I have a personal interest in Krueck and Sexton(formerly Olsen)'s penthouse that was on the market last year and apparently sold last February. I spent a lot of time in the place, and am hoping that whoever bought it didn't/isn't planning to gut it. The interior is honestly a masterpiece of the firm's work.
that 469 west huron building is directly across the street from my office. we have been debating for over a year if they were actually going to build anything there or if the market was going to keep it down. they had a double-wide sales center on the lot, until it was dismantled and taken away last month (a source of entertainment for our office for a few days). they were on site today removing an old generator from the sub-station that is adjacent to the lot.
liberty, i can ask one of my bosses tomorrow. he used to work for k+s and is still on good terms with ron kruek, so he might know something.
evilp, this is the truth: I dated one of the sons of the owners of the penthouse, and stayed there the summer I was working for Krueck & Olsen in an internship arranged by the bf's parents.
Thanks ArchiTed. I'm just curious. The views from the space were amazing, so I can easily imagine someone tearing out all Krueck's work just to have the real estate, but I think that would be a shame and a huge loss.
My bf's parents were absolutely lovely, kind, generous people. Royalty, in the best sense of that word. And, patrons of great architecture by a young, upcoming firm - what could be better?!
Hey no slights intended here, that is great! I've been involved in a project for the family before and thoroughly enjoyed it (though to clarify, I have never met them)
i just got back from a meeting that i was with my boss at, and asked him about the crowns. he worked for K+S long after that project was complete, but for the 4 years he was there he worked for the crown family on numerous projects and re-doing work in their penthouse quite a bit (glass floors, $300 SF silk curtains, etc.) and he absolutely loved them. he said they were flat-out some of the nicest people he has ever met and he thoroughly enjoyed working for them. he didn't know that they had passed away (he hasn't worked for K+S for probably 10 years), so he didn't realize that the penthouse had been sold and he didn't know the condition of the existing space at this time.
Make - theres definately the unresolved part - Its like it's in progress. the massing created by the glass sides sort of overpower the top font and the seperation from retail to garage to living spaces seems too bulky however in the big render it looks better.
The AIA Chicago job board is down to one listing. I remember when I was looking in early 2007 there were several pages of listings. I guess the odds for people looking for work are worse than winning the Lotto. I remember a conversation with some professors at U of I (the original mother ship campus in Urbana) that this year they are graduating the largest class of gradates and undergrads ever. I hope every one is holding on to there money. I feel sorry for those recent grads who will have to suffer a huge ego adjustment right away.
Good news oil is going back up so the international clientele in OPEC will be, a little more, flush with cash. Who knew way back in our undergrad days that Architecture would become such a volatile global industry?
Are there folks out there who are giving up looking for work with AE firms?
Please don’t be offended by my take on Linda Richman from Kauffe tawlk.
I'm a little farklempt! About this whole economy business. Talk amongst yourselves. Here's a topic:
If you can’t get a job in the Architecture business what will you do? Discuss.
And if you to stack parts, then have them work in plan. The perimeter of the building shouldn't be flush. It should stick out and push in. It should create a volume, that's where there's a dialogue between solid and void. It doesn't do that. It's flat.
The Kinzie side us looked like meat packing district with loading docks and warehouses. The Wells side is about movement with the L and the traffic headed downtown. The building is static. It looks like it could anywhere. I dunno.
I hear you - Its a could have been (yet another) however I think it will do better than Flair - it has a cip concrete structure with exposed columns, glass exterior ( that may or may not be a dog ) so in that sense I will give it a slightly high C or extremely low B depending on how it turns out.
