You’re looking for a tall, sturdy six-story brown-brick building with lots of detailed trim and a touch of sandstone above the shops near the sidewalk-just glance up and ahead to spot the grand Carpenter Building holding court on Phillips Avenue.
Now, let’s slip back to the Sioux Falls of 1912, when the streets echoed with horse hooves and the night air buzzed with the excitement of a growing city. Picture dusty roads and the smell of fresh cement as Frances G. Carpenter decided that Sioux Falls needed something grander-and, crucially, a lot less flammable-than the notorious old wooden Cataract Hotel, which seemed to have a habit of catching fire just when things got lively. This time, he demanded fireproof walls, and brought in Joseph Schwartz, a man with a taste for bold brickwork and sturdy design. The construction alone cost a whopping $250,000, a fortune at the time! Imagine the clatter of hammers and the shouts of workers as the skeleton of the Carpenter Hotel rose to dominate the skyline.
Once it opened on an October day, it immediately became the heart of downtown’s social whirl. Step inside-just in your imagination, unless you’ve got a time machine-and you’d feel the marble under your feet, with a whiff of rich coffee drifting from the dining room. Imagine the laughter spilling out from the ballroom, where folks like Katharine Hepburn, Bob Hope, and Benny Goodman kept the walls humming with stories and swing. Down the hall, radio waves zipped from the original KSOO studio, news traveling out to the prairie. In the 1940s, architect Harold Spitznagel brought a stylish update, with modernist flair and a lobby glistening with green Vitrolight tiles.
By the late ‘60s, things got a little more studious as it transformed into a college dorm-probably the first time those marble stairs saw more textbooks than top hats. Today, The Carpenter is still bustling, but now you’ll find boutique shops and apartments filled with new stories. And if you listen close on a special occasion, you might just hear the strains of music drifting from the old ballroom upstairs.
