scarcer than tits on a boar hog. Sure, they happen-so do airplane crashes.
But, relatively speaking, the annual fatalities are so low as to be nonexistent. How much insurance can you buy for fifty cents at the local airport fifteen thousand dollars’ worth?” He calmed a little.
“All the public areas in the Glass House are sprinklered-they have to be. Install them throughout an entire building and the expense would be so high you’d no longer be competitive. Sears Roebuck did it in their headquarters building, as much for public image as for safety.
But we’re not Sears -at least not this year,” Maybe he was tired, maybe it was because Leroux was trying too hard, but Barton didn’t feel convinced.
“Craig, look out there. That building about two o’clock to your right, the one with the small red beacon on top.
The Penobscot Building. National Curtainwall was the developer there. And on your left, about the same relative position-the Hanson Building is ours, too. There are half a dozen more in town, all ours.”
For a moment he was lost in thought. “In a sense, Craig, we’re the original ecologists. Mankind can’t go on expanding his living space forever, cutting down forests and leveling the hills. Los Angeles houses a population two thirds that of Chicago in twice its space. We can’t afford suburbia forever; we have to get back to the city, the city that was invented as a trading center, as a manufacturing center, designed so the worker could be close to his job.” He flicked the ash off his cigar. “We build cities, Craig-it’s not a mean occupation.”
He wasn’t Caesar after all, Barton thought. He was Ramses; he was a pyramid builder.
“You mentioned earlier that you had seen Joe Moore’s project,” Leroux said. “Do you know what’s behind it?”
Barton suddenly felt stone sober. “No, but I’d like to.
For some strange reason, Wyn, I can’t see a country full of replicas of the Glass House.”
Leroux smiled. “You might see one or two, probably no more than that-local conditions vary too much from city to city. But I wouldn’t deny that you’ll see some that are remarkably similar, that might differ only in external detailing or such things as size of site, height-you could list the variables.
And you’ll see parts of it incorporated in buildings that might, to the untrained eye, seem radically different. I wish I could claim the original idea but a hotel chain beat me to it. Their flagship hotels are all designed after the same general model-a shell of rooms surrounding an enormous interior lobby, complete with ‘outside’ elevators running the height of the lobby, fountains,. plaza-type restaurants, the works. The lobbies may vary in size and shape but they’re still the same idea. For the most part, the basic problems of cantilevered floors and the like have all been figured out; you make the modifications you want and the building goes up in nothing flat.”
Leroux was leading up to, something, Barton thought uneasily. He had said earlier that he couldn’t do without him, which was ridiculous, but there had to be a reason why Leroux thought so.
“Construction is a hazardous occupation financially,” Leroux continued. “It’s one where time is-often the most critical factor. As a developer, we first have to arrange for interim financing, usually with a bank or a real estate investment trust, where the interest rates are high-banks don’t like to tie up their capital for long periods of time, for one thing. And the building itself represents a risk, it exists only on paper and a lot of things can go wrong between the rendering and the completed project. God help you if you run into trouble putting in your foundations, for example. When the building is finished, we arrange for permanent financing, usually with an insurance company.
The finished building is much less of a risk and the rates are lower.
One of your obvious expenses, of course, is how long you tie up the initial capital.”
“You taught me all of that in the first six months,” Barton said shortly. “You’ve been a good teacher.”
It was Leroux’s Turn to signal ‘for another drink.
“Developers and builders naturally try to beat the problem. The first thing was to junk the traditional method of acquiring the site, having the architectural firm prepare a complete set of working drawings, then calling for bids.
Unfortunately, there’s the time factor-the time to turn out the drawings, the time required for contractors to plow through all the drawings to make their. bids. You can lose six months, perhaps close to a year. So most high rises are ‘scope’ jobs or built by ‘fast-track’ methods. You usually don’t ask for bids. As soon as the initial shape is pinned down, we start construction of the basic building the foundation, frame, skin, basic mechanical, the core with the fire stairs, elevators, and the like. You work from the shell inward, essentially doing a lot of your designing at the same time you’re building, though granted that much of your basic designing may have been done before the rendering. You do an estimate of the quantity of materials you’d need, even though you may not have decided on a specific use for them at the time of the estimate. There’s an element of waste involved but you save on the most valuable commodity of all-time.”
“You’re leading up to something, Wyn; what is it?”
“The idea is to have a proven product, Craig, like the hotel chain I mentioned. Or the Glass House. It’s beautiful building; we’ll market it in various permutations and combinations-again, like the hotels.
But because there’s so little risk with a proven product, there’s no need for risk capital, for interim, financing, and the high interest rates. You eliminate the middle man financially. Which cuts the expense of the building to the eventual owner.”
“The only thing he doesn’t get is something that’s uniquely his own,” Barton said bitterly. “Something that’s an expression of his own corporation or business.”
Leroux waved his hand at the skyline. “There are a lot of buildings out there, Craig. How many of them strike you as beautiful?
One out of ten perhaps? Or is that a highly inflated figure?
What’s wrong with a Glass House here and a slightly different version of it in Milwaukee?
Nobody lives in two cities at the same time; the natives would hardly be offended.”
Leroux had sold Moore on the idea, Barton thought.
That’s what he had sensed and that’s what Moore hadn’t wanted to admit-that he had actually considered Leroux’s idea to be a good one.
“You’re telling me this for a reason, Wyn. I gather there’s some role you have in mind that I’m supposed to play?”
“That’s right.” Leroux suddenly looked troubled, unsure of himself because of Barton’s lack of enthusiastic response. “This isn’t something that’s going to happen several years from now; it’s in the works already. United Insurance has agreed to finance all National Curtainwall buildings-at permanent financing rates. We’ll be developer, designer, do the general contracting, decorate, and manage.
We’ll be hard to beat.”
“We’ll Turn out buildings like GM turns out cars, that it?
Complete with a five-year guarantee?”
“That’s one way of looking at it,” Leroux said coldly.
“It isn’t mine.”
“And me?”
“You were right earlier-I don’t need your talents as an architect …
I already bought those. I need managerial talent; I need somebody to help me run the show. I hand-picked you and I hand-trained you during the last two years. You’re the man I want-you’re the only man I’ve had time enough to teach. That was probably a mistake” Barton turned back to the window. Opportunity …
again. New title, new salary, success with a capital “S” because if Leroux had figured it right, in a few years National Curtainwall would be one of the largest developers in the country. But opportunity had come when he didn’t want it, when he had already made up his mind as to what he was going to do. Leroux kept opening doors for him that he didn’t want to walk through.
“The concept isn’t quite as narrow as you might think,” Leroux continued persuasively. “The Glass House is only one example; there’ll be other … models, if you like.”
The snowflakes were getting finer, Barton thought idly, and coming -down with greater force.. The wind must really be howling around the building.
“It’s a big job,” Leroux added, irritated. “Maybe you’re not a big enough man for it.”
“Oh, for Christ’s sake, Wyn, cut it out-I’m not twenty-one years old.
I didn’t say I wouldn’t take it. I want time to think it over.” Jenny would be delighted, he thought
