The early 20th century Consumers Building will be facing the wrecking ball soon to make way for a skyscraper.  This building will be "sacrificed" to save other historic highrise buildings on the block (that are oddly in worse shape).  Currently Consumers is an active builidng.  Architectural conditions vary on the interior.  The lobby remains relatively unchanged, as do some floors of the building.  Many other floors have been modernized.

 

Any chance we can get a shot from further away? :-)

What is the location of the building?

220 South State Street

Terrible.

Nooooooo!!!!

I'm not thrilled about it coming down either, but they wanted to keep the historic buildings on the block.  Consumers is pretty generic, and there are many others like it in the city, but with a cornice put back up, a good cleaning, and some new windows this could have really shined.  I just don't think Chicago needs another bland glass skyscraper.  I hope the new renderings show something impressive.  So far I haven't heard any position from preservationists since the option to demolish was announced.  Then again, historic preservationists are ALWAYS late when it comes to buildings in danger.  An effort should have been made long ago to protect this building.

 

So far I haven't heard any position from preservationists since the option to demolish was announced.  Then again, historic preservationists are ALWAYS late when it comes to buildings in danger.  An effort should have been made long ago to protect this building.

 

Why is that? If the building is still active and the tower was originally going somewhere else, how could preservationists have known this would be a concern?

How much power do preservationists really have in Chicago? Mayor Daley has never let historic preservation concerns get in the way of his developer buddies, and the man has the powers of a dictator. The number of historic buildings lost during his administration has been staggering, and most of them have been replaced by schlock.

So far I haven't heard any position from preservationists since the option to demolish was announced.  Then again, historic preservationists are ALWAYS late when it comes to buildings in danger.  An effort should have been made long ago to protect this building.

 

Why is that? If the building is still active and the tower was originally going somewhere else, how could preservationists have known this would be a concern?

 

They definitely knew.  Several options were presented publicly. 

 

1. Tear two blocks of historic buildings down and build new. 

2. Tear down Consumers and a small nondescript next door and build new

3.  Save all the buildings and sandwhich a very narrow tower where the non-descript building is.

 

This was announced long ago, but there has only been silence.

 

"how could preservationists known" isn't much of an excuse in that field.  I feel that even if buildings are occupied with good owners that maintain them, there should always be some sort of watchdog out there to ensure these buildings will be around for another 100 years.  The consumers building has been slipping for about 3 decades and no one ever made a big deal.  Why no concern, why no efforts to landmark it? 

i'd have to balance the loss with whats going to take its place. any renders?