Archinect - News

Chicago releases updated designs of the 'Revive the Drive' lakefront project

2023-03-31T18:57:00-04:00

The groups behind Chicago’s planned overhaul of a key portion of the iconic Lakeshore Drive have revealed the latest renderings of a project that’s set to add much-needed protective barriers and green space along the city’s Lake Michigan shoreline.

The non-profit news platform Block Club Chicago has the latest details on the "Redefine the Drive" plan, which will take shape over the coming years through a series of community engagement meetings expected to reconvene in the fall.

Image courtesy Illinois Department of Transportation & Chicago Department of Transportation

While a final design plan hasn't been confirmed, renders shared by the Illinois Department of Transportation (IDOT) and Chicago Department of Transportation (CDOT) aim to "help Chicagoans 'better understand the characteristics' of park, lakefront, pedestrian, and bike space expansions that would be universal to any final plan," reports Mack Liederman of Block Club Chicago.

Image courtesy Illinois Department of Transpo...

Send your ideas to the 2016 Chicago Prize “On the Edge” competition

2016-12-05T19:45:00-05:00

Visionary plans, policy, and infrastructure have all played crucial roles in the development of the city and consequently in the definition of its edge. Today, conflicting interests regarding ownership, use, and value of the Lakefront have produced a stalemate of what this civic treasure could become.

A hotspot for land-use disputes, the urban development of Chicago's Lakefront is the subject of the 2016 Chicago Prize competition, "On the Edge”. Launched on November 29 by the Chicago Architectural Club and the Chicago Architecture Foundation, the competition seeks speculative architectural interventions for the Lakefront “in consideration of the stated issues that imagine and speculate its scape” — as exemplified in recent situations like the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art, the Barack H. Obama Presidential Library, or the impacts of Lake Shore Drive.

The Chicago Lakefront. Photo: Payton Chung/Flickr.

The CAC asks: “Would new strategies of zoning recharge this long strip of stand-alone city-land? Can architectural interventions function as a framework for the excitation of the edge? How will the collision of the metropolis and the lake create a radical emergence of the unimaginable?”

There is no set program for this competition. A Question-and-Answer period is open now until December ...

Embattled Lucas Museum may move to S.F.'s Treasure Island

2016-05-19T13:58:00-04:00

A spokeswoman for San Francisco Supervisor Aaron Peskin confirmed that the city and museum representatives are in early discussions about a site on Treasure Island, a destination in San Francisco Bay famous for a naval base. Los Angeles is also trying to stay in the game, with Mayor Eric Garcetti saying that Lucas' project would find a good home in the heart of the movie industry.

The lawsuit averse Lucas Museum of Narrative Art, which is openly courting other cities after Chicago's Friends of the Park filed legal action to prevent the project from building on its chosen Chicago lakefront site, may wind up in San Francisco, although Los Angeles (and Waukegan, IL) have offered themselves up as well. Rahm Emanuel, who was a vocal champion of the Museum's proposed locale, recently suggested a compromise in the form of moving the museum to the Lake Michigan adjacent McCormick Place East, but no one is compromising as of yet.

The prequels to this particular saga:

Waukegan, IL: future home of the Lucas Museum?

2016-05-05T16:02:00-04:00

With the future of a Lucas Museum on Chicago's lakefront in doubt, the city of Waukegan is asking the organizers to look a little to the north. Waukegan Mayor Wayne Motley reached out to Mellody Hobson, a Chicago financial executive and the wife of "Star Wars" creator George Lucas, about locating the proposed museum featuring digital, traditional and narrative art on Waukegan's lakefront, a city spokesman said on Wednesday.

After a shake-up Tuesday wherein Chicago-based Friends of the Parks (which was taking a 30-day break from suing to prevent the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art from being built) announced that it wasn't going to budge on its anti-LMNA position, George Lucas announced that he was seriously considering other locations. According to the Chicago Tribune Lucas' wife, Mellody Hobson, noted that "this process has been co-opted and hijacked by a small special interest group." On Thursday, The Chicago Tribune reported that Mayor Rahm Emanuel asked his Law Department Wednesday afternoon to ask a federal appeals court to reject the Friends of the Parks case before it is tried. Could the force be with the industrial shoreline of Waukegan, Illinois, population 90K?

You can conquer the box-office, but stakeholder groups are a whole different echelon:

Chicago Architecture Biennial participants announced

2015-04-14T13:30:00-04:00

The anticipated roster of over 60 architecture firms and artists who will exhibit their work in "The State of the Art of Architecture" -- the inaugural Chicago Architecture Biennial -- that debuts this October has been revealed. Biennial co-Artistic Directors Joseph Grima and Sarah Herda selected 63 participants representing more than 30 countries with a notable advisory committee that includes David Adjaye, Elizabeth Diller, Jeanne Gang, Frank Gehry, Sylvia Lavin, Hans Ulrich Obrist, Lord Peter Palumbo, and Stanley Tigerman.

