that shot with calatrava and the building from the ground looking up is cool.
BOTS, no offense intended. mostly just reacting to the bomb-shelter-for-freedom tower that childs has gifted the city of NY.
funny, as i was writing this a short piece showing the very work in question came on the tele, including a cameo by liebeskind and hadid in milan and others...made national news in part cuz of trump's disparagement, so gotta thank trump for acting stupid (it's gotta be an act, right?).
jump - was that the abcnews report?
Did you notive they spelled Calatrava ...Kalatrava.
It's like they didn't even bother.
That and they called one of Libeskind's works, modest, because the building is a bent shape appearing to bow. hilarious
yeah, it was. i get like 15 minutes of english tv news here every day round breakfast and that was part of today's bit.
the spelling mistake was sad, and the commentary was as you say weak. but i was happy to see it anyway. something i could show my wife and ask her what she thinks, sort of thing. since she is not particulalry interested in architecture its good to have a bit of architecture-lite out there.
this whole twisting thing realy seems to be in vogue at the moment and is calatravas preocupation of the moment. also about the gerkin by foster aren't all the windows faling off and the area underneath cordoned off something to do with the live loads on the facade weren't factored in to its design?
The sales center opened yesterday so I walked down there - option contracts while not officially available seem to be getting bid up - theres only 220 units avail for purchase. While I was in there I watched a couple Japanese business types filling out the forms to get on the list. There may be interest after all, not just from the Chicago area, maybe second homes or international corporate apartments.
Bots - the 2 pics of the developers other towers the Fordahm and the Pinnicle - while not terribly interesting to us architects, are very successful residential towers. I looked at them with disdain until walking through the model units - I could get very comfy in one if I had the cash....try it out - 15 east Hourn st., ground floor sales center.
It's interesting that this building is going to be a residential tower... Apparently Calatrava wasn't concerned that the height would make it a target for terrorism because he sees a residential tower as a completely different animal from a world trade center in nyc...
Also, the twisting form is structural, a means of diverting the heavy wind loads, it was tested in a wind tunnel...
Also, the form has an advantage of creating opportunities for balconies for some of the residential units that a box tower wouldn't....
Say what you will about calatrava as a form driven designer, but his forms are not dumb... He is pretty clever in using structural smarts to drive his self expression... He is pretty good at finding elegant forms that can be accommodated within modern day technology... This is more than can be said of many starchitects who create purely sculptural forms which are in bold conflict with economic and political constraints, or who bend over to accommodate economic forces, sacrifice design aspirations, and give in and produce something 'dumb' but that is good enough, that is sufficient to meet some minimal needs for the developer.
Lets assume that architecture can still be in the business of innovation, pushing boundaries... What good is a starcharchitect who doesn't have the balls or intelligence to come up with something innovative and technically innovative, and to be able to fend for their design with smart arguments in the face of challenges?
By comparison to this tower, I think SOM's freedom tower is well, dumber, less innovative, and supported by more BS...
Yo, so, reports out in the news in chicago today that the City OKd the zoning changes, and fordham tower has the green light.
Anyone else hear anything new about this? on the news they were saying they are saying completion is set for 2011
although all of calatrava's work seems to be a personal trek of making his sculptures into buildings, this is not that bad, and what are skyscrapers if not sculpture.
what sickens me, however, is the fact that given this guy's obvious "media darling" status, he chose sculpture over technological innovation, something piano or foster would have done. not saying those two are amazing designers, i'll let others subjectively place opinions on who they like or dislike.
what i am saying is that he had a choice and chose form over function as he always does. if he is such an innovator, i wish he would leave his comfort zone and really push innovation somewhere besides allusion.
if you haven't already, check this out: it is relevent.
although all of calatrava's work seems to be a personal trek of making his sculptures into buildings, this is not that bad, and what are skyscrapers if not sculpture.
what sickens me, however, is the fact that given this guy's obvious "media darling" status, he chose sculpture over technological innovation, something piano or foster would have done. not saying those two are amazing designers, i'll let others subjectively place opinions on who they like or dislike.
