The building is merely a block of offices, and being
of brick instead of Portland stone it has probably cost less than most office blocks of a similar type. Its triumphant success is in no way due to magnificence of material or profusion of ornament. No attempt is made to disguise the purely utilitarian purpose to which it will be put. Why, then, does this building rise to a different plane and make everything else that can be seen at the same time look either commonplace or vulgar ? In the first place it must be conceded that it owes something to the fact that it actually dominates its immediate surround- ings in height. But lots of insignificant buildings do that. Office buildings arc always high and most architects are frightened of admitting the fact, so they emphasize the horizontal lines and tease the silhouette with projections. But here the clean edges rise sheer like a cliff, as the projection of the cornice is veryslight, a most important element of the general success. Above the cornice the wall is set back for a storey and finally the whole is covered by a steep pantiled roof tilted in a slightly Chinese manner. This tilting combined with the severity of the general outline recalls in a curious way the great Tibetan monasteries.
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