(first posted 6/4/2016) In 1948, the postwar boom was in full swing. After almost 20 years of Depression and wartime rationing, people were buying – cars, homes, TVs, you name it. And commercial construction was finally taking off as well, to serve burgeoning demand. The people at GM knew this meant a lot of dealers would be building new dealerships, and they produced a remarkable book to help them come up with state of the art facilities. Planning Automobile Dealer Properties was the result, a large 11×17 book that has no equal before or since.
The first part of the book was full of practical information about siting, lot size, and the treatment of the different operating areas – new cars, used cars, service, and parts. Despite the color two-color illustrations, the real prize was yet to come.
The heart of the book was 15 prototype dealership designs, each with its own full-color, full-page rendering, descriptive text, and a “blueprint”, usually hidden behind a foldout on the right.
These were not in-house GM designs. They were the winners of a series of competitions staged by GM and conducted by the Architecture Forum under the direction of the influential and brilliant George Nelson. Having been trained as an architect, I can’t imagine a similar competition happening today.
Each of the designs was based on a different program, or set of requirements a dealer would likely have. This one, for example, was for a narrow lot on a busy road. There were designs for corner locations, for dealers who also sold gas, urban dealers, and dedicated truck dealers.
Stylistically, each one was individual, aside from the “GM” lettering. Collectively, they paint a picture of roadside design in the early postwar era. Lots of glass, structural glass panels and glazed brick, and very expressive design. Modernism, but with a popular, commercial bent.
From today’s perspective, these images tell us a lot about how the dealer business then differs from today. For starters, the showrooms are small, 2 and 3 car displays, and there’s almost no new car storage in any of the plans. Which makes sense when most companies were selling one size of cars and buyers typically ordered new cars versus buying off the lot.
And when cars were more simply equipped, and more easily repaired, there was a lot more emphasis on parts and accessories retailing, as this page from the first section indicates. quite a contrast to the walk-up window with maybe a display case you’re likely to find today.
Another big difference is location. This is one of only 2 multi-story, urban designs. Like their customers, the dealers were decamping to the suburbs, and most of the book is dedicated to suburban – or at least out-of-downtown, single-story designs.
The real difference, architecturally, is the lack of corporate identity. There’s no reason why GM couldn’t have taken the same 15 designs, and created a small, medium, and large standardized designs for each of their five car brands. But back then it was expected that a dealer would have his (and aside from my Great Aunt, they were almost all “He” back then) own, individual design. Some brands like Studebaker had fairly standard designs back in the 20’s for large city dealerships, and Ford made a few efforts as well before the war, but they were exceptions to the rule.
Unlike their roadside counterparts the motel and restaurant chains, automakers were slow to recognize the benefits of standard signage, let alone buildings. Not until the early 60’s would Chrysler be the first to take the plunge, with the Pentastar program developed by Lippincott & Margulies, the design firm that pioneered corporate identity. But that’s another, fascinating story.
I’ve had a 44-year love affair with this book since I first encountered a copy in our local Carnegie Library in 1972. We moved away, and when I later checked back, that copy had disappeared. Fast forward to 1986, and I found another copy shunted away in an odd corner of the main University Library – where I was the first person to check it out since 1951. And finally, about a dozen years ago, I found this copy for myself. It’s a time capsule, a snapshot of a time when the future was bright and selling cars was very different.
Love it! I had never heard of this book, but then I have zero background in architecture.
As lush and wonderful as these designs are, they are definitely of a period. I can only imagine the thoughts of a dealer who shelled out for a new suburban store like this that was up and running by, say, 1949. How outdated it would have been just 20 years later when multiple models required much larger showrooms and inventories. It might not have been planned obsolescence in the same way that the auto industry employed it, but it was obsolescence nonetheless.
In my own city (Indianapolis) I cannot think of a single operating dealership that is still working out of a building or location where it was in 1946, and there were really very few even as of, say, 1986. The dealerships keep following car buyers into the suburbs, and now even those modern dealerships built in the 60s and 70s are mostly gone.
There is a building that used to be the Olds Cadillac dealer that looks something like the third picture. Most of the new car dealers here are moving into new buildings or have already.
The small towns I grew up around, well, the GM brands, used these same types of buildings into at least the mid 80s. The post war franchises were still in the original hands, tho maybe in a son’s hands, and money was poured into support of new models quite sparingly. Fresh paint? Only when needed. A few more service bays? Maybe. But the Chevy dealer and it’s neighbor the Buick, Olds, Jeep dealer stuck pretty much with the designs shown for narrow lots.