he chose form over function as he always does. i wish he would leave his comfort zone and really push innovation somewhere besides allusion.
if you haven't already, check this out: it is relevent.
i agree with you that calatrava has definetly chosen form over function, and yes, it would be nice if he would be willing to push his comfort zone and innovate. This is all true, i do however think this is project is a great opportunity for chicago to make a statement that it is willing to take risks and begin to establish itself as architecturally significant in this age. Even if this project is motivated by formal ambitions, i fail to see why this is a problem, and why formal investigation is less beatiful than pragmatic technologic investigation. $550,000,000 high rise condos are never going to be able to innovate beyond acceptable developer risk. its unfortunate, but true im afraid
"formal investigation is less beatiful than pragmatic technologic investigation"
I am curious, why? Form, to me, translates directly into experience - something that people can really understand. Technological innovation does not necessarily do that (although it certainly can) and it can be as gratuituos as sculpture making.
moda - man, there are some hideous winners in that competition!! I am certainly glad none of those will be built - anywhere!! Good example of "Ok, so yeah, that's interesting, but God, it's UGLY!!!". World has enough ugly things, lets not build ugly things that actually have logic involved.
good points all around. however, the post was aimed at the "state of the art" here. where calatrava continually emphasizes allusions to birds and drill bits, the winners of that competition (again ugly is subjective. i agree on a few disagree on others) took time to study and reflect on the urban condition, which, in the end, is what skyscrapers should(?) do. and yes, market forces are not present in competitions, but the ideas are worth thinking about.
as far as the ugly crap being built in chicago right now, it's definitely a change for the better. at least until we see more development in the design.
I hear ya, moda. It's those blobby things that perplex me. Looks like Lynn (the others escape my mind...thankfully) 5 years ago. Now, i am not going to pretend to understand the methodology that went into the structure analysis (at least that's what one looked like) as we can't see or read, but I have a hard time appreciating any kind of architecture that I don't like the way it looks. Shallow, maybe, but I can't help but think "yeah, great idea, but..."
C's skyscrapers are at least a little different and they are (hopefully) going to be built in the US. I think Foster's investigations are more interesting, by far, but he's yet to build them here (probably because the only thing driving C's buildings is "ok, how many square feet? Ooooo, big $$$$!").
At least big devs here are appreciating some better designs and not resorting to Trump's (although there are some better ones going up) ugly crap.
What is "choosing technology over form"? As if the "high tech architects" are not form driven, or produce forms that are somehow more objective...
Okay, to play the devils advocate: there may be forms that are partly driven by external forces like wind loads-- foster's swiss reinsurance hq, and this building as well-- but ultimately buildings are formal... and they do "say" something as well, don't they? a building that is functional, that "works" ultimately is subject to many factors, one of the moss critical being the market... Apart from pushing the technological envelope, a successful and functional building should speak to people, it must be economically sustainable as well... People have to like it, so aesthetic form, whether it comes from, I don't care if its a birds ass or a corkscrew whatever, if the external idea generator planted a seed, led to a better building, that resulted in something new that people like (even if they don't have a clue where it came from), that works better, then that is a successful architecture...
Speaking of calitrava, his work is as much scientific as it is artistic... his work is obviously formal, but it is often an expression of structural forces, loads, the bending moment, etc. In that way, the form is very much driven by function, he's very different from say gehry in that the structural members are very rational, the guy is both an architect and a structural engineer, he wrote a phd thesis on the "foldability of spaceframes"... while his structures seem to be anthropomorphic, they are structurally innovative, organic in caltrava's work is always structurally sound, not just blobby...
I generally like this tower. The thing that bothers me about all the images is that none show the context as it will be when trump's monstrosity is finished in a couple years. Speaking of marring the Chicago skyline... yeesh. Not to mention fucking up the river views up in north loop...
Right now I think Calatrava's tower anchors the skyline nicely. But when Trump's goes up I am not sure. I would like to see something overlaid with the two--maybe I'll do that if I get a moment.
