U.S. Steel Tower

The U.S. Steel Tower is a Contemporary skyscraper designed by Harrison, Abramovitz & Abbe, and built between 1967 and 1970, for a reported $50.0 million dollars, in Pittsburgh, PA.

U.S. Steel Tower is not the only name you might know this building by though. It is common for companies to want to attach their names to iconic buildings when they move in, or for the general public to come up with nicknames, and this one is no exception. The building has changed names several times over the years, and is also known as:

• U.S. Steel Tower between 1970 and 1988.
• USX Tower between 1988 and 2001.
• U.S. Steel Tower from 2001 until this day.
• UPMC building from 2007 until this day.

Its precise street address is 600 Grant Street, Pittsburgh, PA. You can also find it on the map here.

At the time of its completion in 1970 the U.S. Steel Tower incorporated solutions that were quite advanced at the time, these included The building features an underground wiring system and was one of the first to use fire-resistant liquid-filled columns.

The building underwent a major restoration in 2020. The architect commissioned to undertake this restoration was Tall Timber Group.

Harrison, Abramovitz & Abbe 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 U.S. Steel Tower a reality:

• Robertson, Fowler & Associates P.C. in charge of Structural Engineering
• Turner Construction Company as the Main Contractor
• Jaros Baum & Bolles in charge of MEP Engineering

The U.S. Steel Tower can be categorized as a Contemporary building.

That being said, and even thought being a contemporary building, probably taking advantage of modern materials, construction techniques, and technology, the design of the U.S. Steel Tower is inspired by the modern style.

By today's standards the U.S. Steel Tower could probably be classified as a "high-tech" building. Only time will tell if this substyle will grow and stick onto the history books, or if perhaps it will become a substyle of a larger style. Only time will tell. Until then, we believe it's best to refer to the U.S. Steel Tower as a contemporary building.

The U.S. Steel Tower uses a frame structure made of steel columns and concrete and steel 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 of the building however, is load bearing. This doesn't imply that it is a traditional load-bearing wall. Rather, it means that the structure's exterior pillars have been pushed to the very edges, becoming integrated with the facade, and therefore, technically, a part of it.

The tower has a triangular shape, with a large central steel core surrounded by four levels of steel columns and an exterior steel shell. The design is based on the concept of 'a tower within a tower.' The columns are connected to the exterior shell by steel trusses that support the rest of the structure.

The 18 exterior Cor-Ten steel columns that form the structural frame are hollow and filled with a mixture of water, antifreeze, and rust inhibitor. This system allows the liquid to dissipate heat in the event of a fire, enabling the columns to maintain structural integrity for up to four hours.

Using liquid-filled columns required the entire structural steel frame to be completely watertight and leakproof.

From an aesthetic point of view, the facade features

dark metal and small vertical windows. The upper floors feature translucent glass panels that allow natural light to enter, while the lower floors are clad in aluminum panels coated with a reflective finish to reduce solar heat gain .