The Ford/Mercury dealer where my father, sisters, and I bought cars barely changed in 35 years. It was a collection of small/medium buildings around a 2 pump gas station with a ” grease pit ” out back.. Covering over/filling that pit was the extent of re-modeling.done until Ford absolutely threatened to yank the franchise if they didn’t update.
Very interesting. Thank you.
Love to read a view from an insider who knows the subject!
Their artist clearly wasn’t a GM insider, though… his cars look like Packards, Hudsons, and Lincolns. No GM family resemblance.
Beautiful illustrations, and it’s nice that they chose a large format to show off the designs at their best.
I would imagine the stock it’s printed on puts today’s papers to shame.
In Mary Walton’s book “Car,” she mentioned a large, successful E. Coast dealer whom Ford treated like royalty. These folks had no showroom, as they considered them unproductive space.
Same thing with the most successful Toyota dealership, Longo in El Monte, CA. When I bought the ’84 pickup, there was no showroom, just lots of sales desks and F&I cubicles. Oh, and a Bank of America branch in the building for financing.
They even have Starbucks, Verizon, & Subway franchises on site, along with Enterprise & AAA. I remember them, on the way to my wife-to-be’s house. I sometimes mentally mangled their name as “Mongo” Toyota.
“Fast forward to 1986, and I found another copy shunted away in an odd corner of the main University Library – where I was the first person to check it out since 1951.”
Awesome book and awesome explanation of the book. I bet you were really excited when you found that copy in the library.
That is really cool. The original Chev-Olds dealer my Dad worked at in the ’70s was built around 1948, and while it didn’t look exactly like any of the illustrations I can see where some of design details may have originated. The parts department looked like a retail store with lots of interesting displays. When they moved to their present location with it’s corporate identity in ’78 all the charm and character was lost.
Note the similarity to the recently opened Cadillac-LaSalle museum in Hickory Corners, MI. The plans were taken right out of this book!
Wow, that’s amazing! Thanks for sharing.
Too bad they didn’t use the contemporary script for both makes.
Very cool! There used to be a GM service training school here in Tigard OR. Now I see where the styling comes from.
We have a GM dealership, Springfield Buick, that was opened in 1949 and is still operating out of the same building; https://www.curbsideclassic.com/blog/springfield-buick-the-little-dealership-that-time-forgot-is-it-the-last-or-smallest-stand-alone-buick-dealer/
It’s a bit modest sized, so it may or may not have been designed from this book, but the general influence of the time is obvious.
This small Buick dealership opened in 1954 in my hometown ( Lakewood, OH ), and is still going strong after all the other dealerships relocated to the farther-out suburbs. Looks pretty similar!
Barry was finally forced out of business by GM. Interestingly,their building was built as a Hudson dealer. And their body shop across the street was Packard-Lakewood.
What a great book! And the picture of those van conversions sitting prominently in the front of a Chrysler dealer is pretty cool too. Times had really changed by the 70’s!
This is really cool! I am an architecture buff, so I really love seeing these plans and renderings. Design competitions seemed to have been a big thing in the 1930s through the 1950s–I’ve seen a lot of residential design competitions that were published, like “Best Small Homes.” But I’ve never seen one for GM dealers–great find!
Hope to learn more about Chrysler’s architecture/branding development as well. Lippincott is still in business (they dropped the Margulies at some point) and continue to be a very well respected design/branding firm.
Why, oh why cannot we build things that look like this today? Yeah, yeah, I know: Vitrolite and Louvrex and other architectural materials of the day aren’t made any more, and all that. But still.
Fascinating. As a lawyer that represented franchised car dealers, it was always interesting (and vital in most cases) to read the “facilities requirements” addendum to the franchise agreement. Most dealers decamped from the inner cities to the suburbs primarily because of the storage lot and service bay requirements. There was only one franchised dealer left in the inner city of where our practice was – and the manufacturer was always threatening termination because of lack of owned storage space. Because of increased dense development, the dealer was forced to lease spaces in nearby office parking garages in order to store new car inventory. Used was already on a leased lot several blocks away.
In the small town I grew up in, all the GM brands are still operating out of the same buildings that they were in back in the early 50s. Obviously, they updated the showroom’s facades, but the building behind each showroom is the same basic building.
The former Oldsmobile showroom is now a Dodge-Jeep showroom. And the former Pontiac/Cadillac showroom is a Ford and Cadillac dealership.
Of auto dealerships that has preserved their facades the most, I can think of Casa de Cadillac in Sherman Oaks, California…
My family bought several cars from them. What a design and they’ve kept it fairly intact over the years.
I’m sure that the idiots now running Cadillac marketing (Google Melody Lee) are trying to either get them to put on a corporate facade or have them build a new building.