"Even if this project is motivated by formal ambitions, i fail to see why this is a problem, and why formal investigation is less beatiful than pragmatic technologic investigation."
so i wasnt saying that formal investigation is less beautiful, i was in fact asking why moda felt formal invesitgation was not as legitimate as technologic investigation.
i agree with you that technologic innovation can often time be lost in translation, and if you look at many 'high tech' project that claim to be pushing some sort of structural or technological boundry, they are often times designing in the same way a formal investigation might be carried out. I have seen plenty of high tech projects that have forced structural solutions for the sake of using it...
i think that drill bit is h.o.t. and i hope it goes up big time...with antenna.
every time i pass the trump thing i shudder involuntarily. it is so horrible. its like no one made any decisions about it at all. i wonder if the CDs just said 'insert default skyscraper as needed.' yick.
Trump really chump'd us. Remember back in 2002/03 when the show was hot and everyone was praising this slimeball? He was "changing the face" of real estate in Chicago. They act like hes the one who made our city desireable to live in as if the Illini tribe were camped here untill he came along.
The only thing I can say about the chump chicago is that I wish it was more reflective and less not - the only thing its got going for it is its angles relative to the grid could provide some interesting reflections.
The new screw looks a little more broad-shouldered than the previous encarnation, but I am really happy to not see a hilton parking lot caught at its base like toilet paper on the bottom of its shoes.
Having just caught up on the news that the Spire went from slender and pointy to "licorice stick", I think the new scheme is just a bad idea. So, OK, the hotel isn't going to work because you're too far from the strip. Why not just insert some other program in there, keep the original 300 units, and call it a day? I can't imagine how they can sell 1300 big money condo units, especially since many of them are going to be so far up. It seems like the developer is on an ego trip here - building that high is simply unnecessary, and philosophically, a waste of material. Maybe one day when we all have cars that fly but until then, no.
I like the antenna-less version only because the antenna seemen unnecessary in the first place. Are that many condos really needed or in demand? They should have kept the hotel, more of a destination point maybe. I'm glad they decided to bury the parking. "toilet paper on the bottom of its shoes" is an unfortunate malady of skyscrapers.
The glass on the trump tower is very 80's corporate. Ive stood on the bridges watching them install them, and for the talk about how advanced the glass is, its deformations are very annoying. At least for the East facade couldnt they have used a more stable glass? The bowing looks bad, and cheap, even though its not a cheap glass.
Also - stand on the bridge and look up. Now take the IBM building and add another one - thats the shear height this wall of 80's era curtain will rise.
That's funny, evilp, I had the same thought about the glass--that it looked really cheap and flimsy and totally 80s--and went on a long tirade about how outdated the façade *already* looked and how it reminded me of Trump's hairpiece ("everyone knows it's a weave or something but no one will say anything about it because it's Trump") and how I couldn't believe that they really were putting up such a cheaply executed, hodge-podge of a design that couldn't decide if it wanted to be a cylinder, a rectangle, or a Sears-tower-knockoff, etc etc.
...but I didn't know it was supposed to be special, advanced glass!! Oh man, that's so awful.
I like the antennae version with the thinner profile. I find the taper to be more elegant in that version, and it reaches more to the sky, which is supposed to be the point, I guess. Without that grasp toward heaven it becomes more obvious that there's no real reason for this thing to be so high--it just looks more like a stretched regular skyscraper, instead of a form created for height. (For example, see the Eiffel Tower.)
As for Trump, that's a good point about the reflectivity, crowbert. That would actually make it better, I agree. It would reflect the river beautifully, and the IBM building, etc, and be more deferential to these better designs. Far be it from Trump to be humble, however...
As for condo space, I honestly can't imagine how all the developers are going to sell all the luxury units *already* going up around town, let alone a whole new building worth of them!!! There are SO MANY buildings going up around town, it's astounding. Cranes everywhere. And they are ALL "luxury condos". Is the market really that good? I hope all the rich people move there and leave the outer neighborhoods so they become cheap enough again for us regular folks to afford.
