The new Main & Gervais Office Tower is situated on one of the most prominent sites in all of downtown Columbia, the corner of Main and Gervais Streets, overlooking the South Carolina State Capital Building. As if the grounds of the capital were extended across Gervais Street, the existing public plaza along the tower’s South-facing façade has been refurbished with new landscaping and lighting, creating a park-like setting for the new building. The plaza can be enjoyed by passers-by on a daily basis and can also be the venue for more formal gatherings.
The eighteen-story, 200,000 square foot tower has been designed to respond to the prominence of its important setting. In addition to office space for several well-known members of the downtown Columbia business community, the building program includes a lobby-level branch bank, a signature restaurant with outdoor dining on the plaza, and a 540-space, six-level parking garage. The tower’s simply sculpted form, sheathed in all glass, makes a powerful statement on the city skyline that can be seen from multiple vantage points. The façade facing the Capital has been articulated with vertically-accented aluminum mullions to express both the prominence of the site and the height of the tower.
While the Gervais Street façade of the tower fronts onto the plaza and overlooks the Capital, the main lobby entrance fronts onto Main Street. This allows the building to reference both the importance of being on Main Street while addressing the Capital Building and maintaining direct access to the public plaza. The addition of a two-story tall terrace on the first office level, approximately eighty feet above the plaza, accents both the Main Street lobby entrance and the verticality of the tower. Views from the terrace across the plaza to the Capital grounds will be unparalleled in all of downtown. Construction is scheduled to begin in the summer of 2008. It will be 226 feet tall when complete.
