Architecture
The building is a white terra cotta structure designed by John Ahlschlager in 1914 for the Schulze Baking Company. The terra cotta walls were five storeys high. The building featured blue lettering, foliated cornice ornamentation, and stringcourses of rosettes. The building uses 700 windows grouped to complement the ornamentation's allusion to themes of nature and purity. The ornamentation is considered abstract, Sullivanesque and modern. The company used Apron conveyor manufactured by the Jeffrey Manufacturing Company of Columbus, Ohio. A lengthy low industrial complex extends northward behind the main five-story building.
The structure has a flat concrete slab floor with four-way reinforcement designed to support 300 pounds per square inch (2,100 kPa). The dimensions of the building 298 feet 4 inches (90.93 m) by 160 feet (49 m) and it is composed of floor space segmented into 17 feet 6 inches (5.33 m) by 20 feet (6.1 m). The second floor is 9 inches (23 cm) thick except in the 7 feet 6 inches (2.29 m) square surrounding each column where it is 14 inches (36 cm) thick.
As of late 2008, the building was showing signs of wear, disrepair and neglect. At least one terra cotta cornice was missing, and the building had numerous walkway coverings to protect passersby from falling debris such as further terra cotta loss. One side wall was propped up with wood beams at 45 degree angles. In addition, the building has some graffiti markings.
Read more about this topic: Schulze Baking Company Plant
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