Guys (esp. evil) I know the curtain wall on the chump is cheap 80's tinsel - I'd easily take more ladies in legwarmers than that shlock. At least people will be able to see the difference between quality and quantity in one view. The difference beween the IBM Building - I mean 330 N Wabash building - and Chump Chicago is pretty stark.
A lot of those condos are being bought as second homes, so that wealthy socialites can weekend between the bean and watertower place. This is all good until things wind up replicating The Apartment - which is when I will buy up one of those snazzy condo at divorce-court prices.
Crow/Myriam - the Trib did an article about the building a few weeks back that explained the glass - from Conn. mfr. - I will try yo find it online.
I cant see whats so special about the glass. It looks distorted. Many other recent highrises downtown have better glass - maybe its the residentail req. that dictate the "float glass" deformed look
That chump glass is just looking worse and worse - but if we can project the escapades of trumps latest "second chance" perhaps I might have a whole new opinion of it...
Speaking of the IBM building, is there any truth to the rumor that plans are underway to convert the building to condos? The mind boggles that they would even consider such a thing.
Calatrava tower for chicago... let the debate begin
I've already got an idea for the landscaping
that shot with calatrava and the building from the ground looking up is cool.
BOTS, no offense intended. mostly just reacting to the bomb-shelter-for-freedom tower that childs has gifted the city of NY.
funny, as i was writing this a short piece showing the very work in question came on the tele, including a cameo by liebeskind and hadid in milan and others...made national news in part cuz of trump's disparagement, so gotta thank trump for acting stupid (it's gotta be an act, right?).
s'all good.
It looks like the Ivory Tower from the Neverending Story:
jump - was that the abcnews report?
Did you notive they spelled Calatrava ...Kalatrava.
It's like they didn't even bother.
That and they called one of Libeskind's works, modest, because the building is a bent shape appearing to bow. hilarious
yeah, it was. i get like 15 minutes of english tv news here every day round breakfast and that was part of today's bit.
the spelling mistake was sad, and the commentary was as you say weak. but i was happy to see it anyway. something i could show my wife and ask her what she thinks, sort of thing. since she is not particulalry interested in architecture its good to have a bit of architecture-lite out there.
this whole twisting thing realy seems to be in vogue at the moment and is calatravas preocupation of the moment. also about the gerkin by foster aren't all the windows faling off and the area underneath cordoned off something to do with the live loads on the facade weren't factored in to its design?
I can taste it!!!! (It's the new Kalatravah Flavor)
haha... i like that Ants... at least now we know the true inspiration for Calatrava.
looks like calatrava designed a big 'SCREW YOU'.
could make for some good novelty t-shirts
"i screwed chicago"
i'd buy that shirt.
The sales center opened yesterday so I walked down there - option contracts while not officially available seem to be getting bid up - theres only 220 units avail for purchase. While I was in there I watched a couple Japanese business types filling out the forms to get on the list. There may be interest after all, not just from the Chicago area, maybe second homes or international corporate apartments.
Bots - the 2 pics of the developers other towers the Fordahm and the Pinnicle - while not terribly interesting to us architects, are very successful residential towers. I looked at them with disdain until walking through the model units - I could get very comfy in one if I had the cash....try it out - 15 east Hourn st., ground floor sales center.
Drilldo
Do you really not know what building it is? Come on.
An interesting discussion here, which include a nice new york times article: http://www.wirednewyork.com/forum/showthread.php?t=6813
It's interesting that this building is going to be a residential tower... Apparently Calatrava wasn't concerned that the height would make it a target for terrorism because he sees a residential tower as a completely different animal from a world trade center in nyc...
Also, the twisting form is structural, a means of diverting the heavy wind loads, it was tested in a wind tunnel...
Also, the form has an advantage of creating opportunities for balconies for some of the residential units that a box tower wouldn't....
Say what you will about calatrava as a form driven designer, but his forms are not dumb... He is pretty clever in using structural smarts to drive his self expression... He is pretty good at finding elegant forms that can be accommodated within modern day technology... This is more than can be said of many starchitects who create purely sculptural forms which are in bold conflict with economic and political constraints, or who bend over to accommodate economic forces, sacrifice design aspirations, and give in and produce something 'dumb' but that is good enough, that is sufficient to meet some minimal needs for the developer.
