General Motors design landmark gets second life--as a school

"The profession was invented in this room,” says Richard Rogers, president of the College for Creative Studies (CCS), as he stands in the dusty construction site that used to be the General Motors Argonaut Building.

“And this is where Harley Earl's office was.”

Looking across the top floor of the building, it is easy to see a circle of concrete like the landing mark of a flying saucer. The circle is the remnant of an early platform for clay models, developed here for the first time as design tools for mass-production autos.

“The Buick Y-Job, the first concept car, was created here,” Rogers adds, “and Boss Kettering's inventions.” Technical and engineering milestones such as Hydramatic--the first widely sold automatic transmission--also came out of the Argonaut. “That's an elevator big enough to move a car,” points out Rogers, who leads an institution that is one of the nation's premiere educational grounds for automobile and other designers.

The Argonaut Building was home to many ground-breaking GM designs.

The massive 11-story Argonaut Building, built in stages in 1928 and 1936, is in the midst of a $145 million renovation. It is one of the few bright spots on Detroit's horizon these days. The project will redevelop the 760,000-square-foot building, donated by GM, as “an integrated educational community focused on art and design.” It is located behind the Fisher Building and the original GM buildings in Detroit, and, with thick walls and high ceilings, it radiates a sense of being rock-solid--as GM and Detroit's economy did at the time it was built.

The building's walls are topped with arches of alternating light and dark, stone and brick, which evoke the Moorish architecture of Spain. The Argonaut was de-signed by the venerable Albert Kahn, the dean of Detroit architects. Kahn and his firm designed most of the important factories and laboratories in Detroit at the time, as well as the mansions of Edsel Ford and other members of the automotive aristocracy, in wholly different style.

The architects of the renovation are Albert Kahn Associates, the descendant firm of the original architect, and creative consultant Jennifer Luce of Luce et Studio, which created studios for Nissan Design, among other projects.

The Argonaut will offer space for CCS programs, including new graduate programs, with dining and dorm space for 300. The building also will house a new sort of middle and secondary school, devoted to design. The idea is to hook inner-city kids early in the creative process and foster them along the way. Students of all ages will be able to learn from one another so, the theory goes, talent can be seamlessly encouraged and developed from first budding to full blooming.

With funding from nonprofits and incorporating the innovative charter-school model, the project is one of Detroit's little-noted green shoots.

There will be a rooftop conference center for public, academic and corporate events. A parking garage for 500 vehicles was added, as well as a gallery and retail space for rent. All told, the planners say, the refurbished building will bring about 2,000 people daily to the New Center area, supporting retail, services and other business.

The building takes its name from that of GM's real-estate holding firm. (There was a GM-owned Argonaut Building in New York as well.) It likely will end up with a new moniker in its new role. The building served as the home for design and engineering until 1956, when GM moved those departments to the Tech Center in Warren, Mich., but the Argonaut continued as a busy office building for various parts of the company over the years.

The building closed in the late 1990s and stood idle before the new concept was developed, led by CCS and the Larson Realty Group, which is overseeing the project with several partners. Local businesses, including Crain Communications and community groups such as the New Center, have offered support, both financial and advisory. The editorial director of AutoWeek, Keith Crain, is the chairman of the CCS Board of Trustees.

The future looks bright for the structure.

Design consultant Luce says that the architects and developers are hoping to obtain a John Chamberlain sculpture to install in the building's lobby. Chamberlain gained fame in the 1960s for his pop sculptures, created from banged-up automobile bumpers, fenders and other old parts. The Chamberlain piece in question, called Deliquescence, stood for years outdoors on the campus of Wayne State University in Detroit and now requires indoor shelter.

The piece is an apt symbol of a battered industry and an exhausted city, requiring the shelter and nurturing of education and art--the forces that CCS and its partners hope to renew as they renew the Argonaut Building.

By PHIL PATTON