Flair gets a D unless it's satreet level retail is extraordinary than I say C-
That thing west of Orleans by the riever just Fails
You're right, static can work as well. I don't see it here. This facade could have been anywhere. It would have cool if the composition turned the corner. Look at the building under construction at Van Buren and Wells. It uses dark glass contrasted with light-colored concrete to create a dialogue of opposites that flows horizontally. The concrete is has a lip that creates a border and gives it volume without a lot of massing. It does a lot with a little. That's the mark of someone who's grappling with the problem at hand rather than really bored and quickly sketching out an unresolved solution such as this one. I don't have any pictures of the Van Buren building.
To most Americans it came as news:
To show your disrespect you throw your shoes
Directly at the guy you're disrespecting
(When shoes are not at all what he's expecting).
Should this catch on here in the U.S.A.,
It's possible George Bush should stay away
From, say, New Orleans. Otherwise, I'd posit,
He'd see more shoes than in Imelda's closet.
update - the stalled hotel at LaSalle and superior seems to be active again - the spray on insulation company wrapped the open floors and appears to be fire proofing. There is life!
Cool pic from Chicagoist of the amtrak / airline junction near 16th st. I love how the South Loop is starting to get it's own skyline. That coupled with it's proximity to real neighborhoods like Taylor St / Pilsen / Chinatown / Bport makes me think the near southside has a really exciting future ahead of it despite the naysayers. Theres so much potential there and at one point that really was the soul of the city. Most of it razed in the 50 and 60's. Just think how cool the south loop would be today with west loop style warehouses even larger than the ones on the west side since the south loop was the primary shipping point well into the 30 /40s. Anyways, I love how that area is slowly comming together. I almost think it's the protypical 21st century urban model. Sort of suburban / urban / and corridor all in one.
Kind of in the same vein, what do you guys think of the Roosevelt collection near the Target and Roosevelt Red Line stop. I was just in the area last week, the project seems to be comming along nicely. I'm really excited about how it connects the Red Line stop with all the shopping to the west and just a little further, UIC. I also think the views will be exciting from the plaza. I think it will really change the way people think of that street, it will be a destination instead of just a bridge over a wasteland.
its really hard to say... visually it might be nice but im always super skeptical of developments of that size... they are so discriminatory, they are great ways to make people money, terrible terrible ways to develop functioning neighborhoods.
I admit i havent been down there in a while so I cant comment. I will say I like the way the area is starting to fill in with shops / bars / services that make a neighborhood a hood. Lets hope the economy does'nt kill it off first.
I know what you are saying. I think the movie theater they are putting in could really help this neighborhood develop. I can see people from the are going to see a movie, which would promote atleast a restaurant or two going into the area. There is already the Whole Foods and above mentioned Target in the area, so it starts to be a little bit of a comprhensive neighborhood.
Also I give it a little slack because it is really creating a transitional neighborhood where nothing existed before, so it isn't like it is upsetting some existing condition. What I like is the idea that people might make the walk along Roosevelt now, perhaps all the way to Grant park, because if this project is succesful, it will be more approachable and human scale.
I like the concept, the architecture of the lowrises looks pretty residential anywhere USA but the tower at the north end looks freakish and cartoony. Is that the one thats stalled out about 8 floors up off congress and franklin?
Synergy - Just imagine if the old warehouses were still there - that would be far more interesting to infill between them and the irregular paths from the old rail lines. But alas the site needs to be graded and filled. I hear the soil in that area is a disaster - an amalgam of debris, rubble, railroad grade materials and sand for like 10 feet.
i agree with everything you all are saying, and this is my bleeding heart here, but this project provides amenities to people who can get them anywhere... it doesn't provide any lower or middle income families with things they ACTUALLY need... it just gives rich people another option when looking to buy a condo... yes, its better than barren land, but we could be so much more constructive with our land uses.
How do you come to that conclusion? Certainly it is new, but it also has a lot of 1 and 2 bedroom units, I believe the largest is 2+den, with 2 bathrooms. It doesn't sound like ultra high luxury to me. More importantly, what would be an alternative use for the site you are getting at? The elevation change is so extreme, this seems like one of the only choices. Also i think the movie theater will service a lot of near south side areas that right now have few options.