Lets assume that architecture can still be in the business of innovation, pushing boundaries... What good is a starcharchitect who doesn't have the balls or intelligence to come up with something innovative and technically innovative, and to be able to fend for their design with smart arguments in the face of challenges?
By comparison to this tower, I think SOM's freedom tower is well, dumber, less innovative, and supported by more BS...
does it come in flesh-colored?
Yo, so, reports out in the news in chicago today that the City OKd the zoning changes, and fordham tower has the green light.
Anyone else hear anything new about this? on the news they were saying they are saying completion is set for 2011
just found this, this report isnt as optimistic as the news casters sounded, but still, i really hope this gets built, the new model looks beautiful
although all of calatrava's work seems to be a personal trek of making his sculptures into buildings, this is not that bad, and what are skyscrapers if not sculpture.
what sickens me, however, is the fact that given this guy's obvious "media darling" status, he chose sculpture over technological innovation, something piano or foster would have done. not saying those two are amazing designers, i'll let others subjectively place opinions on who they like or dislike.
what i am saying is that he had a choice and chose form over function as he always does. if he is such an innovator, i wish he would leave his comfort zone and really push innovation somewhere besides allusion.
if you haven't already, check this out: it is relevent.
http://www.evolo-arch.com/
although all of calatrava's work seems to be a personal trek of making his sculptures into buildings, this is not that bad, and what are skyscrapers if not sculpture.
what sickens me, however, is the fact that given this guy's obvious "media darling" status, he chose sculpture over technological innovation, something piano or foster would have done. not saying those two are amazing designers, i'll let others subjectively place opinions on who they like or dislike.
he chose form over function as he always does. i wish he would leave his comfort zone and really push innovation somewhere besides allusion.
if you haven't already, check this out: it is relevent.
http://www.evolo-arch.com/
i agree with you that calatrava has definetly chosen form over function, and yes, it would be nice if he would be willing to push his comfort zone and innovate. This is all true, i do however think this is project is a great opportunity for chicago to make a statement that it is willing to take risks and begin to establish itself as architecturally significant in this age. Even if this project is motivated by formal ambitions, i fail to see why this is a problem, and why formal investigation is less beatiful than pragmatic technologic investigation. $550,000,000 high rise condos are never going to be able to innovate beyond acceptable developer risk. its unfortunate, but true im afraid
"formal investigation is less beatiful than pragmatic technologic investigation"
I am curious, why? Form, to me, translates directly into experience - something that people can really understand. Technological innovation does not necessarily do that (although it certainly can) and it can be as gratuituos as sculpture making.
moda - man, there are some hideous winners in that competition!! I am certainly glad none of those will be built - anywhere!! Good example of "Ok, so yeah, that's interesting, but God, it's UGLY!!!". World has enough ugly things, lets not build ugly things that actually have logic involved.
trace
good points all around. however, the post was aimed at the "state of the art" here. where calatrava continually emphasizes allusions to birds and drill bits, the winners of that competition (again ugly is subjective. i agree on a few disagree on others) took time to study and reflect on the urban condition, which, in the end, is what skyscrapers should(?) do. and yes, market forces are not present in competitions, but the ideas are worth thinking about.
as far as the ugly crap being built in chicago right now, it's definitely a change for the better. at least until we see more development in the design.
i think the yawn says it all
I hear ya, moda. It's those blobby things that perplex me. Looks like Lynn (the others escape my mind...thankfully) 5 years ago. Now, i am not going to pretend to understand the methodology that went into the structure analysis (at least that's what one looked like) as we can't see or read, but I have a hard time appreciating any kind of architecture that I don't like the way it looks. Shallow, maybe, but I can't help but think "yeah, great idea, but..."
C's skyscrapers are at least a little different and they are (hopefully) going to be built in the US. I think Foster's investigations are more interesting, by far, but he's yet to build them here (probably because the only thing driving C's buildings is "ok, how many square feet? Ooooo, big $$$$!").