Here's the growing roster:

Al Borde (Quito, Ecuador)
allzone / Rachaporn Choochuey (Bangkok, Thailand)
Andreas Angelidakis (Athens, Greece)
Andrés Jaque / Office for Political Innovation (Madrid, Spain; New York, USA)
ArandaLasch (Tucson, USA; New York, USA)
Assemble (London, UK)
Atelier Bow-Wow (Tokyo, Japan)
Iwan Baan (Amsterdam, Netherlands)
Erin Besler / Besler & Sons (Los Angeles, USA)
Tatiana Bilbao S.C. (Mexico City, Mexico)
Bjarke Ingels Group / BIG (Copenhagen,...

Chicago Architecture Biennial announces three Lakefront Kiosk teams between local architecture schools + international firms

2015-03-16T20:56:00-04:00

Preparation for the anticipated Chicago Architecture Biennial this October are already well underway. Today, the Biennial announced the three partnerships -- between local Chicago architecture schools and international firms -- who will each envision an innovative kiosk design to be realized during the Biennial. The project marks a unique collaboration between architectural industry leaders, students, schools, and citywide programs.

The three collaborative teams are: the Illinois Institute of Technology (IIT) and Pezo von Ellrichshausen, an art and architecture studio from Concepción, Chile; the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (SAIC) and the Amsterdam + Lagos-based practice NLÉ led by Kunlé Adeyemi; finally, the University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC) will work with an architectural design team comprising of Paul Andersen of Denver-based Indie Architecture as well as Paul Preissner, principal of Chicago-based Paul Preissner Architects.

If you haven't forgotten, the Lakefront K...

Chicago Architecture Biennial starts percolating with Kiosk Competition announcement

2014-12-18T19:09:00-05:00

The [Lakefront Kiosk Competition] calls for the inventive design of a new kiosk that will be installed on Chicago’s lakefront, one of the city’s most vibrant public spaces. A jury of architects, curators, and city representatives will select one winner to receive the BP Prize, which includes an honorarium for design development and a construction budget to realize the design.

The very first Chicago Architecture Biennial is gearing up for its run October 2015 - January 2016: themed "The State of the Art of Architecture", the biennial just announced its "Lakefront Kiosk Competition", to design a kiosk for use on Chicago's waterfront during and after the Biennial.

As stipulated in the brief, the kiosk must serve a commercial purpose during the summer season, and still function as "an iconic work of architecture that will attract visitors and enliven the lakefront year-round". Other than that, it's pretty open.

Part of a coordinated, broader effort with the Chicago Park District and the city's mayor, Rahm Emanuel, the competition is open to anyone, anywhere – teams can be multidisciplinary, so long as it's headed by someone with an accredited architecture degree. The jury will consist of "architects, curators and city representatives", including architects David Adjaye and Jeanne Gang.

Check out the Lakefront Kiosk Competition listing on Bustler for more inform...

George Lucas announces MAD and Studio Gang as architects for his Museum of Narrative Art in Chicago

2014-07-28T12:44:00-04:00

"Star Wars" creator George Lucas on Monday will announce an architectural team for his controversial planned museum on Chicago's lakefront: an avant-garde Chinese designer whose credits include Toronto-area skyscrapers dubbed the "Marilyn Monroe Towers" and Chicago's Jeanne Gang, shaper of the undulating Aqua Tower here.

Read our recently published interview with Ma Yansong of MAD

Winner of the 2011 Burnham Prize Competition “McCormick Place REDUX”

2011-05-02T16:25:13-04:00

Three winners and seven Honorable Mentions were recently announced for the 2011 Burnham Prize Competition “McCormick Place REDUX”. [...] The Jury awarded the First Prize to the proposal "(Toward) a Requiem" by Mohamed Sharif, Felix Monasakanian, Efren Soriano, and Teo Biocina from Los Angeles; the Second Prize to Srdan Nad from Ljubljana, Slovenia; and the Third Prize to PATH, Matt Hutchinson and Brandon Pace.

Hosted by the Chicago Architectural Club and co-sponsored by the Chicago chapter of the American Institute of Architects and Landmarks Illinois, this year’s competition is intended to examine the controversial origins and questionable future of the McCormick Place East Building, the 1971 modernist convention hall designed by Gene Summers of C.F. Murphy Associates and sited along the lakefront in Chicago's Burnham Park.