Look up at the tallest building in Charlotte, one of the most distinctive skyscrapers in the American South. The Bank of America Corporate Center rises 871 feet above Trade Street, its crown of Gothic-inspired spires — designed by César Pelli, the architect also responsible for the Petronas Towers in Kuala Lumpur — visible from miles across the Piedmont. When it opened in 1992 as NationsBank Corporate Center, it announced that Charlotte was no longer a mid-sized regional city but an aspiring financial capital.
Hugh McColl, the aggressive NationsBank chief executive who drove the acquisitions that built a national banking empire from this building, became the defining figure of Charlotte's transformation. The building's lobby features a massive mural by Ben Long depicting the history of Charlotte and the Carolinas. Charlotte's banking supremacy — with Bank of America and Wells Fargo both headquartered here — did not happen by accident.
It was built through a generation of aggressive deal-making, favorable state banking laws, and a civic culture that supported expansion at every turn.