At least big devs here are appreciating some better designs and not resorting to Trump's (although there are some better ones going up) ugly crap.
What is "choosing technology over form"? As if the "high tech architects" are not form driven, or produce forms that are somehow more objective...
Okay, to play the devils advocate: there may be forms that are partly driven by external forces like wind loads-- foster's swiss reinsurance hq, and this building as well-- but ultimately buildings are formal... and they do "say" something as well, don't they? a building that is functional, that "works" ultimately is subject to many factors, one of the moss critical being the market... Apart from pushing the technological envelope, a successful and functional building should speak to people, it must be economically sustainable as well... People have to like it, so aesthetic form, whether it comes from, I don't care if its a birds ass or a corkscrew whatever, if the external idea generator planted a seed, led to a better building, that resulted in something new that people like (even if they don't have a clue where it came from), that works better, then that is a successful architecture...
Speaking of calitrava, his work is as much scientific as it is artistic... his work is obviously formal, but it is often an expression of structural forces, loads, the bending moment, etc. In that way, the form is very much driven by function, he's very different from say gehry in that the structural members are very rational, the guy is both an architect and a structural engineer, he wrote a phd thesis on the "foldability of spaceframes"... while his structures seem to be anthropomorphic, they are structurally innovative, organic in caltrava's work is always structurally sound, not just blobby...
I generally like this tower. The thing that bothers me about all the images is that none show the context as it will be when trump's monstrosity is finished in a couple years. Speaking of marring the Chicago skyline... yeesh. Not to mention fucking up the river views up in north loop...
Right now I think Calatrava's tower anchors the skyline nicely. But when Trump's goes up I am not sure. I would like to see something overlaid with the two--maybe I'll do that if I get a moment.
trace,
i said...
"Even if this project is motivated by formal ambitions, i fail to see why this is a problem, and why formal investigation is less beatiful than pragmatic technologic investigation."
so i wasnt saying that formal investigation is less beautiful, i was in fact asking why moda felt formal invesitgation was not as legitimate as technologic investigation.
i agree with you that technologic innovation can often time be lost in translation, and if you look at many 'high tech' project that claim to be pushing some sort of structural or technological boundry, they are often times designing in the same way a formal investigation might be carried out. I have seen plenty of high tech projects that have forced structural solutions for the sake of using it...
well now, its been updated
http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/chi-0612070161dec07,1,5249446.story?coll=chi-news-hed
whats everyone think about it.
on first glance i feel like the new tower meets the ground more convincingly but im definetly not sold on the top of the tower. it dies on me there.
the developer says construction is still scheduled to begin in spring-summer of '07
i really hope this gets built, along with the aqua tower, these could be two of the most exciting highrises done in the states lately
tribune poll: which do you prefer? drillbit with antennae or drillbit without antennae?
i think that drill bit is h.o.t. and i hope it goes up big time...with antenna.
every time i pass the trump thing i shudder involuntarily. it is so horrible. its like no one made any decisions about it at all. i wonder if the CDs just said 'insert default skyscraper as needed.' yick.
Trump really chump'd us. Remember back in 2002/03 when the show was hot and everyone was praising this slimeball? He was "changing the face" of real estate in Chicago. They act like hes the one who made our city desireable to live in as if the Illini tribe were camped here untill he came along.
he's got a pretty strong portfolio of ugly buildings, that's for sure.
unfortunately (or fortunately, depending on how you look at it) he sells them wherever he builds them.
Can't say I particularly care for either of Calatrava's buildings, but the drill bit with antennae looks more elegant, I think.
The only thing I can say about the chump chicago is that I wish it was more reflective and less not - the only thing its got going for it is its angles relative to the grid could provide some interesting reflections.
The new screw looks a little more broad-shouldered than the previous encarnation, but I am really happy to not see a hilton parking lot caught at its base like toilet paper on the bottom of its shoes.
