August 26, 2024 Ι Untapped Journal There is a lesser-known shadow twin to Daniel Burnham’s epic 1909 Plan of Chicago, which synthesized many elements of contemporary urbanism we have come to expect from cities: comprehensive parks and highway systems, an orderly street grid, preserving the city’s waterfront as a public amenity, and coherent neighborhood-scaled civic… Continue reading Sometimes, Democratic Design Doesn’t “Look” Like Anything
Tag: Chicago
Revisit: James R Thompson Center in Chicago, US by Helmut Jahn
Architectural Review Ι May 20, 2024 ‘Now we’re replacing the state with Google,’ says the fresh‑faced Evan Jahn, son of high‑tech postmodernist Chicago architect Helmut Jahn and president of his father’s firm. Delivered in Starship Chicago II (2023), a documentary by Nathan Eddy, it is a praiseworthy statement, for its truth on both literal and… Continue reading Revisit: James R Thompson Center in Chicago, US by Helmut Jahn
Landmarking the Black Panther Party
Bloomberg CityLab Ι February 24, 2024 The walls of the Church of the Epiphany in Chicago are two feet thick, made of red-brown sandstone from the upper peninsula of Michigan. Designed by Francis Whitehouse and listed on the National Register of Historic Places, it’s a preeminent example of the Richardson Romanesque architectural style. The ornate… Continue reading Landmarking the Black Panther Party
CTA’s largest-ever expansion reaches out to fulfill a transit gap
Architect’s Newspaper Ι Nov. 20, 2023 With a focus on economic development in a part of the city that’s been starved for transit access and investment for much of its history, the Chicago Transit Authority (CTA) announced in September nearly $2 billion of federal funding for its Red Line Extension. The plan will add four… Continue reading CTA’s largest-ever expansion reaches out to fulfill a transit gap
After School Closings, a Renovation Challenge
Bloomberg CityLab Ι Oct. 9. 2023 Dwight Perkins isn’t among the most familiar names associated with Chicago architecture. But unlike Louis Sullivan, Frank Lloyd Wright and Mies van der Rohe, his work left a particularly vivid impression on the childhoods of generations of Chicagoans from all corners of the city, because he designed their schools.
Preservationists Don’t Put Too Fine a Point On It in Their Maximalist Postmodern Reno
Sept. 2023 Ι Dwell An architect/preservationist and a city planner/1980s-vibe channeler, Jonathan Solomon and Meg Gustafson are fluid aesthetic experts. But when it came time to design a house together after getting married, they weren’t interested in a ground-up project. They wanted “something that already had authenticity,” says Meg. But also “something that we wouldn’t… Continue reading Preservationists Don’t Put Too Fine a Point On It in Their Maximalist Postmodern Reno
Step Down, Splash Down
June 15, 2023 Ι Landscape Architecture Magazine A few years ago, if you wanted to visit the site of Cascade Park in Chicago, designed by Claude Cormier + Associés (now CCxA), you’d find yourself near the shores of Lake Michigan at a 50-foot cliff overlooking a vacant pit bordered by a foreboding service road that… Continue reading Step Down, Splash Down
High in the Sky, Where the Money Stacks Up
August 31, 2023 Ι Architects’ Newspaper In the 1960s, the same Chicago city agency conjured some of the worst and the best in American residential high-rises, and in rapid succession. The Chicago Housing Authority’s (CHA) Robert Taylor Homes were the nation’s largest public housing project when they opened in 1963: the buildings locked in a… Continue reading High in the Sky, Where the Money Stacks Up
The Lord’s Estate
August 1, 2023 Ι The New York Review of Architecture There aren’t many industries that have been stripped of their architecture as consistently as legacy media. A brief roundup covering just the last few years would include 30 Hudson Yards by KPF, which AT&T/Warner Media sold to developer Related Companies just a month after the… Continue reading The Lord’s Estate
In downtown Chicago, office conversions are being used to create affordable housing
Architect’s Newspaper Ι June 21, 2023 Last fall, Chicago’s Department of Planning and Development (DPD) introduced the LaSalle Reimagined plan to revive the sleepy and pervasively vacant downtown LaSalle Street corridor. Its focus will be the conversion of office towers with an emphasis on affordability. A minimum of 30 percent of the units will be… Continue reading In downtown Chicago, office conversions are being used to create affordable housing