ModernismBoise / Stories from the fieldJeffery Holley

800 West State Street · Boise · 1965

Home Federal Savings

Thompson and Kolbo’s New Formalist bank and the changing shape of postwar Boise.

Jeffery Holley · October 12, 2026

Color rendering of Home Federal at night, with its illuminated glass banking hall beneath a broad roof.
Home Federal at night, Home Federal documentation. Author's rendering from unattributed 1966 photo.

Home Federal Savings and Loan at the Capitol (1965) 800 W. State Street Boise, ID 83702

Our goal: to preserve a record of Home Federal Savings and Loan as a distinctive example of its time, architectural style, and place within Boise’s Capitol Mall.

Summary

Our small preservation team walked, measured, photographed, and recorded Home Federal, a remarkable 1965 bank designed by Thompson and Kolbo across from the State Capitol. Its quartzite, concrete, steel, walnut, glass, atrium, drive-up teller, and parking lot reflected Boise’s growing confidence and changing daily life after World War II. With help from TOK and the owner representatives, we identified features for careful salvage and reuse, allowing the building’s design, craftsmanship, and history to survive after its walls disappear.

A gateway mid-century building to the Capitol Mall

Historic black-and-white photograph of Home Federal’s illuminated glass facade and tall concrete piers.Color rendering of the same nighttime facade, showing warm light inside the banking hall.
Swipe between black and white and color views of Photographs: Idaho State Historical Society Archives, P1966 26.303. Architectural details: Idaho Cultural Resource Information System.

Today

Home Federal’s roof and facade with the Idaho State Capitol dome visible beyond the trees.
Across from the Capitol and view from 8th and State Streets
Home Federal’s street frontage behind mature trees.
Across from the Capitol and view from 8th and State Streets
Sidewalk view past Home Federal’s stone wall and projecting roof.
Across from the Capitol and view from 8th and State Streets
Oblique view of Home Federal’s stone-clad side elevation beneath its flat roof.
Across from the Capitol and view from 8th and State Streets
Home Federal’s two-story side wall with vertically grouped windows and concrete piers.
Secondary entrances on the west and north elevations.
Corner view of Home Federal’s stone walls, tall windows, and projecting roof.
Secondary entrances on the west and north elevations.
Sunlit corner of Home Federal, showing stone veneer and full-height concrete supports.
Secondary entrances on the west and north elevations.
Long stone-clad side elevation of Home Federal with a vehicle at the curb.
East and West elevations.
Home Federal’s glass street facade beneath the broad projecting roof.
East and West elevations.
Recessed glass entrance framed by stone veneer and concrete piers.
Features and Details
Close view of a recessed round light in the roof soffit above the stone facade.
Features and Details
Stone-clad corner and narrow windows beside a tall concrete pier.
Features and Details
Upper window with a projecting panel above the stone-clad lower wall.
Features and Details
Drive-up teller window set into the stone wall between concrete piers.
Features and Details
Close view of a concrete pier’s stepped base beside the stone veneer.
Features and Details
Upward view between paired concrete piers toward the roof soffit.
Features and Details

Archive

Below, professional photographs document Home Federal Savings and Loan shortly after its 1965 completion. At night, its New Formalist composition, a modern approach using classical symmetry, monumental scale, repeated structural elements, and refined materials, emerges through the broad precast roof, paired full height concrete piers, irregular quartzite veneer, aluminum framed curtain wall, recessed can lights, and illuminated two story atrium with an open stair. Light transforms the transparent banking hall into a civic display, expressing the strength, security, dignity, color, and careful detailing praised by an outside jury at the Owyhee Hotel.

Only three months after the building opened, the jury selected Thompson & Kolbo’s work as one of three winners in the Idaho AIA chapter’s first annual design awards program. Five days later, the Greater Boise Chamber of Commerce named Home Federal the city’s most attractive new commercial building costing more than $100,000.

Historic nighttime view through Home Federal’s glazed entrance.
It has that new bank smell. Photos 1966
Historic oblique view of the glass banking hall between exterior concrete piers.
It has that new bank smell. Photos 1966
Historic view along the glazed entry passage into Home Federal.
It has that new bank smell. Photos 1966
Historic photograph of the banking hall, showing desks and the patterned luminous ceiling.
It has that new bank smell. Photos 1966
Historic office photograph with desks, chairs, and full-height curtains.
It has that new bank smell. Photos 1966
Historic view of office desks and partitions beneath the luminous ceiling.
It has that new bank smell. Photos 1966
Another historic view of desks and upholstered chairs beside full-height curtains.
It has that new bank smell. Photos 1966
Historic office interior with desks, glass partitions, and geometric ceiling lighting.
It has that new bank smell. Photos 1966
Historic banking hall interior with desks and geometric luminous ceiling panels.
It has that new bank smell. Photos 1966

Future

These digital elevations are foundations for modeling and exhibition projects.

Measured drawing of Home Federal’s south elevation.
Elevations: South; East; North; West.
Measured drawing of Home Federal’s east elevation.
Elevations: South; East; North; West.
Measured drawing of Home Federal’s north elevation.
Elevations: South; East; North; West.
Measured drawing of Home Federal’s west elevation.
Elevations: South; East; North; West.
Measured plan of Home Federal’s first floor.
First Floor Plan

Thank You!

We thank TOK, the building’s owner representatives, the Idaho State Historical Society, and everyone who opened doors, shared knowledge, and helped us document Home Federal, ensuring that the story of this remarkable Boise building will remain accessible.

Notes

Thank you to Weston Architect, and team: Jennifer Russell; Michael Latta; Uriah Trout for supporting this project.

Preserving a record of Home Federal Savings and Loan as a distinctive example of its time, architectural style, and place within Boise’s Capitol Mall.

Through a circle of care, we survey before demolition, photograph before disappearance, archive before records scatter, salvage before landfill, interpret before forgetting, and welcome the public into the record. Fieldwork, measured drawings, historic sources, City of Boise records, Idaho Statesman coverage, Facebook posts, and interviews document how the bank looked, operated, and was understood.

Together, these sources place Home Federal within a cultural landscape shaped by banking, homeownership, automobile access, labor, civic ambition, gender roles, and ideas of progress. They record the building as it stands, explain its meaning in 1965, and preserve its legacy.

Jeffery Holley, Preservation Media Producer and Architectural Historian | 415-776-5333 | jeff@preservation.ltd

Sources and credits

Research and interpretation by Jeffery Holley. Adapted from Home Federal Savings, the original StoryMap. Captions and source attributions accompany the images; original notes appear above.

A closer look