The State Tower's exterior

The exterior of the State Tower Building remained nearly unchanged in its first 75 years. In 2003, the original canopies were replaced by new canopies.

The original canopies over the entrances had a scalloped design painted in the red and green color scheme seen all over downtown. Over the years, they had been allowed to deteriorate so badly that they were unsalvageable. Some of the steel panels had rusted completely through and birds were nesting inside. For the renovation, management had the canopies removed then replaced with polished brass canopies of a completely different design that did not even try to draw inspiration from the originals. The new canopies are somewhere between Art Moderne and the Art Deco style the State Tower Building was originally designed with and have been compared to a theater marquee. They are bright and flashy, but their simple angles and complete lack of curviture look out of place on an Art Deco buildling. Simple, straight-sided shapes were chosen for ease of fabrication, ignoring that Art Deco usually is ornamented with shapes and patterns from many sources, most notably Ancient Egyptian with its colorful and curved hieroglyphs, as visible on the former Niagara Mohawk Building (note the curviture beneath and around the figure). The horizontal orientation of the zigzag ridges is contrary to the normal vertical emphasis in Art Deco. It looks like the entrance of a different building was accidentally grafted onto the State Tower. The letters spelling out the name of the building are poorly sized and spaced.

Unwilling to clean or replace the original reddish stone around the entrances, the owners had it covered with the same polished, black marble tile used on the new lobby floor. Again, it looks out of place as polished black marble had never previously existed on either the interior or exterior of the building. As a final touch, tall, fluorescent sconces were added to flank the west and south entrances.

Many storefronts have steel panels above them that still show open holes where store signs and lights once hung. Water inside has rusted the holes and new holes have even rusted completely through. Before that, awnings extended outward above each storefront. Unrenovated storefronts have unfinished aluminum doors and poorly installed frames around the windows that show numerous gaps, such as the frame shown above at left, on the window for Murphy's Book Store. Small birds have been seen flitting in and out through the openings, apparently having a nest somewhere inside.

No other work was done on the exterior of the building during this renovation. The brickwork remains as dingy as it was over 60 years ago, when coal-fired locomotives roared down East Washington Street and blackened downtown buildings with their smoke and soot. A few small patches that had been inadvertently cleaned show the original bright bricks that lurk beneath the grime.

The situation is the same as with the windows. Without suspended scaffolds, workers cannot reach the upper walls to clean them. From a distance, the building stands as a grubby finger pointing into the sky. Meanwhile, nearby buildings of similar vintage display exterior walls that have been given the attention and cleaning they deserve, including the Verizon (originally New York Telephone) building, Clinton Exchange (former Federal Building and Main Post Office), Onondaga Savings Bank (now M&T) building, the Hills Building, City Hall, Key Bank, and Syracuse Savings Bank (now Bank of America).

The State Tower roof

Please refer to the Syracusethenandnow website for photographs of the State Tower's original roof.

In the State Tower Building's early years, an elegant roof garden sat atop the lower roof, level with the 11th floor. Seats, tables, umbrellas and large planters provided a luxurious vantage point and there was even reportedly restaurant service there. In fact, the roof gave a mood very similar to its Art Deco contemporary in New York City, the 1933 RCA Building at 30 Rockefeller Center (today known as the GE Building). Both had ceramic tile floors, robust parapets and chairs for lounging. Tishman Speyer Properties spent $75 million renovating the outdoor observation deck on the GE Building, reopening it in November 2005 as the spectacular Top of the Rock. After the tragedy of 9/11, Top of the Rock has become the second highest observation deck in New York, surpassed today only by the Empire State Building's deck.

Today, the State Tower's lower roof is loaded with cooling towers and pipes. All vestiges of warmth and comfort are gone as it's become strictly an equipment space, inaccessible to the public.

At night, large floodlights on the lower roof once bathed the upper section in brilliance, making the building stand out in the downtown skyline. While other structures such as the M&T building across Hanover Square and the Niagara Mohawk building on Erie Boulevard have maintained and even upgraded their lighting, the State Tower's floodlights are a distant memory, black stumps on the roof the only signs that they were ever there.

The microwave horn and dishes on the roof were installed decades ago for point-to-point data transmission. Many people say they ruined the clean roofline of the building. Since then, fiber optics and the Internet have exploded onto the scene, providing much faster, more secure and more reliable data transfer than any microwave equipment could ever hope to offer. Newer wireless technology such as long-range 802.11, a version of the home wireless networks ("Wi-Fi") that many consumers own, can achieve range up to 20 miles with antennas a tiny fraction of the size.

Over the years, both of the State Tower's flat roofs have developed sags, cracks, tears and blisters which have accelerated the their deterioration. At the top of the stairway on the 22nd floor, accessible to the public but off the beaten path, serious water damage from leaking rain is evident. After major rainstorms, the final flight of steps is often strewn with paint flakes and plaster that have fallen off the ceiling.

The lower (10th floor) roof has its own problems. While both roofs have serious leaks, the lower roof is by far the larger and the only one with tenant spaces immediately beneath. As of 2005, much of the tenth floor was water damaged and in unrentable condition and would remain so until the roof can be torn up and replaced. Over half the floor has been vacant for at least a decade, including suite 1020, the largest space on the floor located at the end of the hallway. Occupied decades ago by internists who fled to the suburbs along with most medical tenants, this space had stained and collapsed ceiling tiles, crumbling drywall and waterspotted carpets. Leaks above occupied spaces have led to some tenant concerns about toxic mold and sick building syndrome. Re-roofing (putting a new roof over the original) is not an option. Asphalt built-up roofing was already added on top of the original ceramic tiled roof decades ago and adding even more weight would be a concern when combined with the snow load of a serious but not unusual winter storm in Syracuse. A complete roof replacement will likely be required since the original roof has probably been damaged by excess summer heat and water that seeped beneath the built-up roof.

The long skylight down the center of the lower roof sits neglected, its wireglass panes dirty, cracked and leaking, despite crude patches. Inside, the skylight has long been covered by a dropped ceiling that prevents sunlight from passing through, but the skylight still makes its presence known with rain-induced water stains on the acoustic ceiling tile.

The parapets surrounding the lower roof had badly deteriorated. The remaining brick walls were sometimes secured with roofing felt, lumber retainers and now-rusty steel mesh for safety purposes. The picture at right shows both types of materials. Some large pieces of the parapets, precast from concrete, were removed (possibly due to safety concerns) and stored on the roof for well over a decade. Their weight -- up to several hundred pounds apiece -- could make them extremely hazardous should they become detached. The plywood beneath those pieces has delaminated, warped, and rotted, a testament to how long the pieces have sat there.