Historical Summary: Kenneth McLeod, a former Edmonton alderman, contractor and real estate speculator, announced the construction of the McLeod Building in 1912, claiming it would be the highest in the city, 25 feet taller than the Tegler.  Construction of the nine-storey structure began in 1913 and was completed in 1915.  Twelve hundred tons of steel was required mainly because McLeod ordered footings to be 11 square feet, large enough for a 50-storey building.  It was also the first building in Edmonton to be wired with conduit.  The contractors of the $600,000 building were Olsen and Johnson, and the steel contractors were McPhee and Nicodemus.  With the Polson Building in Spokane, Washington as the model, McLeod commissioned the architect, John K. Dow to build a duplicate in Edmonton

The McLeod Building is regarded as Alberta’s best remaining example of an architectural style for commercial buildings known as the “Chicago School” which was developed in Chicago at the turn of the century by architects such as Louis Sullivan, Holabird and Roche, William Jenny, and Burnham and Root.  Chicago School features include the massing and stressed verticality, heavy overhanging cornice, the use of terra cotta on the exterior (rare in Edmonton and Alberta), and the three-part division into the ground floor, intermediate floors, and top floor with cornice.  Despite this modernity, many details such as the balconet over the entry, window keystones, colored tiles, entablature with heavy modillions and classical ornamentation along the cornice edge, reflect Edwardian classicism.