110 North Wacker is rising along the Chicago River on the former site of the Morton Salt building.
Want to know what I did last weekend?
Yep. I went to 110 North Wacker and snapped some photos in the dark. Haven’t been here since it was barely more than a hole in the ground. Nice work on the build so far by Clark Construction.
Have a look:
Picture yourself, on a rebarge, by the river.
There’s something you should know about ongoing caisson work at 110 North Wacker.
Case Foundation is doing the dirty work at The Loop construction site. They have a crew on a barge making the rebar cages that will be sunk into the ground to reinforce the caissons. You know what that means?
They’re using a REBARGE! Sorry, not sorry.
Clark Construction is the GC on this one. They’re tasked with getting the Goettsch Partners-designed office tower to rise to its 54-story goal.
One more thing you should know is that caisson work along the river is very photogenic. Especially on a bridge-lift day. Have a look for yourself in the gallery below.
Foundation work is underway at 110 North Wacker, as Case Foundation gets busy in The Loop.
The rubble of the old Morton Salt Building (or the GGP Building–Don’t @ me) is long gone, and now Case Foundation is on the job, doing the dirty work to get 110 North Wacker started.
A permit was issued by the City of Chicago on April 9, allowing work to be done on the two below-grade levels, on up to the 4th floor. We’re hoping for a tower crane permit sooner rather than later to get this one up to its ultimate 54-story height, but that might take some time. But don’t worry; there’s already plenty to see. Get yourself a comfy lawn chair and go hang out on the Washington Street Bridge and watch the show.
A rendering of 110 North Wacker, which received its foundation permit from the City of Chicago Monday, from Goettsch Partners.
A foundation permit was issued Monday for 110 North Wacker, the 54-story office tower that will replace the now-demolished (and much-photographed-in-the-process) Morton Salt Building. Case Foundation will be out on site in the very near future, handling the foundations alongside general contractor Clark Construction.
All yous up there in the surrounding high-rises, get those demolition cameras down, put up your construction cams, and be ready to send in your bird’s-eye views!
https://twitter.com/JoshatNRDC/status/978651006190931968
It’s gone now.
The former Morton Salt building, more recently the former home of GGP (General Growth Properties) at 110 North Wacker Drive, is a dirt lot now, as can be seen in the above photo shared by Twitter user @JoshatNRDC. (Great view of the new tower construction, Josh! I’ll bring the coffee if I can borrow your windows for a few hours a day.)
You can kinda sorta watch the demo work by Heneghan Wrecking along the way in the photo gallery that follows. Coming soon: a shiny new 54-story office tower from Howard Hughes Corporation and Riverside Investment & Development, designed by Goettsch Partners.
Big chunks are missing from the GGP building at 110 North Wacker. The barge is catching them.
It feels good to write something about activity in The Loop again.
The former GGP headquarters at 110 North Wacker Drive in The Loop has begun to crumble into the Chicago River. Not by accident, of course. And not actually into the water. There’s a barge out there on the river, and Heneghan Wrecking is using it to haul away debris from the demolition of the six-story building, making space for the much-anticipated 54-story, Goettsch Partners-designed office tower 110 North Wacker, from the Howard Hughes Corporation and Chicago’s Riverside Investment and Development.
The start of demolition at 110 North Wacker immediately vaults the site to the top of the official Tower Crane Anticipation list. Though that could change, if 145 South Wells gets underway. Stay tuned.
150 North Riverside is open and spectacular along the Chicago River.
If being obsessed with a building is a problem, then those of you who know me well (or know me at all, let’s be honest here) know I have a problem.
150 North Riverside is my obsession. And problem. If I ever manage to salvage the thousands of photos on the hard drive I dropped of construction of Goettsch Partners’ Chicago office tower, I’ll post them one at a time and you’ll understand what I mean. But you can see into a few of those portals via blog posts here, here, here, and most recently, here.
It started with the sinking of the Chicago River Barge, quite possibly the most famous demise of a water-going vessel in the history of mankind. And just like that, I became mesmerized by construction. I’d go downtown just to stand on the Randolph Street bridge and see how much progress had been made. When we moved to the West Loop, I’d go out of my way to get to and from the L so I could watch.
