Concord Center
One Concord Center is an 11-story, 150,000 square-foot office building at 2100 3rd Avenue North. Completed in 2002, the tower was designed by Williams Blackstock Architects and built by Bill Harbert International.
The project was initially announced on December 11, 1999 with Brookmont Realty serving as its developer. The tower is constructed atop the site of the 1889 Jefferson County Courthouse that had served as a parking lot since 1937. During excavation of the site, foundations from the courthouse were unearthed and removed prior to the construction of the new building's substructure.
On Thursday, August 9, 2001, the concrete structure celebrated its topping-out ceremony. The frame of the tower contains 820 tons of steel and 9,581 cubic yards of concrete. On February 7, 2002, its twin pyramids were illuminated for the first time. The building was officially opened in March 2002.
Costing just over $26 million to complete, at the time of its construction it was the largest new tower to be constructed in downtown Birmingham since the completion of the AmSouth-Harbert Plaza in 1989.
The glass and steel tower features a pair of twin pyramids rising above the western roof line. These 37-foot tall pyramids pay homage to similar structures that once adorned the 1889 courthouse. The lobby is set back 15 feet from Richard Arrington Boulevard, creating a pedestrian-friendly plaza space.
Some of the more notable materials used in the construction of its facade include: gray granite from Portugal, black granite from Angola and marble from the Grecian island of Thasos.
The primary sculpture featured in the ground floor lobby was created by William Christenberry and is entitled Dream Building (For Birmingham).
The law firm of Lange, Simpson, Robinson & Somerville served as the primary tenant of the tower until 2012. The Thai restaurant Surin & Company occupied retail space on the first floor along 3rd Avenue until 2014 when Hooked took over the space. Italian fast-casual restaurant Pranzo opened in that location in Summer 2015.
During 2012, Cadence Bank relocated its corporate offices to Concord Center from the nearby John A. Hand Building. That December, Cadence opened a banking center in the ground floor lobby. A 60-foot long Cadence Bank sign was added to the building's eastern roof line on December 19 and is visible from Red Mountain Expressway.
References
- Tomberlin, Michael (December 12, 1999) "11-story tower to be built downtown." The Birmingham News
- Tomberlin, Michael (August 20, 2000) "Birth of a building: In the beginning." The Birmingham News
- Gerome, John (September 10, 2000) "Back to the future." The Birmingham News
- Tomberlin, Michael (August 10, 2001) "Birth of a building: Concord Center tops-out." The Birmingham News
- Hubbard, Russell (August 2, 2012) "Cadence Bank moves to Concord Center." The Birmingham News
- Diel, Stan (October 24, 2012) "Cadence Bank sign to be placed atop downtown's Concord Center." The Birmingham News
External links
- One Concord Center on Emporis.com
- 3-D model of the Concord Center and adjacent YMCA by Jordan Herring