I just watched the video on the sales site. I'm still having trouble with dicerning the scale of this. If its it wide enough to make a real street, and that street connects to the urban grid and not just some feeder ramp off Roosevelt - I could see it being wildly successful. If it isolates itself from the grid like it's genetic mutation of a neighbor Dearborn Park it would never support that retail density in a million years. Even River City is somewhat of a flop without extensive subsidized housing. All because they aimed to isolate themselves from the grid. The urban planners of that era had it teribly wrong. wrong wrong wrong. Hopefully this wont be a repeat of isolated, split grade lonely plazas and rusty stair cases like lakeshore east was in the 80's
agreed evil... hopefully that central parkway there is integrated with the actual street gird...
i come to that conclusion because new construction always requires a significant amount of capital. And for the developers to make their money, they charge a premium for new construction. A 200k 1br condo is still way way way way way, way out of the price range for a huge percentage of the population. And that happens to be the percentage that most desperately needs a decent place to live. shit... i dont even have the money for that...
As for an alternate solution, its difficult to say because they didnt really tear down any existing residence to build this, as evil mentioned. However I would ALWAYS prefer that single developers didnt do such massive projects. Variety in building type/use/material and aesthetic is critical for the long term success of any attempt at sustaining a community or neighborhood. This monster will age at the same rate... it will be nice today, sorta nice in 10 years, ok in 20, a slum in 30. If 10 developers did 10 projects providing the same amount of space, it can only create a more heterogeneous development. And heterogeneity is more sustainable in the long term, in fact, id probably say homogeneity is the death knell for any development idea...
"homogeneity is the death knell for any development idea"
Cheers to that. Just look at the scar Dearborn Station 1 and 2 are for the city. Look at a satelite map of the city and look how future development is cut into east of dearborn west of dearborn right where the heart of the south loop should be. What a failure. At the time they actualy thought the south loop would become a little village of wood framed cottages.
I wish I was allowed into architecture and planning schools. I would show them slides of the most exspensive neighborhoods in Chicago, NYC, San Fran and then the areas people tend to avoid. And it would show more times than not that the urban fabric when left to develop Piece by piece is far more interesting and desireable than mega developments. I know we can go back to 1884 when sweat shop workers were living in buildings now costing $2.5 million + and recreate that calibur of detail and craft, nor are our architects trained to accept such collective design intent without injuring their desperate egos. And there are successfull mega developments, especially in Chicago, but Lletdowns right - this gigantised urban renewal trend isnt producing what we want. I fear what we want is already gone and not comming back.
Aggregate Chicago
The house that pension funds built!
;-)
that's BLAGO!!!
Hey Chicago people:
I have a personal interest in Krueck and Sexton(formerly Olsen)'s penthouse that was on the market last year and apparently sold last February. I spent a lot of time in the place, and am hoping that whoever bought it didn't/isn't planning to gut it. The interior is honestly a masterpiece of the firm's work.
Anyone know any inside story?
didn't they used to run a high class call girl service out of there? You wouldn't know anything about that now would you? Naughty.
that 469 west huron building is directly across the street from my office. we have been debating for over a year if they were actually going to build anything there or if the market was going to keep it down. they had a double-wide sales center on the lot, until it was dismantled and taken away last month (a source of entertainment for our office for a few days). they were on site today removing an old generator from the sub-station that is adjacent to the lot.
liberty, i can ask one of my bosses tomorrow. he used to work for k+s and is still on good terms with ron kruek, so he might know something.
evilp, this is the truth: I dated one of the sons of the owners of the penthouse, and stayed there the summer I was working for Krueck & Olsen in an internship arranged by the bf's parents.
Thanks ArchiTed. I'm just curious. The views from the space were amazing, so I can easily imagine someone tearing out all Krueck's work just to have the real estate, but I think that would be a shame and a huge loss.
