On your left, look for the big brick-and-cream tower that fills the whole block, topped with a stepped crown and a little cupola like a hat perched on its head.
This is the 320 South Boston Building, and it’s been doing the most in Tulsa since the day it showed up. It started life in 1917 as a ten-story headquarters for Exchange National Bank, planted right here at Third and Boston. Then Tulsa hit its growth spurt, and in 1929 they stacked on a major expansion, pushing it to 22 stories and about 400 feet tall. For a moment, it was the tallest building in all of Oklahoma-Tulsa basically standing on tiptoe and waving. The title didn’t last past 1931, but in Tulsa it stayed the tallest until 1967.
Architecturally, it’s Beaux Arts-think: formal, confident, and slightly overdressed on purpose. You can spot the terra cotta wrapping the lower floors, the long vertical lines of windows, and that tower that steps back near the top before finishing with a temple-like section and the cupola.
And that cupola wasn’t just decoration. For years it doubled as a giant weather signal: green lights for fair skies, red when trouble was coming. Downtown had its own built-in forecast, no app required.
In 1949, KOTV put a transmitter on the roof-an exciting upgrade with a tragic footnote when a dropped wrench killed a woman on the street below. The station eventually moved broadcasts to a taller tower in 1954. Also, no, the top wasn’t a Zeppelin parking spot-fun myth, zero evidence.
When you’re set, Tulsa Performing Arts Center is a 2-minute walk heading northwest.
