Art Nouveau masterpiece in Budapest, Hungary, completed in 1906 to serve as the European headquarters of London-based Gresham Life Assurance. (Surely this is the most beautiful building ever built by an insurance company.) Designed by Zsigmond Quittner, of whom I have never heard; it seems he was once one of the leading architects in the Austro-Hungarian Empire.
The building became an apartment house under communism and declined into a genteel wreck, but in 2001 it was bought by Four Seasons Hotels and extensively renovated. You can see the result in these photographs.
As an amusing aside, the
wikipedia page on this building says it was built in a style that employs "relatively little ornament," a statement that could only have been made by someone who has spent more time in Baroque churches than modern office buildings.
Art Nouveau masterpiece in Budapest, Hungary, completed in 1906 to serve as the European headquarters of London-based Gresham Life Assurance. (Surely this is the most beautiful building ever built by an insurance company.) Designed by Zsigmond Quittner, of whom I have never heard; it seems he was once one of the leading architects in the Austro-Hungarian Empire.
The building became an apartment house under communism and declined into a genteel wreck, but in 2001 it was bought by Four Seasons Hotels and extensively renovated. You can see the result in these photographs.
As an amusing aside, the wikipedia page on this building says it was built in a style that employs "relatively little ornament," a statement that could only have been made by someone who has spent more time in Baroque churches than modern office buildings.
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