Dearborn Street

Dearborn Street. Chicago Cultural Walk. [Side A] , Dearborn Street showcases some of Chicago’s best architecture, art, and urban design dating from the late 19th century. Great names in architecture include Chicago School architects William LeBaron Jenney, Burnham and Root, and Holabird and Roche, as well as highly regarded modern architects, Mies van der Rohe, Skidmore Owings and Merrill C.F. Murphy, and Perkins and Will. Sculptures by world famous artists line the street, including those by Pablo Picasso, Joan Miro, Henry Moore, Marc Chagall, and Alexander Calder. These works of art are set in urban plazas which punctuate long blocks of skyscrapers and become outdoor rooms for performances, sidewalk fairs, farmer’s markets, civic celebrations, and political events., An impressive collection of 1890s skyscrapers with structural and design innovations known as the Chicago School of Architecture is located at the south end of Dearborn Street on either side of the century-old elevated train structure. They are part of Printer’s Row, once the center of the city’s vibrant printing industry. Chicago’s dominance in the world of architecture throughout the 1960s is also represented on the street. The Federal Center by International Style founder, Mies van der Rohe, the Richard J. Daley Center, and the Brunswick Building all made use of the latest technology in the modern idiom that set design standards., Governor John Peter Altgeld, who pardoned the labor agitators of the Haymarket riot in 1896 and ruined his political career as a result, had offices on Dearborn Street. The site has recently been the home of Gallery 37, Chicago’s summer art training program for youth, and the wintertime Skate on State. Across the street, the Richard J. Daley Center Plaza has hosted such diverse activities as United States presidential candidate rallies and celebrations for Chicago sports teams. Noon-time concerts entertain office workers next to Chicago’s Picasso and beside Chagall’s Four Seasons mosaic at the Bank One Plaza., Dearborn Street has recreated itself many times and it has may stories to tell. Its banking, business, and government affairs continue to flourish amid some of the world’s greatest art and architecture, enlivened by a year-round calendar of cultural and civic events., [Side B] , Old Colony Building , 407 S. Dearborn Street , Built 1894, Holabird and Roche, architects , National Register of Historic Places and Chicago Landmark, The Old Colony Building was constructed to provide offices for the burgeoning printing industry that was developing along Dearborn Street south of Congress Street in the 1880s. Called Printers Row, the streets were lined with tall loft buildings that became the center of printing in the Midwest through World War II. Another early Holabird and Roche tall commercial building, the Old Colony is distinguished by its rounded, projecting windows bay at the four corners. A colonnade runs the length and width of the 15th and 16th floors. The Old Colony is named for the first English colony in America at Plymouth, Massachusetts, and its seal is located beside the doorway to the building., Plymouth Building , 417 S. Dearborn Street , Built 1899, Simeon B. Eisendrath, architect, This 1899 building was remodeled with Gothic detailing in 1945 to give a collegiate appearance to a correspondence school then occupying the building. Some of the Sullivanesque ironwork remains, however, on the Plymouth Court facade of the building. The architect once worked for the architectural firm of Alder and Sullivan and as a result the lobby newel post and balusters are similar to those found in the interior stairway of Sullivan’s Carson Pirie Scott Store., Manhattan Building , 431 S. Dearborn Street, Built 1891, William LeBaron Jenney, architect , National Register of Historic Places and Chicago Landmark, Designed by the father of the modern skyscraper, William LeBaron Jenney, the Manhattan Building was among the first to use skeleton construction throughout. Projecting bays give a dynamic rhythm to the facade while admitting as much light as possible to the interior spaces. While the base rusticated granite, the upper floors are brick with richly detailed terra cotta ornament. To stabilize such a tall building, a double-diagonal wind bracing system was adapted from that used in railway truss bridges. Once a printing loft building, the Manhattan has been converted to apartments with retail at the ground floor level.