in 1928 he designed ford motor company's middle east headquarters, later to be named the corm building and gardens, with no formal architectural training. the building was erected in 1929 in beirut, later becoming the corm family home. it was the middle east's first skyscraper and highest standing structure in lebanon until 1967. reflecting charles corm's ecologist instincts, long before that term had come to carry its modern social and ideological "activist" connotations, the building’s 14,000 m2 gardens (the largest private gardens in beirut) contain a variety of artistic and archaeological relics as well as exotic trees and rare plants.