The Guernsey Dairy Milk Depot at 2419 State Street in Boise. Designed by Tourtelotte and Hummel and completed in 1937, it is uniquely Spanish Colonial. Not a unique architectural style for Boise, as seen by the Union Pacific Depot on the bench and the many buildings it inspired. But rather, unique to the architectural styles Tourtelotte and Hummel was producing at the time. “It could be considered the only example, strictly speaking, for earlier instances of Spanish design…have been so mixed and minimalized that they have been generally described as missionesque. This elegant revivalist shell for a building with an industrial interior, designed at a time when the firm was producing its best works in the art deco and art moderne styles, reveals very clearly the eclectic and picturesque propensities of these architects. This may suggest that to them even the apparently progressive styles were simply another form of picturesque.”

“The plan originally enclosed office and salesrooms at right front; milk processing, by-products manufacturing, and receiving and washing and cooling rooms to the left and rear; and a long garage, and interior loading platform, and the boiler room across the rear. “ Milk was brought in to the depot from area farms, processed into other dairy products, packaged, and then distributed from this location.

The building was recently renovated for Silvercreek Realty Group into offices and meeting spaces. The building has been listed on the National Register of Historic Places since 1982. (Hummel did not participate in the recent renovation but we love working on historic buildings.)

(Source: (Excerpt from Inventory Sheet for Group Nominations: Idaho State Historical Society, Boise, Idaho. Nomination: Tourtellotte and Hummel Architecture)