It seems a little suspicious. In happy news, the Cimarex Tower topped out.
One Place tower tops out at 18 floors
A crane lifts a beam with a tree and flag to the top southeast corner of the One Place tower during a ceremony Thursday. MICHAEL WYKE/Tulsa World
1 / 3Showing image 1 of 3By ROBERT EVATT World Staff Writer
Published: 10/5/2012 1:45 AM
Last Modified: 10/5/2012 4:05 AM
Downtown's newest skyscraper has reached its peak.
The framework for all 18 stories of One Place, phase one, is now in place, and a potted, living tree was lifted by crane to the top of the building Thursday to mark the occasion.
Mayor Dewey Bartlett and other officials gathered at the base of the structure - across Denver Avenue from the BOK Center - for the ceremony.
Bartlett said the building is a great example of turning nearly vacant city land into property occupied by thriving businesses.
"Instead of being a partly used parking lot, it'll be a terrific couple of buildings," he said.
Delise Tomlinson, executive director of downtown development with the Tulsa Metro Chamber, said the $120 million One Place project is just part of more than $400 million in construction that is planned or under way downtown.
"It's an incredible achievement for the dream that we have for making downtown Tulsa the vital core of the region," she said.
Also attending the ceremony was Tom Maxwell, CEO of Flintco Cos. Inc., the project's contractor. He said the tradition of topping out a building with a tree has various origins, one of which is an American Indian belief that buildings should not be higher than the tallest tree. Maxwell also noted that this week marks the 10th anniversary of Cimarex Energy Co., the Denver-based company that has leased all of the tower except for the retail-based first floor.
Construction is on schedule and should be finished by spring. A five-story companion building was completed last month and is occupied by Northwestern Mutual.
Construction on another phase, which includes a hotel, has not yet begun. Developers are still shoring up funding, said Brittany Sawyer, a spokeswoman for One Place LLC, a company formed by local developers.
In May, the Tulsa Development Authority approved a two-year construction extension for the project. Now the privately funded undertaking that encompasses a full square block must be complete by Dec. 31, 2016, rather than the end of 2014.
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