Before I was ready to let go, 150 North Riverside was done. And I’ll admit to a tinge of sadness in its construction coming to an end. Not just because there would be no more progress to mark, but because I feared the tower would now become a mystery to me. Sure, the plaza outside is a fantastic space, and open to the public 24/7 for wandering through, or enjoying an al fresco lunch. The lobby even has open hours too. But what reason would I ever have to go inside and see Chicago from this vantage point? Maybe I could find a lawyer with an office there, and threaten to sue someone so I could meet for a consultation.
But then along came my angel. Thanks to Shelby Edwards and the William Blair Company, which started moving its Chicago offices into the tower back in June, I got to go inside this magical building last week. William Blair occupies about a dozen floors in the upper half of the tower. I hung out for awhile on the 46th floor, the main reception area. An amazing space, it offers 360-degree views from a host of meeting rooms, classrooms, and small breakout offices.
And then there’s the art. I respectfully avoided photographing any of the artwork; that usually feels like something you shouldn’t do. But imagine two busts, made of layers hunks of drywall cut from the walls behind the busts. Yeah, it’s as cool as it is hard to describe.
I didn’t spend my entire hour with Shelby taking photos of tower cranes; I captured lots of Chicago views. But those memories are for me. To keep with the theme of this blog, here now are the shots I took to share with you; as many cranes as I could find from the 35th and 46th floors of 150 North Riverside:
There’s work yet to be done on the outside, and desk space to fill up on the inside, but 150 North Riverside is open, and its night game is solid. Have a look at what’s happening along the Chicago River, and a peek at what’s still in the making.
150 North Riverside, casting gorgeous reflections onto Randolph Place, though I’m sure condo owners aren’t pleased with their new views.
150 North Riverside is the first construction project that caught, and kept, my attention. I wandered past it daily when it was still a figment of someone’s imagination, curious about the oil-drilling-rig-looking thing sitting in an empty lot along the Chicago River. Of course, I’d learn later that I was looking at a soil-sampling rig, but that had no significance to me at the time.
Shortly after construction started, some genius in Public Relations came up with a fool-proof way to garner publicity; crews excavating soil form the site sank a barge. Sure, it *looked* like an accident, but suddenly 150 North Riverside was thrust into the spotlight. And there it remained, though it didn’t hurt bringing in a giant red floating crane to erect steel trusses that stopped pedestrian traffic on the Randolph Street Bridge.
That was 28 months ago. And now, on Monday, February 13, 2017, 150 North Riverside opens its doors to office workers. Had I not dropped a hard drive on the ground and lost them, I could show you at least 1,000 photos I’ve taken of this beauty in the last 2+ years. Instead, have a look at a select few along the way. Then, make sure you stop by the tower and check out the media stream.
Goettsch Partners: Design architects
Riverside Investment & Development Company: Developer
Magnusson Klemencic Associates: Structural engineer
Clark Construction: General contractor
May, 2016. RP150 rises above the Metra tracks in the West Loop.
Eurythmics. Wham. Go West. Daft Punk. Air Supply. Names that conjure up images of groups, yet only represent a duo. Now you can add a Chicago act to that list: RP150.
You may know RP150 as two separate entities. But to me, they’re like peas and carrots. It’s hard to remember what this city looked like without them, and now they’ll be here, together, forever.
150 North Riverside is a 54-story office building, designed by the Chicago architecture firm Goettsch Partners, between Lake Street, Randolph Street, and the Chicago River. Right next to it, on the north side of Lake Street, is River Point, a 52-story office tower at 444 West Lake Street designed by Pickard Chilton. Being developed by Riverside Investment & Development Company, and Hines, respectively, the two neighbors will deliver about 2,250,000 rentable square feet to the West Loop. There will also be nearly three full acres of public park space, for those of us who don’t need to rent an office in either building. And glass. Lots of shiny glass.
Building Up Chicago 