Doors Open Pittsburgh: Featuring PPG Place

As part of DOORS OPEN Pittsburgh, an annual two-day event that provides unprecedented access to buildings around the city, we are featuring 20 of the many buildings participating.

Today’s building is PPG Place.

A Brief History of PPG Place

PPG Place is a complex located in downtown Pittsburgh consisting of six buildings in three city blocks. The buildings are named for their anchor tenant, PPG Industries. The buildings are all a matching glass design consisting of 19,750 pieces of glass. The main building is One PPG Place, at 40 stories high. Groundbreaking for the complex was in January 1981, with additional smaller buildings opening up in 1983 and ’84. The project was started by PPG Industries, formerly known as Pittsburgh Plate Glass Company, and was the company’s headquarters after being downtown since 1895. During the demolition process for the complex, University of Pittsburgh anthropologists collected thousands of artifacts from the 18th century.  They found medical instruments and stone-lined wells and cisterns. The site was previously where Guskey’s department store once stood.

The buildings are recognized for their 231 glass spires. The biggest spire stands at 82 feet tall. The design of the building is energy-efficient—heat in the summer is reflected away from the building and in colder temps, infrared heat is reflected and contained in the building. The building of PPG Place was part of Pittsburgh’s Renaissance II period.

For tickets to this outstanding event, you can visit Doors Open Pittsburgh here.

Buildings already featured here on Pittsburgh Beautiful:

Byers Hall

Boggs Manion : The Inn on the Mexican War Streets

Alphabet City Building

David L. Lawrence Convention Center

The Oliver Building

EQT Plaza

The Engineer’s Society

The Pennsylvanian

First Presbyterian Church

William Penn Snyder House

Union Trust Building

Koppers Building

Dollar Bank on Fourth Avenue

Speakeasy at the Omni William Penn

The Grant Building

PPG Place

Penn Brewery

 

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