Price Tower: Bartlesville, Oklahoma 1952-56
There's a lot of history to the Price Tower. It is a beautiful and dramatic building that really stands out against the skyline of this small Oklahoma city. Harold C. Price was the owner of a company that built oil drilling and pipeline equipment for the emerging oil industry in Oklahoma and Texas. Mr. Price originally wanted Bruce Goff, head of the Architecture Department at Oklahoma University, to design his headquarters. The Price family had a history with Goff and he was definitely their preferred architect. Goff turned down the commission, but recommended that Price talk to Frank Lloyd Wright.
The Price Tower is 19 stories (221 feet) tall. Each floor is a little bit smaller than the floor below it. The building has a central core with elevator shafts that house 3 custom-designed by Otis Elevator Company. The Price Tower was designed to be a multi-use building from the beginning and it stays that way to this day. The building had 8 loft apartments in the upper floors and a first floor apartment for the care taker.
In order to get a permit for building the tower, Wright was required by the city to include a public service office in the building. He did so by making a drive-through that goes in the middle of the first floor. What is now the room where you watch the orientation movie was once a narrow drive through where you could pay your public service bill. It is way too narrow for any current cars to fit through.
Barbara's Dress Shop and an Beauty Shop were located on the second floor. There was a doctor's office and dentist's office in the middle floors. These offices were so small that they had to use the lobby on the first floor for their patients' waiting room. The first floor also had a newspaper and cigar stand.
Harold Price Sr.'s Apartment was on the 17th floor. It is a beautiful, small apartment with a loft for the bedroom. The stairs are quite narrow and steep to save space. Most of the furniture for the apartments had to be assembled on-site because the elevators and stairways were so narrow.
Each of the apartments came out to be about 930 square feet. They have a small and rather unique kitchen with an appliance that is the size of a normal stove/oven, but is split in half so that one side is the stove and oven and the other side is the refrigerator.
Mr. Price Sr. had an office on the 19th floor and his secretary had a tiny office space next door. The office is absolutely tiny when you consider it's occupant was the head of a multi-national company. It was barely big enough to hold its Wright-designed desk and chair and a built in sofa. Wright also designed a mural for the office. Price's office is the only one with a real wood-burning fire place. All of the other apartments have gas fire places.
Price kept the building unti 1971 when it was purchased by Phillips Petrolium Company. Phillips later donated it to become the Price Tower Art Center. As it is today, it is an art center on the lower floors, a museum and cafe on the upper floors and a hotel in the middle.
Information about The Inn at Price Tower can be found HERE.
