This corner store is the most outstanding example of ornamental brickwork in Brownsville. Modest in size, it served as the grocery store of Adrian Ortíz, a native of Santander, Spain. Although not rising to the level of complexity of the Portscheller-designed stores in Roma (
SM12), the brickwork of the Ortíz Store creates an animated composition in standard modular brick, without recourse to custom-made shapes. The five bays at each of its two main elevations are divided by full-length pilasters that spring diagonally to create an entablature, and then continue upward to end as pinnacles that are linked, in turn, by a curved parapet. The store, eventually abandoned and roofless, was rehabilitated in 1987 in a laudable rescue effort.