Northwest

The Riggs Bank Northwest Office located in the Adams Morgan historic district of Washington, D.C., is designed to blend with the classical fabric of the adjacent buildings. The exterior elevation references the owner’s original historically significant Main Office on Pennsylvania Avenue. 

The simple temple-like exterior facade is a clear and recognizable symbol of stability and permanence, the traditional hallmarks of a good public building.  The pedimented entrance, supported by paired pilasters, has precedent reaching back to the temples of Delos.  Echoing this larger order is a secondary order of pilasters framing both the entrance and the windows.  The classical language of the facade allows for the layering of elements both in scale and dimension; while the elegant materials, granite base, limestone walls and cornices, bronze doors and windows, reaffirm the sense of permanence.

The spacious atrium-styled banking hall provides a simple open solution to the problem of building between two existing party walls.  The paired columns of the interior define the entry vestibules and anchor the rhythm of smaller columns at the tellers’ line as well as the low partition of the officers’ platform.