Magnolia Lounge (Magnolia Petroleum Building), 1936

William Lescaze (New York)
Thomas & Booziotis, restoration, 1987

This little-known project by New York architect William Lescaze introduced European Modernism to Texas in 1936.  Lescaze's rapid climb to fame occurred four years earlier when his work was included by Philip Johnson in the Museum of Modern Art exhibition on modern architecture.  Although his design for the Magnolia Petroleum Building includes elements commonly found in Art Deco, its overall image was radically different from that of any other structure at the Exposition.  Solid volumetric massing was supplanted by floating planes and cantilevered decks. Slender metal piers replaced monumental colonnades.  The effect was avant-garde and exhilarating. The Magnolia Petroleum Building would serve as modernist inspiration to a generation of Dallas architects.  Adjacent to the Magnolia Lounge are the former Hall of Religion, George Dahl, 1936; and the African American Museum, Arthur J. Rogers, 1993.

Credits: Excerpts taken from The American Institute of Architects Guide to Dallas Architecture, published in 1999 by the American Institute of Architects, Dallas Chapter. The editor of this book was Larry Paul Fuller. The Fair Park Introduction and entries were written by Willis Winters, AIA.

Permission to publish these excerpts was granted by The American Institute of Architects, Dallas Chapter, in October 2002.