“Built in Chicago in 1923, the Reebie storage and removals firm not only reveals the impact that the discovery of Tutankhamun’s tomb had on architecture and decorative arts in the United States, but it also introduces the subject of the use of hieroglyphs within Egyptomania. Contructed by Charles S. Kinglsey, it was decorated by Fritz Albert with a vast display of polychrome terracottas. Decorative motifs included several full-length statues of Ramesses II, representations of the goddess Hathor, winged beetles and hieroglyphic friezes. The colours—pink, coral, fawn, indigo and light green—and golden disks with blue wings and green snakes, appear to shine as brightly today as when they were first created. . . . Hieroglyphs overtly proclaim the function of the building: ‘I offer protection to your furniture.’”

—Clifford Price and Jean-Marcel Humbert, from their Introduction: An Architecture Between Dream and Meaning, from Imhotep Today: Egyptianizing Architecture, edited by Jean-Marcel Humbert and Clifford Price, 2003.