Wrigley Building | 1924
Graham, Anderson, Probst & White
Style: Spanish Revival
Clad in 250,000 glazed terracotta tiles in 6 shades of white/cream, The Wrigley Building is a Chicago favorite partially inspired by the White City of the 1893 World’s Fair. William M. Wrigley had the building constructed to be the headquarters of the Wrigley Chewing Gum company. The iconic clock tower on top was modeled after La Giralda bell tower of the Seville Cathedral in Seville, Spain.
TRump international
hotel & Tower | 2009
Skidmore, Owings & Merrill
Style: Contemporary / Contextualism
Trump Tower was modeled after the tallest building in the world, the Burj Khalifa in Dubai. The design relies heavily on Contextualist features like the three patio setbacks that correspond to the height of nearby buildings, or the silvery stainless steel facade that bridges the color space between the bright terracotta of The Wrigley Building and the black anodized aluminum of the AMA Plaza.
Marina City | 1967
Bertrand Goldberg Associates
Style: Modernism / Brutalism
Often called “a city within a city,” Marina City is one of the most iconic buildings in our skyline, appearing in a number of films and TV Shows. It was the first post-war high-rise residential complex in the United States and is seen as a catalyst for the residential building boom that swept through the downtown area in the last few decades of the 1900s. All the amenities – including valet parking, a movie theater, ice-skating rink, a marina, and office spaces – gave it the complexity needed to draw residents downtown when the area was still heavily industrial.
77 W Wacker | 1992
Ricardo Bofill of Taller de Arquitectura
Style: Postmodernism or Neoclassical
An eye-catching example of Postmodernist architecture with classical influences, 77 W Wacker is the only building on our tour designed by an international architect, the late Ricardo Bofill of Spain. It is known for its white granite exterior columns flanking sheets of reflective glass windows often reflecting the sky above down to the river.
Wells Street bridge | 1922
EH Bennett
Style: Double Lead Trunnion Bascule
This 1920s bridge supports car and pedestrian traffic on the lower level, with Chicago Transit Authority train tracks on the level above, serving the Brown and Purple lines. The original bridge from 1922 was replaced in the early 2010s, assembled off site and floated home by barge.
Reid Murdoch Center | 1914
George C. Nimmons
Style: Prairie Style
One of the last remaining warehouse structures along the main branch of the river. It was used as offices and a grocery warehouse. On July 24th, 1915 after the S.S. Eastland capsized in the Chicago River right next to the building. Today, the building currently houses the headquarters of Encyclopedia Britannica.
Merchandise mart | 1930
Graham, Anderson, Probst & White
Style: Art Deco
When this behemoth was completed in 1930 as the Marshall Field’s wholesale warehouse, it was the largest building on Earth! The building is so large, it had its own zip code until 2008. There’s as much square footage as 73 American football fields. From April through December, a light projection show called Art on the Mart occurs shortly after sunset. The 34 projectors cost $8 million total!
wolf point | 1830
Wolf Point is the confluence of the three branches of the Chicago River: the main branch, which runs east to west, the north branch, and the south branch. In early Chicago of the 1830s, Wolf Point was an early center of development, home to the city’s first church, drugstore, theater, hotel, and taverns. Today Wolf Point is a showcase of contemporary architecture. Most structures in the area are new since 2017. It is also home to the western start of the Chicago Riverwalk.
Nuveen Building | 1983
Kohn Pederson Fox Associates
Style: Postmodernism
Our strongest examples of Contextualist design: the curve of the building imitates the curve of the river at Wolf Point and the two rows of different colored reflective glass recall the color of both the river and sky. On the other side of the building, it is designed with right angles and straight edges to match Chicago’s grid-style streets. This building may look familiar as its where Ferris Bueller’s dad looked down on the parade!
Fulton House | 1898
Frank Abbott & Harry Weese
Style: Tudor Revival
The oldest building on our tour route found on the North Branch. What is now a residential building was once a cold storage facility for the North American Cold Storage Co. Chicago was the “Hog Butcher of the World,” bringing in barges of beef from the cattle stockyards to freeze in the Fulton House, then offload and shipped across the country.
