Legend of the Land: The Cleveland Trust Building

Standing at the corner of East 9th and Euclid is The Cleveland Trust Building completed in 1908. Designed by George Browne Post, who was known best for his design of the New York Stock Exchange, it was the third largest bank building in the US when it was completed.

The luxurious building has white granite facing, an eighty-foot dome ceiling, Tiffany-style glass panels, fluted columns, and marble floors and walls. Designed by Italian immigrant Nicolas D’Ascenzo, the glass panels are 61 feet in diameter.

The interior walls just below the dome are decorated by a series of 13 murals completed by American painted Francis David Millet. The set of murals is named “Development of Civilization in America”, each given its own name such as "LaSalle on Lake Erie", "Father Hennepin at Niagara Falls", or the “Puritans”. To ensure the paintings could be seen from the ground 40 feet below they are 15.5 by 4.5 feet in size. They consist of simple cohesive designs all with the same color scheme.

In 1919 the bank announced a plan to add an 11-story tower to the building, but the expansion didn’t come to fruition until much later. The late 1960s plan laid out two towers framing the rotunda but only a singular tower was ever built. This tower would later be known as Metropolitan at The 9.

The Cleveland Trust Company continued to prosper in the 70s and it became known as Ameritrust. With 120 branches and $5 Billion in assets, it was the 18th largest bank in America. Unfortunately, the collapse of the real estate market in the late 80s hurt the institution, and AmeriTrust was bought out by Society Corporation (later known as Key Bank). The building fell out of commercial use and closed its doors in 1996. After much deliberation of what to do with the grand building, it ultimately sat empty for nearly two decades. There was discussion to tear it down but the building proved too difficult and costly to demolish.

In 2013 the structure and adjacent tower were purchased by Geis Companies and converted into a hotel and luxury apartments. Cleveland-based grocery store chain owners Tom and Jeff Heinen then invested money to renovate the rotunda, where the teller windows once stood ringing the rotunda, Heinen’s creatively converted them to the meat, fish, and hot deli cases. The second floor features the beer and wine department with additional seating and a sampling area. The 27,000-square-foot supermarket was completed and opened in February 2015.

The adjacent tower is known as Metropolitan at the 9 home to the previously mentioned luxury apartments and hotel suites. There are also a variety of restaurants and bars including, The Centro, The Ledger, The Garden of Eden located on the rooftop, and The Vault located within the century-old bank vault in the basement.

The Cleveland Trust Building won’t be going anywhere as it was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1973.

Did you know this building can be seen in many movies including movies of The Marvel Cinematic Universe? In The Avengers the building is used as a New York Bank building where Captain America saves hostages. This was shot in 2012 before renovations to the building made it a supermarket. In 2015’s Captain America: The Winter Soldier, the exterior shot of the building is used as the location where the Winter Soldier is interrogated.

This historic building is a must-see, whether you visit to get a drink, grab groceries, or just stroll through to see the art. It is certainly a unique adaptive reuse of a historic building and we are lucky that this didn’t get demolished. Instead, it got a second life for a whole new generation to appreciate its beauty.