BLDG51. News and Events |

09 Mar latest salvaged artifacts recently added to urban remains virtual online catalog

Posted at 22:20h in Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous, New Acquisitions, New Products by Eric

the following gallery offers a glimpse at the most recent american architectural, medical, and industrial artifacts and/or miscellaneous objects added to our ever-expanding urban remains virtual catalog (over 35,500 catalog listings to date). the newly acquired items have been documented, cleaned/refinished (if need be) and...

08 Mar burnham, root, and atwood’s reliance building in 1987

Posted at 16:18h in Bldg. 51, Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous by Eric

burnham, root, and atwoood's reliance building (1890-1895) as it looked in 1987. the mood of this tired building (since restored) is overpowering, so i chose to intervene as little as possible. the kodachrome slides were taken by john vinci. i wish i could've spent a...

05 Mar village theater’s polychrome terra cotta facade stays, but the building’s auditorium goes

Posted at 16:37h in Bldg. 51, Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous by Eric

work has begun on village theater (built as the germania in 1916). concealing the facade by stacking three 53' foot containers is interesting. the auditorium will be demolished, but the facade will remain intact. will have to keep a close on eye on this one. ...

01 Mar several historically important artifacts, books and ephemera join bldg. 51 museum and archive in 2018

Posted at 22:42h in Bldg. 51, Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous, New Acquisitions, New Products by Eric

2018 looks to be a very promising year in terms of ephemera, book, and artifact acquisition - based upon what the bldg. 51 museum archive has already secured, along with arrangements in the works or nearing finalization. the ever-growing museum archive has reached a critical...

27 Feb another post-fire chicago residence on orchard faces wrecking machine

Posted at 21:20h in Bldg. 51, Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous, Salvages by Eric

i finally had a chance to leave my shop and shoot architectural ornament this afternoon. while driving around old town i recalled a demo permit issued for a structure on orchard. i had to triple-check the address (2252 n. orchard) when i pulled up...

24 Feb herman v. von holst’s southside chicago prairie style gaitan building (1924) threatened with demolition

Posted at 23:43h in Bldg. 51, Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous by Eric

a green fence was wrapped around a southside chicago comed substation named the gaitan building (1924) - located at 6141 s. prairie ave a few days ago. this is yet another building from the chicago landmarks historic survey that may be wiped from memory. i...

22 Feb john vinci slides of chicago’s past: the first of several posts covering the digitizing of his extensive archive

Posted at 03:58h in Bldg. 51, Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous by Eric

[caption id="attachment_35297" align="alignleft" width="1200"] chicago stock exchange trading room blueprint, 1977.[/caption] i've spent the last several months digitizing hundreds of kodachrome slides taken by john vinci beginning in the late 1950's and ending in 1990's when he retired his hasselblad 500c camera (kodachrome film was discontinued in...

21 Feb with demolition complete, documentation of south side masonic temple draws to a close

Posted at 15:07h in Bldg. 51, Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous, Salvages by Eric

by eric j. nordstrom and ornament chicago [caption id="attachment_35763" align="alignleft" width="1200"] the last series of images chronicling the demolition of clarence hatzfeld's south side masonic temple (1921).[/caption] [caption id="attachment_35766" align="alignleft" width="1200"] south entrance partially covered in snow.[/caption] [caption id="attachment_35765" align="alignleft" width="1200"] machines at rest after chicago snowstorm.[/caption] [caption id="attachment_35764"...

20 Feb devoting time to document chicago’s architecture has proved challenging in 2018

Posted at 20:27h in Bldg. 51, Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous by Eric

spending countless hours over the past several months digitizing and disseminating john vinci and tim samuelson's historically important chicago architectural objects and ephemera, along with restructuring my architectural fragment museum in preparation for moving it to a storefront accessible to the public, has been immensely...

16 Feb bldg. 51 museum hosts iit’s college of architecture phd program student field trip

Posted at 23:45h in Bldg. 51, Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous by Eric

i was honored that students and faculty from the illinois institute of technology's school of architecture phd program chose to visit the bldg. 51 museum for their field trip in january of 2018. the extensive tour was a great opportunity to view and discuss historically...