Casa de Cadillac is a gem of Mid-Century architecture.
I believe this NJ dealer (Arena Buick-GMC in Hammonton) is still in business, though I have not been out that way for quite a while. They started in the 1920s selling Nash and Dort cars. The front of the building was redone in the 1940s. They also were an Oldsmobile and Pontiac dealer years ago, and even sold International Harvester for a while. So that would put them nearly 100 years in the same location!
Lyman Slack Chevrolet built a new building in Portland OR after WW2. It was supposedly to have won an award from GM and was held up as model for dealership building design. It was built on Sandy Blvd in the city. The building still stands today housing in part an electric vehicle dealer.
Great article, especially from my vantage point as someone who is interested in postwar dealership architecture. But long before Chrysler standardized dealership design, International Harvester was way ahead of them with their dealership showrooms built out around a vertical pylon. Here’s an example.
Great catch. I should have made it clearer that Chrysler was the first of the Big 3 to do so. IH used Raymond Lowey Associates as their industrial design firm, and they developed both the IH “tractor” logo and these dealership designs.
By any measure Robert, it was an excellent story. I posted it on my Facebook page and a friend of mine whose family has owned GM dealerships in Orange County, California, for decades saw the post and has the book. We’re going to get together soon for me to get a look at it.
I am actually working on the story of the IH dealerships. It’s a fascinating story.
Here’s another photo. The dealerships had many different designs, but the central pylon sign was almost always present.
I used to pass one of these buildings near where I used to live and could never figure out what it was built as and you just solved the mystery so thanks for posting this picture Rich! It’s been a hardware store for at least the past 35 years and look much worse for wear but it is the exact design shown in your picture. Too bad it doesn’t have any new International Scouts to sell!
I can think of one dealership in Melbourne that has been in the same location since probably the 1920’s when most of the dealerships and distributors moved out of the main CBD grid itself, City Toyota that is roughly 1km north. It may even be the original building, with an updated showroom facade.
One of the first purpose built car dealership/showrooms was demolished last year to make way for an apartment tower, unfortunately not even the facade was retained.
This book reminds of one I saw years ago on shearing shed design (for sheep) that probably dated from around the same era, and was done for the same purpose. Obviously no corporate branding issues there either!
City Toyota was built as Melford Motors (Harry Norris Architect, 1936). The Ford name was integral with the surface treatment adjacent to the entry.
I hadn’t noticed it had gone. Uh oh… that surprises me. It would have been very easy to adapt as a podium for a set back tower.
The facade, apart from branding was original. The glass was canted outwards towards the top to minimise reflections, so says Robin Grow in Melbourne Art Deco.
At least we still have the Royce Hotel building, for now.
I read last week that approval has been granted to demolish a 19 century CBD carriage showroom that had survived until the need for 35 sq m. apartments for short term leases became overwhelming.
No the one demolished was a different building in A’Beckett St.
Is the Royce Hotel building the one on Kingsway?
They really need to improve the heritage controls.
What a fantastic book. And a fascinating article. Thanks Robert.
+1 on that. Wonderful piece!
Oh, what a beautiful find. I like books, I like cars, I’m less enamoured with the business of architecture because it consumes 5/7ths of my life.
Worked in offices involved in a few showroom projects GM, Alfa (stand alone! Yep, it was a long time ago), Porsche/Mazda, M-B, and a feasibility for BMW. Yes, display/storage numbers are paramount – amounting to a sameness of product on a large scale in most cases.
An entirely unscientific observation: the greater the site area and project budget the less likely you are to encounter any person with a genuine interest in cars apart from the profits they may generate.
Now, I need me a copy of this book! Thanks for the preview.
You can find a copy of this book online at the Internet Archive:
https://archive.org/stream/planningautomobi00gene#page/n0/mode/2up
This particular copy was held in the U. of Florida Library and scanned for the Archive. You can download a copy and read it on your computer (full color scan, too!)
Done! And thank you.
Thank you for sharing this with us, I found it fascinating. I worked at a British Leyland dealership when I was a teenager (pumping petrol and cleaning cars) and it was interesting comparing the layout of that dealership with the ideas in your article.
You mentioned in passing about car dealers being a mostly male profession back in the day. Come to think of it, I don’t think I could name any female-owned dealerships today, or at least none which share the name of the owner with the name of the bidness. I’ve come across plenty of saleswomen moving product, but I don’t think I’ve ever encountered a woman owned dealership, which I find remarkable.
Good point. I’ve only encountered one – Richardson/Wynette, a GM dealer in Malden, Missouri. Country music singer Tammy Wynette owned half and obviously was not involved in daily activities. Since she died, I’ve not been back in the area to know if the name has changed or not.
