Mount Vernon Cultural Walk: 10 Light Street

Be Here Stories

The Mount Vernon Cultural Walk is created by The Baltimore National Heritage Area (BNHA), which promotes, preserves, and enhances Baltimore's historic and cultural legacy and natural resources for current and future generations. A walking tour of this and other destinations is available at www.explorebaltimore.org/tours. Located at 10 Light Street This Art Deco masterpiece was the tallest skyscraper south of New York when it opened in 1929. Built for the Baltimore Trust Company, the 34-story structure typified the era’s “cathedrals of commerce” with its streamlined aesthetic, Aztec-inspired geometric flourishes, and Gothic massing—all capped by a striking copper-and-gold roof. The building’s elaborate artwork celebrates Baltimore. Murals of the city in the War of 1812 and after the 1904 Fire grace the ornate interior. Groundbreaking woman artist Hildreth Meiere decorated the marble floor with mosaics inspired by local commerce. Outside, gilded spires depict crabs and clipper ships. Other carvings tout the Baltimore Trust Company’s commercial identity: a beehive for industriousness, grapes for abundance, an owl for wisdom. Wisdom or no, the company floundered after the 1929 stock market crash. Within a year of opening, the skyscraper was practically vacant; bankruptcy and receivership followed. The building housed a New Deal agency in the 1930s and the city’s first television transmitter in the 1940s. After various corporate owners and name changes, in 2012, it was converted to luxury apartments. Preserved by the latest owner, many of the building’s historic elements are visible today, though Meiere's mosaic floors are covered by the ground-floor fitness center’s artificial turf.