Stephen Decatur Button

Stephen Decatur Button (born 1803, Preston, Conn., U.S.—died Jan. 17, 1897, Philadelphia, Pa.) was an American architect whose works influenced modern tall-building design, particularly that of Louis Sullivan. His impact, however, was not recognized by architectural historians until the mid-20th century.

Button discarded the massive dead-wall treatment appropriate to masonry structures and seems to have welcomed the design implications of metal-frame (skeleton) construction 30 years before that method was first used in tall office buildings. Button’s 241 Chestnut Street Building (1852) and Leland Building (1855), both in Philadelphia, of five stories each, were given suppressed spandrels and large, squarish windows; their facades appear to be cells of glass. Both were near the office of Furness and Hewitt, the Philadelphia architectural firm for which Sullivan worked as a draftsman in the early 1870s.