The L’Avon, or Avon, Apartments is a unique flatiron building bounded by College Avenue, Elm Street, and Pine Street. A flatiron building gets its name from the triangular footprint that buildings possess from intersecting streets that create acute angles. The L’Avon is a three-story brick building in the Queen Anne style featuring many bay windows. It was constructed around 1901. How many other flatiron buildings can you think of located in Indianapolis?

Looking through early city directories, or books that contain a list of all addresses and the occupants in the city, shows us that the building often housed 11 or 12 units. These units would have been small, perhaps efficiency apartments with a shared hall bathroom. In recent decades, local rumors persist that these small rooms were used as a brothel, but it is much more likely that these units were working class efficiency room rentals. For example, the 1904 city directory lists an engineer, a chainmaker, a confectioner, a foreman, a machinist, and a bartender as tenants; it also lists Claude Brandt, who was a printer for the Indianapolis Sun, a precursor to the Indianapolis Times paper. The following year, many travel agents resided in the apartment, along with Omer Ellis, a drummer and manager of the Danzon Orchestra. A 1910s resident, Audrey Craig was a firefighter, later Lieutenant, with the Engine Company No. 10 of 601 South Illinois Street. 

In the early 2000s the apartment building was renovated by turning each floor into its own spacious unit, full of light and 360 degree views of the Fletcher Place neighborhood. The first floor unit has a two bedroom plan and the second and third floor units each contain two bedrooms plus dens. 

Apartment building illustrated on the 1915 fire insurance map; note the bay windows drawn in gray.
Credit: 1915 Sanborn Map, MapIndy, City of Indianapolis.

The Danzon Orchestra in 1926; Omer most likely on the left with the drumset.
Credit: Walter D. Hickman, “On Times Program Tonight,” Indianapolis Times, September 24, 1926.

A portrait of Audrey Craig from his personnel files.
Credit: “Personnel Record,” Indianapolis Firefighters Museum Collection, Via Digital Indy-Indianapolis Public Library, 1914.

The L’Avon prior to renovations in 1981.
Credit: 615 S. College Ave., The Avon Apartments, Indianapolis Historic Preservation Commission Image Collection, Herron School of Art Library, 1981.