21 Jan

Posted at 15:12h in Bldg. 51, Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous, New Acquisitions, New Products by

another year has drawn to a close and looking back, the bldg. 51 museum collection managed to secure several historically important architectural fragments, in addition to the evolving archive, consisting of period photographs, books, documents, drawings, blueprints, models, and other related materials that will prove...

16 Jan

Posted at 01:25h in Bldg. 51, Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous by

for richard nickel, ruth moore, joe benson, john vinci, and david norris. the schiller building virtual archive's images and artifacts courtesy of ryerson and burnham, art institute of chicago, john vinci collection and the bldg. 51 archive.  EXCAVATION OF ADLER AND SULLIVAN'S SCHILLER BUILDING WOOD PILE FOUNDATION...

14 Jan

Posted at 20:28h in Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous, New Acquisitions, New Products by

the following image gallery offers a glimpse at the latest american architectural, medical, and industrial artifacts and/or miscellaneous objects added to the ever-expanding urban remains virtual catalog (over 50,000 items digitized/cataloged over the past 15 years). the newly acquired items have been documented, cleaned/refinished (if...

10 Jan

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

images of sullivan-designed exterior s.a. maxwell building (1881) cast iron mullions and surrounding spandrels with emphasis on protruding bases accentuated with deeply recessed ferns and leaf spirals. the five-story building's exterior ironwork was likely fabricated by snead or possibly union foundry works. i would really like...

08 Jan

Posted at 03:35h in Bldg. 51, Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous by

unfortunately, i didn't have the bandwidth to continually document von holst's 40th street commonwealth edison substation, including its demolition, which is all but complete. when i arrived yesterday afternoon, all that remained were slabs of concrete and a partially exposed basement. i was told...

04 Jan

Posted at 03:38h in Bldg. 51, Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous by

a brief description on the use of wood piles for the foundation supporting adler and sullivan's schiller theater building (1892), along with several images taken by richard nickel in 1961, when the building was demolished and ground excavated exposing the largely intact foundations (including oak...

31 Dec

Posted at 10:17h in Bldg. 51, Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous, New Acquisitions, Salvages by

the following collection on posts revolve around architectural salvage operations (big and small) across the city of chicago over the past decade. in time, i hope to revisit dormant images and information waiting to be transformed into posts to shed light on buildings demolished long...

29 Dec

Posted at 03:16h in Bldg. 51, Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous, Travel by

photographic study of h.h. richardson's sever hall (1878-1880) exterior east facade brick ornament adorning east facade. the richly carved brick ornament was likely executed by the peerless brick company, philadelphia, pa. the 3-story building (4th story set within roof) was constructed using nearly 1.3 million...

23 Dec

Posted at 03:37h in Bldg. 51, Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous by

thankfully, i brought my camera equipment on an afternoon i was given the opportunity to step out onto the swing stage and raised myself up against the louis h. sullivan-designed ohio sandstone panels adorning the upper facade of adler and sullivan's s.a. maxwell five-story loft...

21 Dec

Posted at 21:08h in Bldg. 51, Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous by

john vinci personal kodachrome slides (digitized by the bldg. 51 archive) chronicling his restoration work on louis h. sullivan's schlesinger and meyer department store (1899) from the late 1970's, shortly after vinci and partner larry kenny rebuilt adler and sullivan's chicago stock exchange trading room...

19 Dec

Posted at 18:49h in Bldg. 51, Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous by

after several months of an intensive collaboration - between eric j. nordstrom of bldg. 51 and tigerman mccurry art and architecture archivist nathaniel parks of the ryerson and burnham archives - spent gathering ephemera and artifacts chronicling the recovery and reconstruction of adler and sullivan's...

17 Dec

Posted at 07:41h in Bldg. 51, Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous, New Acquisitions, New Products by

two richly ornamented and historically important architectural fragments from adler and sullivan buildings are the latest additions to the rapidly-expanding bldg. 51 archive and museum. the first piece, executed by james legge and cast in plaster, was salvaged from the 10th floor hotel dining room...

16 Dec

Posted at 20:45h in Bldg. 51, Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous by

latest photographic images from ongoing restoration of howells and hood's bedford limestone tribune tower (1925) and cornerstone extraction of incised limestone cornerstone with time capsule from jarvis hunt's printing plant (1929). the majority of the images focus on capturing tradesmen restoring the tower's bedford limestone...

16 Dec

Posted at 18:56h in Bldg. 51, Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous by

a selection of images of 19th and early 20th century exterior residential prairie school architecture located in and around oak park, river forest and riverside. the majority of the images from this ongoing study focus on the ornamentation designed by notable chicago architects william drummond,...

14 Dec

Posted at 13:37h in Bldg. 51, Events & Announcements, Featured Posts, Miscellaneous by

[caption id="attachment_36362" align="alignleft" width="1500"] detail of chicago stock exchange trading room main truss stencil and monogrammed plaster discovered shortly after the false ceilings were removed by john vinci, richard nickel, and others assigned to dismantle ornament from the room. note the dust-covered mazda light bulbs...

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