16 Feb newly discovered photographs capture the tragic loss of adler & sullivan’s pilgrim baptist church

Posted at 21:29h in Bldg. 51, Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous by Eric

[caption id="attachment_35691" align="alignleft" width="917"] photo courtesy of the richard nickel archive and chicago art institute.[/caption] [caption id="attachment_35692" align="alignleft" width="1767"] photo courtesy of the richard nickel archive and chicago art institute.[/caption] one of the most important objectives this year is to begin the arduous process of navigating...

13 Feb revisiting “unearthing chicago” in 2018

Posted at 00:46h in Bldg. 51, Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous, Salvages by Eric

i have tens of thousands of images taken from dig sites across the city of chicago. sadly, only a few hundred have been edited and added to blog posts over the years. the "unearthing chicago" book will remain in suspended animation until the day i...

10 Feb demolition nearing its end on clarence hatzfeld’s south masonic temple building

Posted at 01:27h in Bldg. 51, Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous, Salvages by Eric

by eric j. nordstrom & ornament chicago very little remains of south side masonic temple (1921). a few riveted joint steel trusses and columns, partially covered with chunks of dangling concrete, will be pulled apart with the wrecker's long reach excavator this week. remnants of a grand...

08 Feb artifacts dating from the 1860s recently unearthed from downtown chicago excavation site

Posted at 01:50h in Bldg. 51, Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous, New Acquisitions by Eric

i finally had time to shoot these two artifacts unearthed from a downtown chicago dump a while back. the 1860's hutchinson "ring top" bottle was found 15 feet below grade. the single-sided porcelain enameled depression era chicago sign, dug from the same location, was found...

06 Feb a relentless focus on digitizing images of chicago’s past a welcome change from documenting building ornament

Posted at 23:06h in Bldg. 51, Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous by Eric

i've devoted a few hours nearly every evening (beginning in late fall) digitizing the archives of both john vinci and tim samuelson as a countermeasure to battle the onset of burnout from non-stop documentation of architectural ornament adorning historically important buildings across the city. viewing chicago's...

02 Feb unusual time capsule extracted from bethel church (1905) during building’s demolition

Posted at 16:43h in Bldg. 51, Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous, Salvages by Eric

by eric j. nordstrom and ornament chicago built as the bethel norwegian danish methodist episcopal church in 1905, the ingleside community church of the nazarene was demolished this week by heneghan wrecking. through a collective effort yesterday afternoon, the dated bedford limestone cornerstone and diminutive lithographed...

01 Feb newly discovered images offer a closer look at richard nickel salvaging garrick theater

Posted at 20:44h in Bldg. 51, Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous, Salvages by Eric

the following images are part of my ongoing efforts to digitize what i've dubbed "the john vinci artifact and photographic archive." given my limited bandwidth, i'm posting images now with the hopes of returning to fill in badly needed contextual information to offer greater insight and/or...

31 Jan DOCUMENTATION OF SOUTH MASONIC TEMPLE BUILDING (1921) DEMOLITION CONTINUED, PART 6

Posted at 22:15h in Bldg. 51, Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous, Salvages by Eric

by eric j. nordstrom and ornament chicago images of the south side masonic temple building (1921) taken this morning. a single bedford limestone fluted column with ionic capital remains standing. the majority of clarence hatzfeld's ornament is on the ground in ruin or buried in a...

29 Jan contents from humboldt garage & auto service building walk-in vault saved shortly before its demolition

Posted at 22:44h in Bldg. 51, Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous, New Acquisitions, Salvages by Eric

the former humboldt garage & auto service company building (1911) had a walk-in vault. shortly before that section of the building was demolished, the wreckers managed to open the door, where they discovered several ledgers, signs, salesman samples, blueprints, and other odds and ends left...

25 Jan DOCUMENTATION OF SOUTH MASONIC TEMPLE BUILDING (1921) DEMOLITION CONTINUED, PART 5

Posted at 22:36h in Bldg. 51, Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous, Salvages by Eric

by eric j. nordstrom & ornament chicago with all the wrecking machines working in unison now, the south side masonic temple's east and north facades are fading fast. thankfully, some ornament has been carefully removed and awaits a new home - wherever that may be. sadly, the...