It was built for the Presbyterian Board of Publications and Sabbath School Work.

It is an 11-story, steel frame E-shaped building, faced with brick and granite.

Its exterior features Corinthian order and Ionic order columns, statues, medallions, seals of various boards and agencies of the Presbyterian Church and of related Reformed churches.

[1] Several statues and some of the medallions were designed by sculptor Alexander Stirling Calder (1870–1945), including statues of six historically prominent Presbyterians, Francis Makemie, John Witherspoon, John McMillan, Samuel Davies, James Caldwell and Marcus Whitman.

These sculptures were removed in 1961 and later moved to the courtyard of the Presbyterian Historical Society in Philadelphia.