It preserves Maine's most significant collection of early 20th century public and commercial buildings, and commemorates an urban re-building campaign matched only by Portland's following its own destruction by fire in 1866.

The district comprises 48 buildings (and three parks), most of them constructed between 1911 and 1915 in the burned area, which accounted for half of Bangor's commercial core.

The designs were contributed by a number of nationally prominent architectural firms, including Peabody and Stearns; Carrere and Hastings; and Jardine, Kent & Hill; as well as U.S. government architect Oscar Wenderoth, and local architects C. Parker Crowell, Wilfred E. Mansur, Victor Hodgins, and Frederick A. Patterson.

Every building except one is of brick, though some are steel-framed, two are faced with terra-cotta, and two are completely sheathed in granite.

Three of the district's architecturally-significant buildings were constructed somewhat later, in the 1920s and 1930s, most prominently the Bangor Telephone Exchange (1931), designed in Art Deco style in 1931 by the Boston architectural firm of Densmore, LeClear, and Robbins, and the most prominent example of that style in Maine.