The Wright-Kay Building, completed in 1891, is one of Woodward Avenue's finest Gilded Age commercial buildings. The Wright-Kay Building, completed in 1891 and designed by Gordon Lloyd, was built for the jewelry firm of Wright, Kay and Company in a richly textured Romanesque Revival style, all rounded arches, carved stonework, and ornamental brick. It is notable for housing one of the first passenger elevators in Detroit, a marvel when the city's commercial core was just beginning to climb upward.
For decades it sold fine watches and silver to the city's prospering merchant class, the same families building mansions up Woodward. After years of decline along this stretch, the building was restored and now holds offices, shops, and a basement cocktail lounge. Picture the arched windows and the decorative band of carved stone near the cornice, the confident flourish of a moment when Detroit's downtown was first dressing itself in stone for the century to come.