Seattle Tower (formerly Northern Life Tower), Seattle

Downtown Seattle's 27-story skyscraper, known as the city's first Art Deco tower, features a distinctive, ziggurat exterior clad in 33 shades of brick designed to effect a gradient which lightens from the bottom to the top. This is said to have been inspired by local (Pacific Northwest) rock formations in the mountains, but similar ziggurats were once located at the very heart of ancient Mesopotamian cities and were looked upon as mountains that had been recreated by human hands.

The plan to construct the building, "finer than anything on the Pacific Coast", at a cost of $1.5 million, was announced in April 1927. Completed one year later, the skyscraper represented a dramatic shift in the appearance of Seattle's skyline. Earlier 20th-century structures had derived their style from classical precedents, but by the 1920s architects began to favor designs that attempted to emulate the speed, efficiency and power found within technology, perceived by many as humanity's hope for the future. The Northern Life Tower was the first building in Seattle to illustrate this style, now known as Art Deco or Art Moderne.

Above everything, the tower beautifully illustrates the increasing popularity of a simple, smooth, almost machine-like exterior. This faith in progress also appeared in the lighting that once fully illuminated the building: more than 200 floodlights faded into one another in a "phantasmagoric display" meant to imitate the aurora borealis, a play on the Northern Life Insurance Company's name and an illustration of the belief that science could imitate nature's most incredible wonders. Today the lights are gone, and taller, newer skyscrapers dwarf the building, but it remains one of the Northwest's most elegant Art Deco designs.

All in all, a memorable destination for those who are fascinated by the brick and mortar edifices of early skyscrapers. There is not a whole lot to see inside, but the lobby (accessible during regular work hours) is absolutely exquisite, with a dark marble floor and a bronze relief above the seating area that's quite worth checking out.