The Perelman Building was originally constructed to house the headquarters of the Fidelity Mutual Life Insurance Co. (which occupied it until 1972).
The building is lavishly decorated with sculpture, color and gilding, and is regarded as one of the finest Art Deco structures in Philadelphia.
The sculptor Lee Lawrie (1877-1963), whose work adorns such notable American public buildings as Rockefeller Center, the Library of Congress and the National Academy of Sciences, was principally responsible for its decorative scheme.
The building was designed by Zantzinger, Borie and Medary who, together with architects Horace Trumbauer and Julian Abele, also designed the Museum's neoclassical structure on Fairmount, completed in 1928.
Leon Solon, the scholar who advised the Philadelphia Museum of Art on the color scheme of its celebrated glazed terracotta decoration and pediment, also served as color adviser for the Perelman Building.
The polychrome sculpture of Egyptian-inspired flora and fauna symbolize attributes of insurance: the owl of wisdom, the dog of fidelity, the pelican of charity, the opossum of protection, and the squirrel of frugality.
With a decorative scheme which also includes reliefs of Seven Ages of Man and the Perils of Land, Sea, and Air on the Earth's Four Great Continents, it remains the most elaborately sculpted facade of any 20th-century building in the city.
Constructed of Indiana limestone highlighted with color and gilding, its north and south pavilions are joined by a soaring, arched main entrance facing the Benjamin Franklin Parkway.
The building was listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 1973 and the Phila. Register of Historic Places in 1980.
Ownership of the building passed to the Reliance Standard Life Insurance Co. and then to the City before its purchase by the Philadelphia Museum of Art.