You dated one of the members of the Crown family? they are Chicago Royalty.
My bf's parents were absolutely lovely, kind, generous people. Royalty, in the best sense of that word. And, patrons of great architecture by a young, upcoming firm - what could be better?!
Hey no slights intended here, that is great! I've been involved in a project for the family before and thoroughly enjoyed it (though to clarify, I have never met them)
No slight taken Synergy, sorry if it came off that way. They really were great people.
That is a good story- LB has KS experiance who knew!!!
I knew!
liberty bell,
i just got back from a meeting that i was with my boss at, and asked him about the crowns. he worked for K+S long after that project was complete, but for the 4 years he was there he worked for the crown family on numerous projects and re-doing work in their penthouse quite a bit (glass floors, $300 SF silk curtains, etc.) and he absolutely loved them. he said they were flat-out some of the nicest people he has ever met and he thoroughly enjoyed working for them. he didn't know that they had passed away (he hasn't worked for K+S for probably 10 years), so he didn't realize that the penthouse had been sold and he didn't know the condition of the existing space at this time.
I was going to post some pics from my camera phone but alas the Trib has much better already up:
[url=http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/chi-trump-ugcpg,0,5038064.ugcphotogallery
]trump spire instalation[/url]
link
crown apartment is at olympia centre 63rd floor on chicago just east of michigan [nieman marcus building] not erie
I was wondering what this was going to be; 29 story eco-rentals at Kinzie and Wells just north of the mart. Cool rendering in the link.
Seems like a nice composition of glass and voids; however we will see how the glass actualy turns out. Always a mystery until its complete.
the rendering in the link looks much better than the picture
enV
it seems very fitting for the location, I bet interior design firms will want to locate in this one.
I think it's clumsy and unresolved...
i think i'd need to see some floor plates before I'd come to a conclusion about the building. Evil, Are they available somewhere?
I dont know - I've looked for leasing information or a broker's page and nothing. Theres surprisingly little out there about this development.
I know it's by Lynd, a development company from Texas. The architect is Valerio, and its a green apartment building.
Make - theres definately the unresolved part - Its like it's in progress. the massing created by the glass sides sort of overpower the top font and the seperation from retail to garage to living spaces seems too bulky however in the big render it looks better.
The AIA Chicago job board is down to one listing. I remember when I was looking in early 2007 there were several pages of listings. I guess the odds for people looking for work are worse than winning the Lotto. I remember a conversation with some professors at U of I (the original mother ship campus in Urbana) that this year they are graduating the largest class of gradates and undergrads ever. I hope every one is holding on to there money. I feel sorry for those recent grads who will have to suffer a huge ego adjustment right away.
Good news oil is going back up so the international clientele in OPEC will be, a little more, flush with cash. Who knew way back in our undergrad days that Architecture would become such a volatile global industry?
Are there folks out there who are giving up looking for work with AE firms?
Please don’t be offended by my take on Linda Richman from Kauffe tawlk.
I'm a little farklempt! About this whole economy business. Talk amongst yourselves. Here's a topic:
If you can’t get a job in the Architecture business what will you do? Discuss.
Evil,
It looks like a glass equivalent of the 19th century stone faced buildings in New York where you put one renaissance palazzo on top of another.
It looks like someone stacked a lot of parts of top of each other. There's nothing to draw your eye up and connect it. I'd like to see a plan...
And if you to stack parts, then have them work in plan. The perimeter of the building shouldn't be flush. It should stick out and push in. It should create a volume, that's where there's a dialogue between solid and void. It doesn't do that. It's flat.
The Kinzie side us looked like meat packing district with loading docks and warehouses. The Wells side is about movement with the L and the traffic headed downtown. The building is static. It looks like it could anywhere. I dunno.
I hear you - Its a could have been (yet another) however I think it will do better than Flair - it has a cip concrete structure with exposed columns, glass exterior ( that may or may not be a dog ) so in that sense I will give it a slightly high C or extremely low B depending on how it turns out.
