Architecture is about more than buildings–it’s also about people, events, and ambitions. Here’s my list of the ten most important things that happened in Chicago architecture this year.
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Construction on Block 37 The 1989 bulldozing of the entire city block across from Marshall Field’s turned into one of Chicago’s longest-enduring fiascoes, resisting a succession of developers, architects, and beautiful visions to remain little more than a dirt pile for a decade and a half. With construction finally under way on an office building, condos, and a big shopping mall, a happy ending finally may be in sight.
“Learning From North Lawndale” A Chicago Architectural Club competition and an accompanying exhibition at the Chicago Architecture Foundation brought one of the city’s most historic neighborhoods–home to the first movie palace and the original Sears Tower and to Golda Meir and Martin Luther King Jr.–back into focus and, along with the UIC City Design Center’s Greystone Initiative, explored ways to revive the community without displacing current residents.
2016 Olympics What Mayor Daley wants, Mayor Daley gets. His current plan to drop a “temporary” 95,000-seat stadium in Frederick Olmsted’s historic Washington Park could be the first attempt to make the 2016 Olympics the justification for every public-works sugarplum he craves over his next three terms.
