PwC Plaza

The PwC Plaza is a Postmodernist skyscraper designed by Leonard Parker, and built between 1984 and 1987 in Minneapolis, MN.

PwC Plaza is not the only name you might know this building by though. The building is, or has also been known as Plaza VII.

Its precise street address is 45 South 7th Street, Minneapolis, MN. You can also find it on the map here.

The 19-story tower was built on top of the 17-story Royal Sonesta luxury hotel, to which it is connected.

The building underwent a major restoration in 2023. The architect commissioned to undertake this restoration was Studio BV.

Leonard Parker 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 here is a list of the people we do know also played their part in making the PwC Plaza a reality:

• Enclos Corp. in charge of Facade Consultancy
• Jaros, Baum & Bolles in charge of MEP Engineering

The PwC Plaza can be categorized as a Postmodernist building.

The PwC Plaza was completed in 1987. At that time Postmodernism was the prevailing style. Fresh, bold and daring, architects were exploring the freedom of designing without having to follow the strict, sometimes arbitrary rules of a specific architectural movement (which ironically became a movement itself). The PwC Plaza was therefore every much in line with what the architecture community, and the people liked and wanted at the time.

The PwC Plaza uses a frame structure made of steel columns and slabs.

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 a combination of reddish marble clad and glass on the first 17 floors, followed by a continuous dark-tinted glass curtain wall.

Both the original hotel building and the newly added tower are crowned with a flat roof featuring a two-sided gable roof at the center.