Look for the tall, bright-white tower with a dark copper cap at the top, rising above the downtown rooftops like a clean-cut wedding cake with a slightly moody hat.
You’re standing by the Mid-Continent Tower, 36 stories of Tulsa confidence at 401 South Boston Avenue-about 513 feet high, which makes it one of the city’s big-league skyline players. The first thing you notice is that crisp white skin: terra cotta that catches the sun and practically dares clouds to drift by. Then there’s that copper roof, the detail that turns it from “tall building” into “oh, that one.”
Here’s the twist: this tower is a sort of architectural time-travel trick. The original building went up in 1918 as the Cosden Building, commissioned by oilman Joshua Cosden and designed by Kansas City architect Henry F. Hoit. And it wasn’t built on just any patch of land-this spot once held Tulsa’s first schoolhouse, started as a mission in 1885 on Creek Nation land. So yeah, the ground under your feet has seen a few chapters.
Decades later, after a restoration in 1980, Tulsa quite literally added to its own history: in 1984, a new 20-story section was cantilevered over the older 16-story base. It looks like the top is sitting on the original building, but the real muscle is an added support on the east side. The designers matched the older Gothic-inspired style so well that most people never realize it’s a two-part story built 66 years apart.
When you’re set, 320 South Boston Building is a 1-minute walk heading north, and it will be on your left.