Flair gets a D unless it's satreet level retail is extraordinary than I say C-
That thing west of Orleans by the riever just Fails
Make - I like the lack of movement in the el facing west side. It has one mid level band of relief. I hate the top.
Evil-
You're right, static can work as well. I don't see it here. This facade could have been anywhere. It would have cool if the composition turned the corner. Look at the building under construction at Van Buren and Wells. It uses dark glass contrasted with light-colored concrete to create a dialogue of opposites that flows horizontally. The concrete is has a lip that creates a border and gives it volume without a lot of massing. It does a lot with a little. That's the mark of someone who's grappling with the problem at hand rather than really bored and quickly sketching out an unresolved solution such as this one. I don't have any pictures of the Van Buren building.
I haven't seen the building on State St.
Or maybe if the flow of the L on Wells had collided with the static loading dock on Kinzie?
Ive got something for you
Returning the humor:
A LESSON FROM MUNTADER AL-ZAIDA by Calvin Trillin
To most Americans it came as news:
To show your disrespect you throw your shoes
Directly at the guy you're disrespecting
(When shoes are not at all what he's expecting).
Should this catch on here in the U.S.A.,
It's possible George Bush should stay away
From, say, New Orleans. Otherwise, I'd posit,
He'd see more shoes than in Imelda's closet.
Heres a chicago architecture blog that maybe we dont check out enough - it goes through periods of inaction - maybe if there were more viewers
[url=
link]http://blog.chicagoarchitecture.info/]link[/url][/url]
update - the stalled hotel at LaSalle and superior seems to be active again - the spray on insulation company wrapped the open floors and appears to be fire proofing. There is life!
yahooo, i was excited to see that completed!
Any images? I'm not sure i know the project.
Cool pic from Chicagoist of the amtrak / airline junction near 16th st. I love how the South Loop is starting to get it's own skyline. That coupled with it's proximity to real neighborhoods like Taylor St / Pilsen / Chinatown / Bport makes me think the near southside has a really exciting future ahead of it despite the naysayers. Theres so much potential there and at one point that really was the soul of the city. Most of it razed in the 50 and 60's. Just think how cool the south loop would be today with west loop style warehouses even larger than the ones on the west side since the south loop was the primary shipping point well into the 30 /40s. Anyways, I love how that area is slowly comming together. I almost think it's the protypical 21st century urban model. Sort of suburban / urban / and corridor all in one.
Kind of in the same vein, what do you guys think of the Roosevelt collection near the Target and Roosevelt Red Line stop. I was just in the area last week, the project seems to be comming along nicely. I'm really excited about how it connects the Red Line stop with all the shopping to the west and just a little further, UIC. I also think the views will be exciting from the plaza. I think it will really change the way people think of that street, it will be a destination instead of just a bridge over a wasteland.
[img]http://wibiti.com/images/hpmain/151/183151.jpg width=420 [img]
[img]http://chicagoarchitecturetoday.com/Images/RC-UOCE-1.jpg width=420 [img]
Oops, here we go.
its really hard to say... visually it might be nice but im always super skeptical of developments of that size... they are so discriminatory, they are great ways to make people money, terrible terrible ways to develop functioning neighborhoods.
I admit i havent been down there in a while so I cant comment. I will say I like the way the area is starting to fill in with shops / bars / services that make a neighborhood a hood. Lets hope the economy does'nt kill it off first.
I know what you are saying. I think the movie theater they are putting in could really help this neighborhood develop. I can see people from the are going to see a movie, which would promote atleast a restaurant or two going into the area. There is already the Whole Foods and above mentioned Target in the area, so it starts to be a little bit of a comprhensive neighborhood.
Also I give it a little slack because it is really creating a transitional neighborhood where nothing existed before, so it isn't like it is upsetting some existing condition. What I like is the idea that people might make the walk along Roosevelt now, perhaps all the way to Grant park, because if this project is succesful, it will be more approachable and human scale.