Indianapolis’ Lockhart Cadillac was the first Cadillac franchise in the country in which a woman was the franchisee. Freda Lockhart took over the former Cleverly Cadillac in 1972 and ran it until she retired. She died a few years ago, but her family still owns it. She also got a Saturn franchise when that brand came out.
Fascinating reading!
In the 1920’s Andre Citroen build an exceptional dealership – though it was called a “showcase” on a narrow site on the Champs de Élysées. Ten stories tall it was a remarkable piece of Art Deco.
Citroen still occupy the site – No. 42 – the building g is all new but fascinating in its own right.
That Chrysler-Plymouth dealership photo brings back a ton of memories. Our family friend’s dealership must have been one of the earlier standardized showrooms from the ’60’s. I can fondly recall the blue and white tile banner signage over the showroom windows just as in the photo. It’s now an “Automall” of mammoth proportions and has lost the feel that it had when we stopped in frequently back in the day. The last time I was there was in ’05 after briefly moving back to the area. I considered the purchase of a Stratus at the time, but ultimately ended up going back to Saab and buying certified pre- owned. It was bittersweet stepping into that same building, which has been expanded to several times it’s original size. It was so bright, so sleek and so “glitzy”. So sterile compared to the wood panellef, metal desk equipped old carpeted showroom floor, where the comforting odors of nicotine, coffee and motor oil were so welcoming. Of course all the old characters from back in the day were gone too. The whole experience was one of those “You Can’t Go Back Home Again” moments.
The problem with these designs is that the Streamline Moderne era had already peaked and was in decline by 1948. Lets say you opened one in 1950. In a decade it would look very dated, just as a 1950 car would in 1960, but you dont trade in a building every couple of years.
By the early 1960’s, VW of America had a similar program, led by regional distributors. Unlike long-established GM, VW’s network of dealers grew rapidly from nothing in the last half of the 1950’s, so many dealers housed in very old, small quarters. Brand identity through signage and showroom design served them well. The common theme with the GM designs is maximum visibility of showroom cars from the street. That is something missing from many 21st Century mega-dealerships.
The observation about the style is undoubtedly correct. The value of the proposals is in the space planning templates they offer. The giftwrap around the perimeter of an industrially sourced long span structure can be varied as required.
Half the work in a project like these is generating a coherent brief to work to. Infinite flexibility is a persistent myth in architecture – it really is best to plan properly at the start.
Really enjoyed this particular article. Nothing like older buildings to show what true character is vs. the “stuff” of today. Goes right along with this link I have had dealing with California dealerships.
http://www.roadarch.com/showrooms/ca.html
What a fantastic website! Thanks for the link.
This one captures the 1930’s, matching the style of the cars inside.
What an amazing article, and book! Well done! I wonder how this dealer design book compares to other car manufacturers’ similar books, if they prodoced them.?
Well done x2!
I’ve picked up a couple of the Ford versions of these — one from about 1960 and one from 1973. They are just fascinating as what you’ve outlined here, and the art just as good. The amount of planning that they allowed the prospective dealer, or the dealer looking to build a new dealership/modernize, is just incredible to me. One of the best parts about the 1960 version is that I’ve seen post card photos of dealerships clearly planned from these,
Here in Nashville Jim Reed Chevrolet has been at the same spot downtown near 15th and Broadway since the 1950’s. As the times change they quit selling Chevys about 12-13 years ago when GM went kaput.
They now sell Subarus and Hyundias, still owned by the Reed family but this year they finally sold out to a developer who is of course gonna put up a couple of towers on the site of expensive condos, office, retail, etc
Beaman Toyota, Buick and GMC sits right across the street on Broadway and they also sold out to developers wanting to put some towers on their lot. Like Jim Reed its a huge site of 10ish acres.
I dont know the name before it became Beaman but its been a car dealer since the 1940’s/50’s. They have a really cool, almost two story neon sign from the 1950s when they sold Pontiacs, has the indian head mascot. Im betting both dealers will be gone and their lots scraped clean by the end of the year
Drew Ford, in the San Diego area, built a miniature Ford “Rotunda” for a showroom, back in the ‘60s. Penske bought out the franchise and tore it down a few years ago.
