One Charles Center

The One Charles Center is an International Style skyscraper designed between 1959 and 1960 by Mies van der Rohe, and built between 1960 and 1962, for a reported $12.0 million dollars, in Baltimore, MD. Mies van der Rohe was commisioned to design the building after winning the competition that was held in 1960.

Its precise street address is 100 North Charles Street, Baltimore, MD. You can also find it on the map here.

The One Charles Center is a structure of significant importance both for the city of Baltimore and the United States as a nation. The building embodies the distinctive characteristic features of the time in which it was built and the International Style style. Because of that, the One Charles Center was officially included in the National Register of Historic Places on July 13^th 2000.

The One Charles Center was awarded with the First Honor Award by the Baltimore Chapter of the American Institute of Architects.

The building stands on a concrete podium topped by a plaza. Initially the podium and the plaza was paved with travertine marble, although the material was replaced at some point in the 80s. The podium is currently clad with pre-cast concrete panels.

The poidum houses retail space and an underground parking.

The building has been restored 2 times over the years to ensure its conservation and adaptation to the pass of time. The main restoration works happened in 1987 and 1993.

Mies van der Rohe was the architecture firm in charge of the architectural design.

That being said, architecture is a complex discipline involving many professionals from different fields, without whom this building would have not been possible. We will surely be leaving out a lot of names here, but at the very least we know that there was one other part involved, that was Metropolitan Structures as the Main Developer.

The One Charles Center can be categorized as an International Style building.

The One Charles Center was designed in 1959. By 1959 the International Style movement had already left its early days behind and could be considered a mature movement, which does not mean it was loved and accepted by everyone, on the contrary. The International Style was accepted by the architecture community way before it was by the general public, and it is therefore likely that the One Charles Center was not well received by everyone at the time.

The One Charles Center uses a frame structure made of reinforced concrete columns and beams.

A frame structure uses a combination of beams and columns to sustain the building's weight. The walls in this case are non-load bearing, which allows for more flexibility when distributing the interior spaces.

The facade uses a non-load bearing curtain wall system. This means the curtain wall modules are anchored to the building's structural frame, typically by being attached to the edge of the floor slabs. The curtain wall system connects to the slabs using brackets, anchors, and mullions, which transfer the loads imposed by wind and temperature changes, to the building's primary structural elements.

This setup allows the curtain wall to accommodate differential movement between the facade and the structural frame, such as thermal expansion, floor deflection, or sway from wind forces. This system's integration with the slab edges also allows for continuous insulation and weatherproofing layers.

From an aesthetic point of view, the facade features the characteristic curtain wall Mies liked to use in his high rises. In this particular case, the modules are 4 ft. 8-1/2 in, made of brown anodized aluminum with brawn glazing and his signature I shaped mullions.