Muralist to repaint and renovate big milk bottle on Oklahoma City’s Milk Bottle Building

Muralist Chris Presley is repainting and renovating the 11-foot-tall Braum’s milk bottle that sits atop the iconic Milk Bottle Building in Oklahoma City, which should add many more years to the bottle’s lifespan.

The triangle-like tract sits 2416 Classen Blvd. (aka Route 66) and is near another Route 66 alignment, Northwest 23rd Street. The Milk Bottle Building was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1998.

Longtime city beat writer Steve Lackmeyer of The Oklahoman reported:

Presley painted a mural, “The Buffalo Goddess,” on the east side of the building last year. […]
“The bottle and surrounding support for it are all metal, which can be tricky because metal expands when it is heated,” Presley said. “In the past, oil-based paint used on the bottle hardened and broke because the heat caused the metal to expand. To prevent this from happening in the future, I am using a FlexiCoat paint that will breathe with the metal expansion and offer more flexibility.”

Lackmeyer also dug up historical tidbits about the 380-square-foot property, which dates to 1930 and has served as a restaurant, grocery, barbecue stand, design studio, fruit stand, laundry, florist and boutique. The big milk bottle was added in 1948.

• Late civic leader John Kilpatrick purchased the property in the 1970s, and it remains in the family with Elise Kilpatrick, who guided a major renovation of the building a few years ago.
• “A reader once told The Oklahoman the building was also home to a bootleg liquor shop, recalling ‘Crab Orchard was $1.25 per pint and Four Roses was $1.50.'”
• The bottle previously advertised Sterling Milk, Meadow Gold, Steffen’s and Townley’s before Braum’s took over in 1996. 
• The property was a target for robbers during the 1960s, and at least two bullet holes can be seen in walls.

(Image of the Milk Bottle Building in 2010 in Oklahoma City by Aaron Hall via Flickr)