KINZIE RAILROAD BRIDGE | 1908
Concrete Bridge Company & Bascule
Style: Joseph Strauss
In the time of its opening, 1908, the Kinzie Street Railroad Bridge was the world’s largest and heaviest bascule bridge. In 2007, it was deemed a landmark and is permanently raised to showcase the concrete overweight that was needed to raise one our Chicago-style bridges. The area next to the bridge on the northern peninsula of Wolf Point is where the Great Chicago Flood began in 1992.
River cottages | 1988
Harry Weese Associates
Style: Postmodernism
Architect Harry Weese is known for his triangular designs in Chicago, from these 1989 townhomes, to the Swissotel, to the Metropolitan Correctional Center. For these four homes, Weese was inspired by his travels to Budapest and his love of all things nautical. While Weese is an iconic Chicago architect, perhaps his most famous work is the underground Metro system in Washington DC.
River Point | 2017
Pickard Chilton
Style: Contemporary
Similar to the Nuveen building, River Point’s signature curve is a reflection of its location. The lower slice in the curved building was meant to avoid having caissons go where the train tracks are below the plaza, so it slants inward to avoid the tracks. The metal arch above the parabolic base also works as a rain gutter for the front of the building. The striking, red sculpture out front was made by Santiago Calatrava and is called Constellation.
150 N. Riverside | 2017
Goettsch Partners
Style: Contemporary
One of the city’s best examples of the relationship between engineering, architecture, and environmental limitations. The base narrows to ground level as the back ⅔ is occupied by active Amtrak and Metra train tracks, and the front is governed by a zoning law requiring buildings to be set back at least 30 feet from the river’s edge.
Boeing Building | 1990
Ralph Johnson of Perkins & Will
Style: Contemporary
Boeing moved here in 2001 from Seattle, where it was originally the headquarters for the Morton Salt Company. It costs roughly $1,300,000 a year for Boeing to have the air rights. There is a steel panel on the roof that has 6 large holes to playfully represent the holes of a salt shaker for the original tenants. You can also see those six holes from the lobby’s ceiling.
2 North riverside plaza | 1929
Holabird & Roche
Style: Art Deco
Originally the Chicago Daily News Building, 2 North Riverside Plaza stands as one of Chicago’s finest examples of Art Deco style. The side facing the Chicago River, that you see while on tour, is decorated with important scenes from the history of journalism. It was the first skyscraper in the U.S. to include an open-air public plaza as part of its design. With that, it was also the first building in Chicago that developed intentionally toward the river.
Gateway Centers i and ii | 1965/1967
SOM
Style: Black Box Modernism
Built two years apart, these two centers are “twins” of a sort. These two are prime examples of the simplicity of Modernist design. You cannot find these buildings online listed as Gateway Center I and II. Instead, they go by their address of 10 S Riverside Plaza and 120 S Riverside Plaza. To put the building’s height into a different perspective, these two buildings are near the same height as the antennas on the roof of the Willis Tower!
Gateway Center III | 1971
SOM
Style: Contemporary
Defying gravity and traditional building shapes, Chicago’s St. Regis was an instant classic when completed in 2020. Two floors near the top remain permanently open so that wind can blow right through, reducing sway. A penthouse at the St. Regis could cost you tens of millions of dollars, but included in your purchase is the right to brag about living in the world’s tallest building designed by a woman.
300 S WACKER | 1971
A. Epstein & Sons
Style: Black Box Modernism
Once a standard black box modernist building for decades until it was purchased in 2013. Often referred to the “Map Building,” the new owners spent $800,000 to paint a to scale map on the west face of the building. In 2015, this new design had its debut and acts as a “you are here” point on the Chicago River.
Post office | 1932
Graham, Anderson, Probst, & White
Style: Art Deco
In 1932, it was once the largest post office. Chicago once was the mail-order catalog industry’s homebase, making the post office a necessity to accommodate incoming and outgoing mail. In 1996, the post office closed until 2019 which costed around $500 million. Today, the building purposes as offices and headquarters for Walgreens, Pepsico, Cisco, Homechef, and Uber.
Chicago Fire
On October 8, 1871, Mrs. Catherine O’Leary was alerted to a fire in her DeKoven Street barn. A severe drought and strong winds fueled the blaze, which roared for 30 hours, destroying much of downtown Chicago, killing 300 people, and leaving about 100,000 homeless. This disaster wiped out the old wooden city, paving the way for a new architectural era and shaping the modern Chicago skyline.
