1987). He returned to New York in 1929, but with few commissions during the Great Depression, the prospect of work brought them to Dallas (Schon was from Texas) in 1935, working as a draftsman at Fair Park, and again with Lescaze on the Magnolia Lounge (DS91.5). Meyer’s long career included residential, commercial, and public building projects.