Dominion Tower, the 26-story, 403,276-square-foot building in Downtown Norfolk, towers over you. Named after the state of Virginia's nickname, "The Old Dominion," it opened in 1987 and for a time was the tallest building in the Hampton Roads metro area. Today it still holds the title of tallest building in the City of Norfolk, though it was surpassed in the region by the mid-2000s construction of the Armada Hoffler Tower and the Westin Virginia Beach Town Center tower in neighboring Virginia Beach.
The tower houses a cafe, a full-service restaurant, a wine shop, and a packing and shipping office, and various corporations keep offices here, giving the lobby a steady, city-center hum. In late 2016 Bank of America moved its regional headquarters here and affixed its signage to the façade, replacing the signage of the Bank of Hampton Roads, which relocated its headquarters to Virginia Beach in 2012 but still maintains a branch in the building. The tower's scale and its role in downtown life become clear from here, your attention moving from its stories to the streets and buildings that define this part of Downtown Norfolk.