Board of trade | 1929
Holabird & Root
Style: Art Deco
The Chicago Board of Trade was the tallest building in Chicago from 1930 – 1965. It has an Art Deco style sculpture of Ceres, the Roman goddess of agriculture, standing tall on the roof. This is the building where Chicago traded agriculture futures on the stock market. There is a painting of Ceres over 3 stories tall that was taken from the old trading floor and installed on a steel framework on the atrium floor. The Board of Trade played Wayne Enterprises in the film, Batman Begins.
311 S. Wacker | 1990
Kohn Penderson Fox
Style: Postmodernism
This building is most notable for its glowing “crown” that sits on top, illuminated at night with LED lights. When the building was first built, the nighttime lights confused the navigation of birds, it is suspected because they think its the moon. They would at times crash into the illuminated crowns and other times the lights caused the disoriented birds to fly around until they tired and died of exhaustion. To help prevent this, now lights are dimmed March 15 to June 15 then again August 15 to November 15 for bird migrations seasons!
Willis Tower | 1990
Bruce Graham & Dr. Fazlur Khan
Style: Black Box Modernism
The most famous building in Chicago, formerly known as the Sears Tower, is the tallest building in the city. Currently, it stands as third tallest in the country behind the World Trade Center and Central Park Tower. The Skydeck on the 103rd floor consists of five glass boxes that stick out from the side of the building. The elevators are among the fastest in the world operating as fast as 1,600 feet per minute. On a clear day, four states are visible from the Skydeck: Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, and Wisconsin.
chicago style bridges | 1902
Joseph Strauss
Style: Trunnion Bascule
Chicago is home to 37 operational drawbridges, which is the most of any city in the US and second in the world only to Amsterdam. Most contemporary bridges on our tour are double leaf trunnion bascule bridges, meaning two pieces lift at the center. Trunnion bascule is French for “pivot point seesaw,” meaning the bridges open and close with a counterweight. There is a counterweight for each leaf of the bridge, which is raised and lowered using a 180 horsepower engine. Strauss, the engineer behind Chicago’s bridges, also designed the Golden Gate Bridge.
Sales Force building | 2023
Pelli Clarke Architects
Style: Contemporary
The last of the new towers built at Wolf Point and the only commercial/office building of the trio. It stands as the tallest office building at Wolf Point. The top two floors are ‘Ohana Floors – spaces for employees and their guests to enjoy during the day and available for local nonprofits to host fundraising events at no cost. ‘Ohana Floors around the world have helped raise more than $108 million for local communities.
Number 55 | 1968
CF Murphy Associates
Style: Brutalism
The one obvious example of brutalism on the river, 55 W Wacker shows off the dark and industrial concrete and heavy materials typical in the Brutalist style. Emotion brutalism is meant to evoke. Many government buildings were designed in this style during the Cold War era. It is currently home to BlueCross BlueShield of Illinois and the Taipei Economic and Cultural Representative Office, as well as some residential units.
Leo Burnett Building | 1989
Kevin Roche, John Dinkeloo & Associates and Shaw & Associates
Style: Contemporary
The Leo Burnett Building was built to house the powerhouse advertising agency. To create more space for corner offices it is known for its protruding corners and unique black and gray pixelated coloring.Their slogan, “Big ideas come from big black pencils,” was the inspiration for the dark exterior. Leo Burnett has created many known brand mascots like: Tony The Tiger, Charlie The Tuna, Pillsbury Doughboy, Keebler Elves, Toucan Sam, the Malboro Man, and more.
Carbide & Carbon Building | 1929
Burnham Brothers
Style: Art Deco
Designed by the sons of Daniel Burnham, this building was believed to resemble a bottle of champagne. The green and terracotta resembles the green glass of a champagne bottle. The real 24k gold leaf on top represents the foil around the cork, it is 1/5000 of an inch thick. It is currently home to Pendry Hotel Chicago. The roof is home to a new rooftop bar, Chateau Carbide serving cocktails and small plates.
TRibune Tower | 1925
Goettsch Partners
Style: French Gothic Revival
Tribune Tower was built as the winning design from a competition hosted by the owner of the Chicago Tribune, covered in pieces of stone and other building materials from architectural marvels and important buildings around the world. The fragments embedded into the exterior come from 150 structures: The Great Wall of China, Parliament House in the UK, The Taj Mahal, The White House, etc.
