Bay Refining Gas Station and Car Wash

815 Ashman st, Midland, MI
Designed by Alden B. Dow F.A.I.A. in 1960.

In the late 1950’s and early 1960’s, automobile designs were characterized by head-turning tailfins and sleek lines. It’s not hard to imagine a ’59 Buick Electra pulling up to the gas pumps of the Bay Service Station on Ashman Street in Midland, designed by Alden B. Dow in 1960.

Perhaps it was those same tailfins that inspired the eye-catching lines of this futuristic structure.

The soaring roofline of the Bay Service Station is a hyperbolic paraboloid – a doubly-curved surface that has a convex form along one axis and a concave form along the other (think of a Pringles potato chip). The use of hyperbolic paraboloids as a form of construction was pioneered in the post-war era. By being both lightweight and efficient, the form was used as a means of minimizing materials and increasing structural strength while also being capable of achieving impressive and seemingly complex designs.

For his design, Mr. Dow made use of Dow Chemical’s Styrofoam for the roof framing, covered with a thin concrete layer and waterproofed. It was one of several gas stations he designed for the Bay Refining Company, a division of Dow Chemical. The building is still in use today as an auto detailing business, still servicing automobiles and, in that way, fulfilling its original function.

In addition to drawings and photographs of the Bay Service Station, the display in the Archives also includes Mr. Dow’s drawings for the Crown Petroleum Service Station in Bay City, a photograph of the Leonard Service Station in Ann Arbor, and a delightful color pencil sketch for a gas station/store/house that was drawn in the 1940’s but never built.