Archinect - News

The imposing Bertrand Goldberg-designed Marina City Towers star in Jordan Peele's 'spiritual' Candyman remake

2021-11-04T19:22:00-04:00

The new film, co-written and produced by Jordan Peele and directed by Nia DaCosta, needed a backdrop for the home of one of the characters (played by Rebecca Spence). Production designer Cara Brower knew the perfect place where a design-obsessed art critic would live: the modernist masterpiece that is Marina City on the Chicago River.

Like the original, the movie is set in the notorious Cabrini-Green housing project that has become synonymous with both the city’s South Side and the inhumane forms of low-income housing that dominated the era. Candyman creator Clive Barker said he selected Chicago for the adaptation in part because of his interest in disparate architecture as a symbol of inequality. Director Jordan Peele was able to recreate the demolished structures through a series of 3D replicas created by an Australian VFX studio called Rising Sun Pictures.

Peele picked Bertrand Goldberg's 1960s residential towers in a possible homage to the blaxploitation period classic Three the Hard Way (1974). The new film features a biting critique of commercial art galleries’ long-established role in gentrification as well as a few nice wide-angle shots of Willis Tower (formerly Sears Tower) and some of The Loop’s more important architectural landmarks.

Marina City balconies off-limits to residents during prolonged repair work: 'Summer Bummer'

2016-07-11T15:36:00-04:00

It’s shaping up to be one bummer of a summer for Marina City, where some residents have been banned from their balconies. City inspectors discovered trouble with nearly 2,000 balcony railings [...] While crews work to fix 1,920 handrail posts, 1,300 balusters and 1,020 bottom rails, some residents have been banned from using the balconies for four months or longer. [...] “What’s worse is that we’re not allowed to open the door to the balcony to let the breeze in.”

The iconic Marina City towers—now officially a city landmark—recently in the Archinect news:

Chicago's Marina City designated official landmark status — it's about time!

2016-02-12T15:22:00-05:00

...it's tempting to turn cartwheels over the Chicago City Council's vote to grant permanent landmark status to Marina City, the city within a city best known for its iconic corncob-shaped towers. Marina City was a landmark building that lacked official landmark status and was therefore vulnerable — if not to demolition, then to insensitive additions that chipped away at the sculpted beauty of its curving concrete.

Since the process began last July, Chicago City Council unanimously voted 48-0 (with the absence of two aldermen) to designate Bertrand Goldberg's midcentury icon as a historic city landmark as of Wednesday, according to Loop North News.

"Ald. Brendan Reilly, 42nd, deserves credit for championing the protection of Marina City..." Blair Kamin writes in the Chicago Tribune. "Yet it can't be forgotten that Reilly in 2012 supported the demolition of the Goldberg-designed Prentice Women's Hospital, a building that lacked Marina City's picture-postcard appeal but was nonetheless worth saving because of its boldly engineered concrete shell structure and humanistic interior. In a sense, Prentice died so that Marina could live."

Previous news on this topic:

Only one vote left before Marina City can become official city landmark

2015-11-10T12:50:00-05:00

[On Thursday, November 5], the Commission on Chicago Landmarks unanimously voted to recommend Chicago Landmark status to the Marina City complex. [...] A resolution will be drafted and will head to the Chicago City Council in December for a final vote.

This seems like a done deal. As quoted in Loop North News, Commission on Chicago Landmarks chairman, Rafael Leon: "everybody recognizes those buildings around the world, that the moment that they see it, they see Chicago. I’m so glad that we have gotten to the point of designating these buildings as landmarks.”

For the lead-up to Marina City's landmark status:

Chicago's famed Marina City seems destined for landmark status

2015-10-16T12:40:00-04:00

Marina City residents support landmark designation because it would help upgrade the complex's concrete exterior through the city's "Adopt a Landmark" zoning provision [...] The measure lets developers build more floor space in return for funding improvements to official city landmarks. Landmark status would allow the Commission on Chicago Landmarks to regulate changes to the exterior of Marina City

Marina City, aka "the corncobs," was given preliminary landmark status back in July. The designation is expected to become official in early 2016.

Chicago's iconic Marina City could be headed for landmark status

2015-07-10T19:15:00-04:00

Marina City, the iconic Chicago riverfront complex famed for its corncob-shaped towers, could soon be on the way to becoming an official city landmark. [...] Goldberg's design, a poetic expression in concrete that combined residential, commercial and entertainment uses to form a "city within a city," is one of the most recognizable images on the Chicago skyline.

Other Goldberg buildings in Chicago weren't so lucky: the Prentice Women's Hospital could not be saved from the wrecking ball — despite enormous public outcry.