CHICAGO | Roosevelt University Dorm | 469 FT / 143M | 32 FLOORS | COM
 

Height: 469 ft
Floor count: 32
Location: 421-25 South Wabash
Construction end: 2011
Architect: VOA
Developer: John Buck Company

http://img25.imageshack.us/img25/2310/59167854.jpg
http://img21.imageshack.us/img21/525...ngup464x6m.jpg
http://img21.imageshack.us/img21/424...de550x733a.jpg
http://img697.imageshack.us/img697/4749/roosevelt2.jpg
http://img51.imageshack.us/img51/5979/image007058.jpg
http://img40.imageshack.us/img40/288...6437344429.jpg

Special mention to Spyguy for posting this info at SSC

Posted elsewhere:

I like everything about this tower except the nasty, gray concrete wall along its western face.

One word:

Why?

^^ That's the northern face, and this is why... the proposal for Buckingham II.

http://img148.imageshack.us/img148/130/chicagodorm.jpg

The Auditorium Building is a landmark in world architecture, so it's pretty safe to assume that it will be there for the forseeable future. Roosevelt also owns the building, so the rules that limit windows along lot lines don't apply (since, for all intents and purposes, there is no lot line). You can put glass on that side and get great southern views. The north side, on the other hand, is a vacant lot with an active proposal for a building that will block any windows on that side. So you put service and circulation spaces along the northern side, and there's no need or reason for those spaces to have windows.

Also, I wish that was exposed concrete, that would be awesome. Instead it looks like some kind of black brick or paneling which would also be awesome. We are running low on new black towers in lately in Chicago.

Roosevelt's tower has quite a good design, but I don't like all the glass on the 5-story box at ground level. They make the entire street frontage glass, which is really shirking away from the context of two beautiful historic buildings in stone and terracotta, respectively. It would be better if the base were a more solid, opaque material, with the glass tower protruding from it

In addition, the fact that the glass is set back from the streetwall by 4 or 5 feet creates a rather disconcerting illusion that makes the facades of the Fine Arts Annex and the Auditorium Building look like odd freestanding structures, with nothing behind them. You can see how the reflection of the Fine Arts Annex creates this "pillar effect" in the rendering below. If I didn't know better, I'd say the architects were trying to play a sly trick based on the skin-deep notion of a facadectomy. Even if they were, though, it's not really appropriate to do that to the Auditorium, which still has all of its architectural innards (praise be to God).

whenever i look at the main rendering from the southwest i always get a "lever house on acid" kinda vibe from this one. the more i see of it, the more i like it; i really have high hopes for this one, if for no other reason than it might be all were gonna get for a while.

This proposal is exciting, if for nothing other than it is about the only thing going on right now. I was more excited at first thinking that this was instead located on the block just south of the auditorium building that has those two hideous brutal parking garages (it seems maybe they are actually in fact one mangled siamese twin L shaped mid-block building) and a surface lot, but this will be replacing that small white forgettable building tucked in just north of the auditorium bldg on wabash. While that parking garage is absolutely revolting, I suppose it does give the area that unique, run down and unkept since the 70's, gritty, urinating in the alley sort of feel to the area that would be gone without it.

The dorm building's entrance/street frontage on Wabash actually has a pretty nice feel to it from that rendering, and with students/etc coming and going and hanging out front it will liven the street up some.

I hope this increases both day and night life in this area, and eventually will lead to more buildings being built south to Roosevelt, thus "connecting" this area to the south loop area more (One museum park area-ish).

Could be a close family member of Chelsea Modern in NY:

http://s3.amazonaws.com/thornton/pro...ern_1_main.jpg
link


or Bernard Tschumi's Blue Building in NY:

http://static.dezeen.com/uploads/200...07m40415sq.jpg
link

i was just gonna say, why demolish the existing building (even though its somewhat ugly) for this dorm when the corner of wabash and van buren is an empty lot? although good to see there are plans for that lot as well. is there a timetable for when that tower is going to break ground?

love the new dorm overall. cannot wait to see it go up ... or anything go up, for that matter :banana:

^^^ Mr. Downtown said it was due to break ground April 17th. Right now they are finishing up the demolition of the previous building on the site.

^ i'm pretty sure left of center was asking about a timetable for the buckingham II starting up, not the roosevelt dorm.

as for the buckingham II, i don't know where that one currently stands as far as its chances of going forward anytime soon. Mr. D? anyone?

Man, I hope the other tower (Buckingham II?) goes up, as well. This block would be so vibrant: aesthetically, with the two bold university towers next to the almost-jarringly red CNA building; and, socially, with all the students activating the space.

Nice dorm... gotta have some killer views.

Hey now... that garage at least has cool cantilevered slabs over the sidewalk on Congress. They help to maintain a sort of streetwall feeling even though the sidewalk had to be shifted behind the streetwall by the expansion of Congress. Unfortunately, it replaced Steinway Hall, where Dwight Perkins, Wright, and Walter Burley Griffin had offices and developed the Prairie Style. (The building itself was designed by Perkins)

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_AkAueJDzN1...0/steinway.jpg

Laugh if you will, but I see fish (whenever I look at this rendering).
http://img248.imageshack.us/img248/6140/fishdorm.jpg
Rendering - SCB
Photo of fish eye - J. Reynolds/ Houston Chronicle
Photo of scales - Kimberly Crick / deviantart

correct

would be nice if it was this summer, having two dorms going up almost side by side. that block of Wabash might be the most action we'll be seeing until the condo/office vacancy improves significantly. Hah, thats kinda depressing ;)


i still remember the "super dorm" opening on the corner of Congress and State. That alone did wonders livening up the whole area. With this dorm and possibly the Buckingham going up, its really going to create a critical mass of after hours pedestrian activity on those blocks. Definitely the right direction to go for the Loop becoming a more 24/7 neighborhood.

Fair enough, it does have sort of a so ugly and weird that it is kind of retro and cool effect going for it... and it would be no big deal if there was a building on that corner that allowed the garage to just cantilever out of the streetwall mid-block like it was originally intended.

Thanks for the tidbit of info about what used to be there.

I'm really loving this tower and glad to see it breaking ground soon.