Reynolds to sell headquarters in Winston-Salem, N.C.

WINSTON-SALEM, N.C. Reynolds American Inc. has officially launched the largest recycling project in its history -- it has put its historic headquarters on the market.

The 22-story building has been the headquarters of R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co. since it debuted as an innovative architectural and engineering masterpiece in April 1929.

At the time, it was the tallest building south of Baltimore. It won a national architectural award, and the same firm that designed it used a larger, similar design for the Empire State Building.

In October 2008, Reynolds started consolidating its downtown employees, both Reynolds American Inc. and its subsidiary, into the neighboring Plaza Building. That consolidation recently was completed.

The decision to vacate the building came shortly after Reynolds said it was eliminating 570 jobs, mostly white-collar, as part of a continuing effort of trying to balance consumer demand for its products with company size.

The Reynolds Building is valued at $12.3 million, according to Forsyth County tax records.

Reynolds has said it is open to selling or leasing the building, which has at least 240,000 square feet of mostly Class B office space. Commercial real estate developers say the building has the potential for mixed use, including residential units.

The broker, Commercial Realty Advisors of Winston-Salem, will work with Jones Lang LaSalle, an international commercial-realty company based in Chicago, to evaluate and market the building, Reynolds spokesman David Howard said.

The market for downtown office space in Winston-Salem is competitive.

The building represented the culmination of a downtown construction spree during the 1920s, but it is not on the National Register of Historic Places.

The job of designing the building went to Shreve & Lamb architectural firm, which was asked to produce "an effect of conservatism along with attractiveness, but to avoid flashiness."

-- Media General News Service