I like the concept, the architecture of the lowrises looks pretty residential anywhere USA but the tower at the north end looks freakish and cartoony. Is that the one thats stalled out about 8 floors up off congress and franklin?
Synergy - Just imagine if the old warehouses were still there - that would be far more interesting to infill between them and the irregular paths from the old rail lines. But alas the site needs to be graded and filled. I hear the soil in that area is a disaster - an amalgam of debris, rubble, railroad grade materials and sand for like 10 feet.
I assume it also has about 2 or 3 bodies per square yard from ancient Mafia hits.
i agree with everything you all are saying, and this is my bleeding heart here, but this project provides amenities to people who can get them anywhere... it doesn't provide any lower or middle income families with things they ACTUALLY need... it just gives rich people another option when looking to buy a condo... yes, its better than barren land, but we could be so much more constructive with our land uses.
How do you come to that conclusion? Certainly it is new, but it also has a lot of 1 and 2 bedroom units, I believe the largest is 2+den, with 2 bathrooms. It doesn't sound like ultra high luxury to me. More importantly, what would be an alternative use for the site you are getting at? The elevation change is so extreme, this seems like one of the only choices. Also i think the movie theater will service a lot of near south side areas that right now have few options.
I just watched the video on the sales site. I'm still having trouble with dicerning the scale of this. If its it wide enough to make a real street, and that street connects to the urban grid and not just some feeder ramp off Roosevelt - I could see it being wildly successful. If it isolates itself from the grid like it's genetic mutation of a neighbor Dearborn Park it would never support that retail density in a million years. Even River City is somewhat of a flop without extensive subsidized housing. All because they aimed to isolate themselves from the grid. The urban planners of that era had it teribly wrong. wrong wrong wrong. Hopefully this wont be a repeat of isolated, split grade lonely plazas and rusty stair cases like lakeshore east was in the 80's
agreed evil... hopefully that central parkway there is integrated with the actual street gird...
i come to that conclusion because new construction always requires a significant amount of capital. And for the developers to make their money, they charge a premium for new construction. A 200k 1br condo is still way way way way way, way out of the price range for a huge percentage of the population. And that happens to be the percentage that most desperately needs a decent place to live. shit... i dont even have the money for that...
As for an alternate solution, its difficult to say because they didnt really tear down any existing residence to build this, as evil mentioned. However I would ALWAYS prefer that single developers didnt do such massive projects. Variety in building type/use/material and aesthetic is critical for the long term success of any attempt at sustaining a community or neighborhood. This monster will age at the same rate... it will be nice today, sorta nice in 10 years, ok in 20, a slum in 30. If 10 developers did 10 projects providing the same amount of space, it can only create a more heterogeneous development. And heterogeneity is more sustainable in the long term, in fact, id probably say homogeneity is the death knell for any development idea...
"homogeneity is the death knell for any development idea"
Cheers to that. Just look at the scar Dearborn Station 1 and 2 are for the city. Look at a satelite map of the city and look how future development is cut into east of dearborn west of dearborn right where the heart of the south loop should be. What a failure. At the time they actualy thought the south loop would become a little village of wood framed cottages.
I wish I was allowed into architecture and planning schools. I would show them slides of the most exspensive neighborhoods in Chicago, NYC, San Fran and then the areas people tend to avoid. And it would show more times than not that the urban fabric when left to develop Piece by piece is far more interesting and desireable than mega developments. I know we can go back to 1884 when sweat shop workers were living in buildings now costing $2.5 million + and recreate that calibur of detail and craft, nor are our architects trained to accept such collective design intent without injuring their desperate egos. And there are successfull mega developments, especially in Chicago, but Lletdowns right - this gigantised urban renewal trend isnt producing what we want. I fear what we want is already gone and not comming back.
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