http://www.chicagotribune.com/featur...0,303612.story
ARCHITECTURE
22 West Washington doesn't reflect strong streetscape
By Blair Kamin Tribune critic | Chicago Tribune critic
September 21, 2008
For nearly 20 years, as close to an entire block of Loop real estate sat empty, we have been waiting, waiting, waiting for the first new building to open on Block 37. Now it's finally here, and the outcome is like one of those trick guns from which you're expecting a violent blast—and a cute little flag pops out instead.
In other words, underwhelming.
That is a harsh judgment, and it should immediately be qualified: The glassy, reflective 17-story office building, called 22 West Washington, is unfinished, not without subtle pleasures and could get better. Public attention will be riveted on it Monday when one of its two tenants, WBBM-Ch. 2, formally opens its ground-level broadcast studio facing Daley Plaza.
In its present state, 22 West Washington offers a paradox. It is too quiet because its meek exterior doesn't hold up its end of the conversation carried on by the mighty buildings flanking the plaza. And it is too loud because its base flaunts a screeching broadcast screen that has been polluting the great civic space with promotions for the likes of Dr. Phil and Judge Judy.
Acclaimed architect
The results are especially disappointing because 22 West Washington's architect, Ralph Johnson of Perkins+Will, is one of Chicago's best, acclaimed for projects ranging from the site-sensitive Boeing headquarters along the Chicago River to the sculptural Contemporaine condo high-rise in River North.
But on Block 37, for which he drew up a fine master plan unveiled in 2004, Johnson has played a role comparable to architect Daniel Libeskind at the World Trade Center, watching helplessly as commercial pressures undermined his vision for a vibrant mixed-use urban center.
At root, then, the problems of 22 West Washington have as much to do with finance as with form. It is a tight-budget office building, not a lavish corporate headquarters. It has had two developers—first, the Mills Corp. and then Golub & Co., which took over when Mills faltered.
Given the economic constraints, Johnson's big idea, clever on its face, was to craft a modest "background building" that would play a mirror game, reflecting such muscular neighbors as the rust-colored Daley Center and the many-columned City Hall-County Building.
With thin, asymmetrically arranged planes of glass and a dash of electronic razzle-dazzle, he sought to give the astonishing mix of styles surrounding Daley Plaza a fitting example from the 21st Century: an almost ephemeral architecture that would use contemporary technologies to achieve the kind of airy, see-through skyscraper Mies van der Rohe could only dream of in the 1920s.
But the steel-framed structure is compromised on many levels, beginning with the way it tries to act as a space-shaping wall that frames the east flank of Daley Plaza.
Ever since Block 37's lively hodgepodge of old office buildings, movie theaters and stores was demolished in 1990 to make way for a Helmut Jahn-designed office and retail center that never materialized, Daley Plaza has needed such a wall to give it the proper sense of containment. Yet 22 West Washington's lack of height and heft combine with its seamless glass wall to give the building a certain insubstantial quality, as if you could poke a finger through it. It looks wimpy compared with everything around it.
Distorted reflections
The wall itself is no prize-winner, either. While it is a pleasure to walk by and catch the reflections of the white terra cotta facade of the Reliance Building or the muscular, mid-20th Century grids of the Richard J. Daley Center and the Cook County Administration Building, those reflections often appear jittery and distorted. Johnson specified a curtain wall that would have produced less distortion, he said, but the Mills Corp. forced him to adopt a cheaper alternative.
Worse still—far worse—is the building's 30-foot-wide LED screen on which WBBM-Ch. 2 plans to broadcast news, sports and some prime-time shows. A feature such as this had the potential to bring electronic art to Daley Plaza, updating the civic contributions of the plaza's Picasso sculpture and Joan Miro's "Miss Chicago" outside the Cook County Administration Building. Instead, we get Times Square. City Hall planners flubbed things big-time when they approved this poke in the eye.
Still, there are pluses, as well as hopeful signs.
WBBM-Ch. 2's ground-floor broadcast studio will energize the plaza with lights, camera and action. Pedestrians should enjoy walking by the sleek TV studio, which will emphasize by its presence the way that the information society has infiltrated daily life. The limestone walls at the building's base complement the Art Deco ComEd substation that is the lone survivor of the old Block 37.
Equally good, the building's transparent glass opens a window onto the WBBM-Ch. 2's third-floor newsroom, which has been smartly designed by Goettsch Partners. That not only lets the public see in but also suggests that the station is an "eye" watching over the city—and, more important, the government. An old, masonry-covered newspaper building such as the Chicago Tribune Tower simply can't do that.
As for the building's future, Johnson is working with WBBM-Ch. 2 to fill in the unsightly gaps on either side of the screen and to create the wrap-around-the-corner focal point he always intended. The design could also improve if LED screens quietly advertising the presence of WBBM-Ch. 2 and the other tenant, investment research firm Morningstar Inc., are placed, as Johnson originally intended, near the building's top.
So there are things to appreciate in this first building on Block 37, but they tend to be details, not the big picture.
It is troubling, as we look forward to the project's completion next year, to see significant departures from Johnson's master plan by the architects of the rest of the project, the Chicago office of San Francisco-based Gensler. Entrances along State Street no longer are at the building's corners. Proposed digital decoration is gone, replaced by facile allusions to the Pritzker Pavilion in Millennium Park. As was reported recently, the Chicago Transit Authority is mothballing Block 37's underground superstation indefinitely because the half-finished project is millions of dollars over budget.
Amid such fiascos, discussing the fine points of architecture may seem silly. But it would be more foolhardy to ignore the impact such buildings have on the Loop—as well as the message they send about Chicago's ongoing capacity to achieve design excellence.