Pocahontas Building: Richmond’s 1923 Bank Tower Demolished for a New Courthouse
In downtown Richmond, a 14-story tower that once anchored one of Virginia’s largest banks is being torn down to make way for a new home for the state’s highest courts.
The Pocahontas Building has stood at 900 East Main Street for more than a century, but within the next year, it will only exist as a memory.
The Pocahontas Building’s 1923 Origins as State Planters Bank
The building’s West Tower opened in 1923 as the headquarters of State Planters Bank and Trust Company, designed by Clinton and Russell, a New York firm that had already built a national reputation for early steel-frame skyscraper construction.
The bank itself had a longer history under a different name. State Planters Bank traced its roots back to the Planters National Bank, one of several Richmond banking institutions that merged and reorganized in the early 20th century as the city’s financial sector consolidated.
The 1962 East Tower Addition
By the early 1960s, the bank’s operations had outgrown the original tower, and an East Tower addition was built in 1962, designed by the Richmond firm Lee, King and Poole.
The two towers together formed the building Richmond residents came to know simply as the Pocahontas Building, a name that stuck even as the bank itself changed hands and identities over the following decades, eventually becoming part of United Virginia Bank.
Housing Virginia’s General Assembly
The building’s later life took an unexpected turn when it briefly served a governmental purpose far removed from its banking origins.
While the Virginia General Assembly Building underwent its own construction and renovation, the Pocahontas Building was pressed into service as temporary office space for state legislators, a stopgap use for a building that by then had passed well beyond its original corporate purpose.
Why the Pocahontas Building Is Being Demolished
The Commonwealth of Virginia approved plans in 2023 and 2024 to demolish both towers entirely, clearing the site for a new $400 million Commonwealth Courts Building intended to house the Supreme Court of Virginia and the Court of Appeals.
Historic Richmond, Preservation Virginia, and the Partnership for Smarter Growth jointly opposed the demolition, arguing for the building’s architectural and historical value, but the state moved forward with its plans regardless.
They wrote that “The limestone façade, with its lavishly carved Ionic colonnade with cast iron screen is impressive and contrasts handsomely with the Mutual Building and First & Merchants Bank Building on opposite corners of 9th and Main Streets.”
As of a May 2026 state procurement filing, the commonwealth was still seeking a contractor to carry out the demolition.
When the towers come down, they will take with them one of downtown Richmond’s more distinctive early commercial buildings.
Sources:
- Richmond BizSense, “State board votes to raze 12-story portion of downtown’s Pocahontas Building for new courts complex” — https://richmondbizsense.com/2024/07/15/state-board-votes-to-raze-12-story-portion-of-downtowns-pocahontas-building-for-new-courts-complex/
- Richmond BizSense, “Designs unveiled for new $400M state government office building downtown” — https://richmondbizsense.com/2025/02/19/designs-unveiled-for-new-400m-state-government-office-building-downtown/
- Richmond BizSense, “Architectural board OK’s new state courthouse building planned in downtown Richmond” — https://richmondbizsense.com/2025/06/09/architectural-board-oks-new-state-courthouse-building-planned-in-downtown-richmond/
- Historic Richmond, “Pocahontas Building” (comment letter, coalition opposition) — https://historicrichmond.com/pocahontas-building/
- SAH Archipedia, “Pocahontas Building” entry
