Starrett-Lehigh Building, July 14, 1936.

The Starrett-Lehigh Building was a much heralded modernist experiment in industrial architecture. Completed in 1931, this massive factory-warehouse offered a novel solution to freight distribution: with tracks leading directly from the piers into the building, freight cars could be moved in 30-foot elevators to truck pits on upper floors. The building was also a dramatic example of International Style architecture, with horizontal bands of windows and cantilevered concrete floors sweeping around the perimeter of a huge city block.

Abbott photographed the Starrett-Lehigh Building twice. In a street-level view of the northeast corner, she left uncorrected the converging perspective created by her wide-angle lens, thus exaggerating the building’s bulk and likening it to the prow of a ship. Two years later, she photographed the entire building from a pier on the far side of the new West Side Express Highway. With the decline of the waterfront, this innovative building never fulfilled its promise. A protected landmark, it is 30 percent vacant.