offered merchandise with uniform quality and price, concepts that were unusual for that time. During the first half of the 20th century, Ayres grew to become one of Indianapolis's leading department stores. In Indianapolis its department store competitors were the William H. Block Company, the H. P. Wasson and Company, and L. S. Strauss and Company. Beginning in 1972, the Lazarus department store chain arrived in Indianapolis as it absorbed the Block's stores. All of these stores offered a full line of merchandise, but Ayres was especially known for its women's fashions. For several years prior to his death in 1896, Lyman had been purchasing real estate along Meridian and Washington streets in Indianapolis, where he intended to build a new store at the intersection of these two prominent downtown streets. Designed by the Indianapolis architectural firm of Vonnegut and Bohn, the new eight-story flagship store opened in 1905. The landmark store at One West Washington Street was enlarged several times. The store's first major expansion was completed in 1915 and doubled the store's size and its frontage along Washington Street. Beginning in the 1920s the company acquired property along Meridian Street, south of its main store, and opened the South Building in September 1929. After World War II, an eleven-story addition to the flagship store completed along Meridian Street, adjacent to the South Building. In the 1950s, downtown Indianapolis began to deteriorate as businesses moved outside the city center; however, Ayres continued to buy real estate adjacent to its downtown store. The company bought several old buildings near its flagship store, tore them down, created surface parking on the vacant lots, and later built two parking garages to entice suburban shoppers to drive downtown and park near its store. Despite Ayres's efforts to improve its Indianapolis flagship store, the city's downtown had declined by the 1970s and the West Washington Street store was surrounded by empty lots and vacant buildings. To encourage economic development of the area, Ayres and others invested in two downtown hotel developments in an effort to attract convention and tourism business. Ayres contributed $3.3 million to development of a downtown Hilton Hotel, which later became a Sheraton Hotel, and $50,000 to the Merchants Plaza project, where a Hyatt Regency Hotel and Merchants Bank offices occupied most of its space. Suburban expansion As urban populations shifted outward to suburban areas, Ayres moved closer to its customers