Piano’s Modern Wing (2009) at The Art Institute of Chicago and a house by Tadao
Ando (1998). Even the still locally influential SOM – which is leading the planning
effort for Chicago’s bid for the 2016 Olympics – has refreshed itself by importing
designers initially trained in its New York office (leading to questions as to whether
it’s still a Chicago firm).
While Chicago has now benefited from a quarter-century of fresh ideas and
talent, it’s not without a downside. What is genuine “Chicago Architecture” today?
That was much easier to answer when Mies and his acolytes designed most of the
city’s commissions. Today, the globalization and commodification of architects and
architecture increasingly blur boundaries and often discount the value of the real,
physical world in favor of a virtual one. Chicago not only made a name for itself
during the height of the classic “Modern Moment,” it defined many of the character-
istics we now associate with that time. In a city where the future of the 20th century
was often first built, the question remains, “What’s next”? n
Edward Keegan is a Chicago architect and architecture critic and a passionate
defender of the city’s architectural legacy. He is Editor-at-Large for Architect magazine;
his articles have also appeared in Architecture, Architectural Record, Metropolis, The
Chicago Tribune and other publications. He teaches courses on architecture journal-
ne Development/Santiago Calatrava.
ism and Chicago architecture at the University of Notre Dame.
Edward Keegan’s new guide, Chicago Architecture: 1885 to Today, is published by tesy Shelbour
Universe Press in association with the Chicago Architecture Foundation. Cour
To Visit
Museum of Science and Industry
57th Street and Lake Shore Drive, Chicago
Lodging
Frank Lloyd Wright Home & Studio
773/684-1414,
www.msichicago.org
Hotel Burnham
951 Chicago Avenue, Oak Park
The rebuilt Palace of Fine Arts from the
1 West Washington, Chicago
708/848-1978,
www.gowright.org
World’s Columbian Exposition (D.H. Burnham
312/782-1111,
www.burnhamhotel.com
Unity Temple
& Co., 1893) features a coal mine, subma-
The classic Chicago School Reliance
875 Lake Street, Oak Park
rine, 727 plane, even the Apollo 8 spacecraft.
Building (1895) by Burnham & Root
was meticulously restored in 1996 to
708/848-6225,
www.unitytemple.org
Modern Wing, its original exterior during a conversion
Robie House
The Art Institute of Chicago of the long disused office spaces to
5757 S. Woodlawn Avenue, Chicago
Monroe Street and Columbus Drive, Chicago hotel rooms.
On the University of Chicago campus.
312/443-3600,
www.artic.edu
708/848-1976,
www.gowright.org
Pritzker Prize winner Renzo Piano’s new
Tours
addition is due for completion in 2009.
Chicago Architecture Foundation
Farnsworth House
312/922-3432,
www.architecture.org
14520 River Road, Plano
Dining Offers tours, exhibitions, lectures and
866/811-4111,
www.farnsworthhouse.org
The Gage special events designed to enhance the
About 60 miles from Chicago.
24 South Michigan Avenue, Chicago public’s appreciation of Chicago’s archi-
John Hancock Observatory
312/372-4243,
www.thegagechicago.com tectural legacy.
875 North Michigan Avenue, Chicago
Located in an 1899 building by Holabird
Chicago Bauhaus & Beyond
312/751-3680,
& Roche, the restaurant’s period interiors
www.hancock-obervatory.com
are new and the food is decent, but the
312/371-0986,
brick piers and large “Chicago windows”
www.chicagobauhausbeyond.com
McCormick Tribune Campus Center on the floors above are typical of their
Celebrates and promotes the preservation
Southeast corner, State and 33rd Streets, contemporaries.
of 20th-century modern architecture and
Chicago
design in Chicago through social events,
312/567-3077,
www.iit.edu/mtcc
17 educational seminars and tours.
17 West Adams Street, Chicago
Jay Pritzker Pavilion 312/427-3170,
www.berghoff.com Chicago has many wonderful stores and
Michigan Avenue, Millennium Park, Chicago This small restaurant and bar in a building galleries. For a selection, click here.
312/742-1168,
www.millenniumpark.org dating from 1872 serves old German
favorites behind one of the city’s earliest
post-fire, cast iron façades.
www.modernismmagazine.com 91
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68 |
Page 69 |
Page 70 |
Page 71 |
Page 72 |
Page 73 |
Page 74 |
Page 75 |
Page 76 |
Page 77 |
Page 78 |
Page 79 |
Page 80 |
Page 81 |
Page 82 |
Page 83 |
Page 84 |
Page 85 |
Page 86 |
Page 87 |
Page 88 |
Page 89 |
Page 90 |
Page 91 |
Page 92 |
Page 93 |
Page 94 |
Page 95 |
Page 96 |
Page 97 |
Page 98 |
Page 99 |
Page 100 |
Page 101 |
Page 102 |
Page 103 |
Page 104 |
Page 105 |
Page 106 |
Page 107 |
Page 108 |
Page 109 |
Page 110 |
Page 111 |
Page 112 |
Page 113 |
Page 114 |
Page 115 |
Page 116 |
Page 117 |
Page 118 |
Page 119 |
Page 120 |
Page 121 |
Page 122 |
Page 123 |
Page 124 |
Page 125