Having just caught up on the news that the Spire went from slender and pointy to "licorice stick", I think the new scheme is just a bad idea. So, OK, the hotel isn't going to work because you're too far from the strip. Why not just insert some other program in there, keep the original 300 units, and call it a day? I can't imagine how they can sell 1300 big money condo units, especially since many of them are going to be so far up. It seems like the developer is on an ego trip here - building that high is simply unnecessary, and philosophically, a waste of material. Maybe one day when we all have cars that fly but until then, no.
And the pointy one just looks better.
I like the antenna-less version only because the antenna seemen unnecessary in the first place. Are that many condos really needed or in demand? They should have kept the hotel, more of a destination point maybe. I'm glad they decided to bury the parking. "toilet paper on the bottom of its shoes" is an unfortunate malady of skyscrapers.
Crow-
The glass on the trump tower is very 80's corporate. Ive stood on the bridges watching them install them, and for the talk about how advanced the glass is, its deformations are very annoying. At least for the East facade couldnt they have used a more stable glass? The bowing looks bad, and cheap, even though its not a cheap glass.
Also - stand on the bridge and look up. Now take the IBM building and add another one - thats the shear height this wall of 80's era curtain will rise.
...now if we could only get the entire building to spin like a windside
That's funny, evilp, I had the same thought about the glass--that it looked really cheap and flimsy and totally 80s--and went on a long tirade about how outdated the façade *already* looked and how it reminded me of Trump's hairpiece ("everyone knows it's a weave or something but no one will say anything about it because it's Trump") and how I couldn't believe that they really were putting up such a cheaply executed, hodge-podge of a design that couldn't decide if it wanted to be a cylinder, a rectangle, or a Sears-tower-knockoff, etc etc.
...but I didn't know it was supposed to be special, advanced glass!! Oh man, that's so awful.
I like the antennae version with the thinner profile. I find the taper to be more elegant in that version, and it reaches more to the sky, which is supposed to be the point, I guess. Without that grasp toward heaven it becomes more obvious that there's no real reason for this thing to be so high--it just looks more like a stretched regular skyscraper, instead of a form created for height. (For example, see the Eiffel Tower.)
As for Trump, that's a good point about the reflectivity, crowbert. That would actually make it better, I agree. It would reflect the river beautifully, and the IBM building, etc, and be more deferential to these better designs. Far be it from Trump to be humble, however...
As for condo space, I honestly can't imagine how all the developers are going to sell all the luxury units *already* going up around town, let alone a whole new building worth of them!!! There are SO MANY buildings going up around town, it's astounding. Cranes everywhere. And they are ALL "luxury condos". Is the market really that good? I hope all the rich people move there and leave the outer neighborhoods so they become cheap enough again for us regular folks to afford.
Guys (esp. evil) I know the curtain wall on the chump is cheap 80's tinsel - I'd easily take more ladies in legwarmers than that shlock. At least people will be able to see the difference between quality and quantity in one view. The difference beween the IBM Building - I mean 330 N Wabash building - and Chump Chicago is pretty stark.
A lot of those condos are being bought as second homes, so that wealthy socialites can weekend between the bean and watertower place. This is all good until things wind up replicating The Apartment - which is when I will buy up one of those snazzy condo at divorce-court prices.
That's the plan anyway...
its cool.. seems like it will be a lot of fun to build...
Crow/Myriam - the Trib did an article about the building a few weeks back that explained the glass - from Conn. mfr. - I will try yo find it online.
I cant see whats so special about the glass. It looks distorted. Many other recent highrises downtown have better glass - maybe its the residentail req. that dictate the "float glass" deformed look
meta thats cool. Even today.
That chump glass is just looking worse and worse - but if we can project the escapades of trumps latest "second chance" perhaps I might have a whole new opinion of it...
i really got bored of his architecture
Speaking of the IBM building, is there any truth to the rumor that plans are underway to convert the building to condos? The mind boggles that they would even consider such a thing.
didn't hear anything about it... but now that you mention it... consider my mind boggled...
Block this user
Are you sure you want to block this user and hide all related comments throughout the site?
Archinect
This is your first comment on Archinect. Your comment will be visible once approved.