There are still a few old-timey car dealerships up my way. At least four Chevrolet dealers used the round glass entry motif, and all four of them are still up in at least part, though only two are still automotive dealers and only one that still sells Chevys, that being Sport Chevrolet in Briggs Chaney, MD. Another (pic below) started in 1939 as Chevy Chase Chevrolet. According to a local article, the building has been renovated 16 times as of eight years ago. The earliest I remember it, it already had two or three levels added above the main building, all round glass. The “CCC” and Chevy Chase Chevrolet were all in that 1955-57 logo. They updated the typography just before the GM bankruptcy (and other factors) resulted the then-Chevy/Mazda dealer flipping to Acura/Nissan. The current appearance of the dealership can be seen if you aim Google Maps to 7799 Wisconsin Ave in Bethesda, MD. Updated but the original round glass front is still there.
Sport Chevrolet in Briggs Chaney, MD has been in the same big round showroom since I was a kid. Another round Chevy showroom was Bob Peck in Virginia, which was torn down several years ago, but the round shape of the building and the blue-and-white diamonds sign that surrounded it were considered so iconic by locals that the new high-rise housing that replaced it retained the old sign and shape (actually it was all new, but an exact replica). Finally, Lustine Chevrolet on Rt. 1 in Hyattsville, MD had a great round glass building, rounded on both sides. (also had a great name, and a great jingle). The dealership is long gone, but the building still looks as it did and still is named the Lustine Center, only now it’s a workout & fitness place.
I remember when Chevy Chase Chevyland was the “in place”.! (and Ourisman Chevrolet!
Hut up some old pics of “Bob Peck Chevrolet” in Arlington VA. “Peacock Buick” , i Falls Church VA. “Don Allen Chevrolet”, in Pittsburgh PA.
You’ll see some designs out of the book.
Once you get started; likely to think of other examples.
“Lustine Chevrolet” , Hyattsville MD just popped into my head.
What a timely repost in 2022 as the dealership model seems to be changing yet again. Drive by the “Automobile Row” in your town and see the acres of asphalt bereft of cars. I’m sure the owners are wondering why they’re paying property taxes on that empty land.
Ford, for one, seems to be headed back to an “order to spec” dealership model. Who knows what the next decade will bring??
The Chevy dealer (Chicago area) is generally filling up the showroom with two big Pickups and a Corvette. Maybe they could set up a carnival in the lot? And then the Ford dealer puts up a sign “we buy cars”. “Buy”!!! Henry must be rolling over in his grave. Good.
A couple of things strike me.
One, GM, no matter how much I revile them, didn’t get to be as big as they once were by being as dumb as they became.
Two, Art Deco. That’s what I see. A throwback to the 30s, but still somewhat interesting with so many rounded looks. Everything I see now is an absolute square box, sharp lines everywhere. And lighting. Tons of outdoor lighting. I swear, some of them could be seen from outer space.
Related side story. Drove me crazy in 2001 when we had an energy crunch here in California and I would go by this series of dealerships, built, but not opened, with enough light in the parking lot to do watch repair, while there were rolling blackouts in some areas. And I see nothing like Evan has mentioned, I see dealerships building bigger and newer and flashier facilities just for bling sake.
A curious irony here where I live, the local auto row, which is about a mile long, has near zero parking. The street they are on, which fronts the freeway so is highly visible, is always jam packed bumper with parked cars, because they have virtually no parking even for customers let alone employees. So they sell cars, but no place to park if you want to look at them. Does not compute.
Current dealership architecture is the antithesis of these interesting designs. Most architecture appears generic and uninspiring even at higher-end marques like Porsche so on. This genericness is likely due to fear of looking dated in a decade. That and knowing ultimately corporate dictates the design they want or will withhold floor plan funds. Great architecture doesn’t really age. It stands its ground proudly and doesn’t give a crap about the critic’s.
This whole concept reminds me of fast food outlets. McDonalds pushed hard for each franchisee to update as the years went by. Yet, they celebrate the very few that still have the Golden Arches in the front of the store.
I live next to the main suburban drag populated with every fast food, auto dealership, bank, and plastic surgeon in town. Each is constantly updating their store front.
The Cadillac museum at the Gilmore in Michigan took its design from one of these prints. It’s right across from our Lincoln museum. Here it is being constructed in 2014.
I started in the architectural world in the 70s and I first became a ware of books like these when I worked on several dealerships in the 80s. Unfortunately I was not a car guy at the time so I did not keep the old books. I remember Saturn put together a pretty extensive book which involved a glass structure where the new car buyer would recieve their new purchase. They wanted them to remember that moment. About 10 years later I took the plunge into the car hobby and eventually started to collect automobilia. I thought back on these books and eventually found a copy of this exact book. I scanned all the plans and renderings, and put 11 x 17 prints of them on my office walls. Each rendering has a color floor plan and I married each plan with the rendering. I loved to show them off. I still have a few prints on my wall at home.