This crane’s Chicago business will be renovating the Thompson Center

Posted on January 25, 2025 by danieldschell

You can check one of those pending tower cranes off the waiting list. Clark Construction & team began erecting the tower crane at the Thompson Center this weekend. They got decent weather for late-January to do it, so hopefully there will be no setbacks through Sunday to getting setup complete.

This is the only tower crane operating in The Loop right now, and one of only six throughout the city. It joins Streeterville’s 400 Lake Shore in the downtown area, and four South Side cranes, including Project H.O.O.D. in Woodlawn, the Obama Presidential Center in Jackson Park, and two at the AbbVie Foundation Cancer Pavilion in Hyde Park. It was permitted on July 03, 2024, with word on the site to expect assembly around Labor Day. That, of course, was four months ago, so we’ve been waiting on this one.

The Thompson Center, as I’m sure you know by now, is being renovated for Google. It has been completely stripped of its exterior skin, to be replaced by a much more energy-efficient glazing. If the building looks like a shell of its former self, that’s because it is. Google hopes to have employees move into the 17-story building mid-2026.

Enjoying the photos? Metra and CTA rides (and Amtrak trains to Milwaukee), Zipcars, Divvy Bikes, camera lenses, domain fees, snacks & energy drinks, and comfortable walking shoes add up. You can help offset expenses by making a greatly-appreciated donation to Building Up Chicago.

Trigger Alert: The Thompson Center looks ravaged

Posted on September 13, 2024 by danieldschell

The Thompson Center is open to the sky, but not to the public, during reconstruction.

Fear not. The Thompson Center *still* isn’t being demolished; it just looks that way. Its transformation into Google offices has taken a toll on the tri-colored exterior, and while the replacement skin might not be as colorful, it will make the building much easier to heat and cool. But for now, it looks rather bare. I almost feel guilty for looking at it, much less taking pictures. But it looks pretty dang cool this way. Now, to get them to let me stand in the atrium before they get the new cladding on…

Tower crane permit issued for Google’s Thompson Center renovation

Posted on July 4, 2024 by danieldschell

https://twitter.com/BuildingChi/status/1805302058016190689

Ok, it just *looks* open.

As Clark Construction continues demolition work on the Thompson Center for Google, a tower crane permit has been issued by the City of Chicago. My guess is, the crane will be installed on the Clark Street (east) side of the building, where a gaping hole in the exterior would allow tying off to the concrete core.

Google’s transformation of the Thompson Center will add the 10th crane to Chicago. We started July with nine in the air. Projects at Hyde Park Labs and The Obama Presidential Center Museum Tower have topped out, but I don’t have info on when those two cranes will be taken down.

Tower crane permit via Chicago Data Portal

1000M, for the final construction visit?

Posted on August 25, 2023 by danieldschell

The days of watching construction at 1000M are drawing to a close. Just a handful of the top levels remain unglazed. Soon the tower crane will come down and this will look like a finished product while crews work on the interior.

1000M gave us the rare thrill of watching a skyscraper begin twice: first when caisson work got underway, and then again, after a pandemic-induced delay left the site dormant for months and months. The tower crane base that had been planted was removed, it went from condos to apartments, the design was tweaked, and it roared back to life early in 2022.

It’s always weirdly sad to me when a building wraps up construction and there’s nothing to watch anymore, but this one legit tugs at the heartstrings, knowing Helmut Jahn isn’t here to enjoy its completion.

1000M should be open to residents in 2024. And please, if you get one of these apartments, invite me over. I’ll even help you move in, if that’s what it takes.

More from 1000M as it rises into Chicago’s skyline

Posted on April 19, 2023 by danieldschell

1000M is at that age where the up-closes aren’t as dramatic as the far-offs. Which is why this post exists in the first place. Wednesday the 12th was as perfect a day as Chicago ever sees in mid-April, and while I didn’t set out to take more progress photos of Helmut Jahn’s South Loop apartment tower, the views once I backed away had their way with me.

So here ya go. A bunch more 1000M photos taken from a variety of perspectives, including Northerly Island (my first real visit there and OMG!), Grant Park, and the Museum Campus. Please enjoy:

Sun’s out, One’s out

Posted on March 5, 2023 by danieldschell

That’s “One” as in “One Thousand M,” though most folks ’round these parts refer to it as 1000M.

I know I was just here, but it wasn’t sunny that day. So I came back. Nuff said. Here are the pics:

Catching up on 1000M, the sky-high apartments coming to the South Loop

Posted on February 1, 2023 by danieldschell

1000M construction progress, taken from Grant Park, looking west.

1000M got started, then it stopped. And we had to wait a long time for it to getting revved up again. Sort of like when the sequel to your favorite movie is announced, but then the release is delayed. Once it comes out, you’re the first in line to see it. Then you see it 17 more times over the nest week and a half. That’s what I was going to do; watch progress at the rejuvenated 1000M. But, well, I didn’t.

But I did take a look this past Sunday, in the cold of late January. The JAHN-designed tower bringing apartments in the sky to the South Loop looks to have reached the high 30s in floor count, with glazing covering about 20 0f those. And here are some photos to prove I was there:

Is that light? Is that blue sky? This was taken the same day as all the others.

It isn’t Spring yet

Posted on January 29, 2023 by danieldschell

Helmut Jahn's 1000M — Helmut Jahn’s 1000M in the South Loop.

I surprised myself Sunday and took the camera out for a spin. I was pretty sure I wouldn’t do that again until spring arrived, but my main man Carlos wanted to meet for breakfast in the South Loop, so I bundled up and headed downtown. A couple things to point out:

It’s cold.
Due to inactivity, I forgot how to use my Canon.
That same inactivity has that Canon acting up a little bit.
The operating system on my PC updated a couple weeks ago; the photo program has changed again, and uploading pics from the camera didn’t go well.
The photo-editing program has changed, including no longer having a blemish removal tool, and for someone who can’t keep his camera clean, that’s a big deal.
Clearly, I need to start getting more sophisticated about editing photos.
I walked too much in the cold. My back, my knees, they’re not happy with me. I might have to go back to my plan of staying inside until the warm weather returns. We’ll see. I *did* enjoy being out there for awhile.

I’ll get a few of these pictures into posts over the coming days. I hit a half-dozen or so construction sites before I had to give up the chase.

The lowdown on the down-low glazing at 1000M

Posted on August 19, 2022 by danieldschell

I haven’t been playing the construction game for long, so maybe things I see that surprise me aren’t really all that unusual. But I’ll be darned if I can recall ever seeing a highrise get its first panes of glass on the first floor.

That’s exactly what we’ve got at Helmut Jahn’s 1000M (1000 S Michigan Ave.) If I hadn’t been expecting to see it (thanks to a Linkedin post) I might have missed it, since my eyes generally look up as these towers start their skyward climbs. But the glass is indeed there, along the east façade. You might need to peek over the fence to see it.

And now, a photographic progress update of McHugh & McHugh’s work (thanks for positioning the tower crane so I could get the mooncrane shot):

Another walkaround at 1000M

Posted on May 24, 2022 by danieldschell

I said I didn’t want to miss much of the construction at 1000M, yet here we are, more than a month since my last visit. Unacceptable. Let’s fix that now.