Apple Store | 2017
Lord Norman Foster
Style: Contemporary
With a sleek and simple design the Apple Store is a testament to the technological fascination and dependency of our modern world. The rood was designed to intentionally resemble a MacBook laptop or iPad. The store cost $27 million to build, but went for sale at $170 million in 2018.
NBC Tower | 1989
Adrian Smith
Style: Postmodernism
Modeled after NBC’s headquarters, Rockefeller Center, this is one of the truest productions of the Art Deco style using modern materials. This studio is where every season of Jerry Springer was shot until 2009. Steve Harvey also taped here from 2012-2017. Currently, The Judge Mathis show is currently recorded here at NBC Tower.
John Hancock | 1969
Bruce Graham & Dr. Fazlur Kahn
Style: Black Box Modernism
How can a 54-story building stand safely on top of a 39 foot-wide base? Caissons, giant reinforced concrete columns, are driven all the way to the bedrock, which in this swampy spot is 160 feet below ground. These caissons then rise all the way to the top of the building. The base only utilizes twenty percent of the site. Why so narrow? To allow for a city-mandated plaza on the river’s edge, and to accommodate railroad tracks on the other side of the lot.
Aqua | 2009
Studio Gang Architects
Style: Contemporary
Jeanne Gang’s first skyscraper features unique balconies on every floor in various shapes and widths. These balconies maximize views, shade units from the sun, direct airflow, and prevent fatal bird accidents. It is rare for a building to have balconies higher than 60 stories because of wind conditions, but Aqua’s flowing shape allows for comfortable outdoor living all the way up to the top, the 82nd floor.
St Regis | 2020
Studio Gang Architects
Style: Contemporary
Completed in 2020, the St. Regis is the newest supertall skyscraper in Chicago. It is the tallest building in the world designed by a woman: Jeanne Gang and her firm, it offers high-end condos and a newly opened hotel on the lower 12 floors. The tower uses three anti-sway techniques: inertial slosh dampers, bundled tubes, and a blow through floor.
Lake Point Tower | 1968
Schipporeit & Heinrich
Style: Curvilinear Modernism
This fidget spinner-shaped icon on the lakefront was one of the first curvaceous buildings ever constructed! New glass and steel technologies in the 1960s allowed for its Y-shaped exterior, which delivers unobstructed views of the water. Lake Point Tower has been home to many famous Chicagoans including Scottie Pippen, Sammy Sosa, Alice Cooper, and Tom Cruise.
Charles Sumner Frost
Style: Modernism / Brutalism
In 1916, it was intended to be used as a dock for freight vessels, passenger traffic, and indoor and outdoor recreation. In 1917 to 1918, the Pier was used as barracks for WWI recruits and housed regiments of soldiers, Red Cross workers, and units for Home Defense. The U.S. military used the pier for pilot training orientation in 1941. After WWII, the Pier became the campus for University of Illinois at Chicago. Today, it is home to numerous shops, collection of eateries, the Chicago Children’s Museum, the Centennial Ferris Wheel, Chicago Shakespeare Theater, and event spaces.
Chicago Locks | 1938
US Army Corps of Engineers
In 1900, Chicago successfully reversed the flow of the Chicago River. With the completion of the Sanitary and Ship Canal, the water of the Chicago River now flows south to the Mississippi, away from the river’s natural mouth at Lake Michigan. This allowed for precious freshwater from the glacier-created Great Lakes to flow uninterrupted into the Gulf of Mexico. After the canal was complete, other Great Lakes states and Canada pursued legal action to help control how much freshwater was coming out of Lake Michigan each day. The lock system is one chamber, 600 feet long, and free for commercial and recreational use. Today, Lake Michigan can average 5-6 feet higher than the Chicago River, so the lock is also used for flood prevention.
Chicago Flag | 1917
Wallace Rice
The design of the Chicago flag reflects its history and geography. The Chicago City Council adopted the flag on April 4, 1917. There was a contest for the design of the flag which Rice’s design was chosen. The top blue stripe of the flag represents Lake Michigan and the north branch of the Chicago River. This leaves the bottom blue stripe to represent the south branch of the river and the Great Canal. The first two stars were added in 1917, the first star was for Fort Dearborn and the second symbolizes the Great Chicago Fire. In 1933 and 1939, the third and final star was added. The last two stars to complete the design of Chicago’s flag represent the two world’s fairs that took place in Chicago.
