it’s been awhile since i’ve documented chicago houses faced with death by demolition. with such limited bandwidth as of late, it’s become increasingly hard to document everything i care deeply about. after seeing this 19th century masonry cottage land on the chopping block over the weekend...
the following blog entry was first posted on july 15th, 2015. i spent the greater part of a day documenting and salvaging ornament from the historically-important early 20th century saloon building that has been identified as the only known "tied house" (i.e., exclusively sold and served standard-brand beer bottled and...
images of howells and hood's chicago tribune tower (completed, 1925) restoration taken earlier this week. despite repeatedly shooting the building for months now, i never grow tired gazing at the crown's gothic style carved bedford limestone ornament. ...
my goal is to digitize any and all images taken by richard nickel of the demolition, salvage, and dispersal of ornament from adler and sullivan's garrick theater (1892-1961) by the end of the year. the images will be a primary source used to build upon the...
my latest project involves scanning seldom seen images of architects, advertisements, and buildings from several late 19th and early 20th century "architects and builders" handbooks i recently acquired over the weekend. the softbound books were published by the chicago architects' business association. the building pictured is...
the following image 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 40,000 catalog listings to date). the newly acquired items have been documented, cleaned/refinished (if need be)...
yesterday afternoon i watched as the parapet wall with terra cotta name plaque come crashing down. in the process both border sections and rondel were chipped or damaged. the sullivanesque terra cotta is a total loss, but it appears the plaque -...
fulton market has been transforming at a dizzying pace, accelerated by the arrival of google in late 2015. since then, several early 20th century structures have either been wiped off the block or remain standing in the form of restored facades with newly-built buildings. HISTORICALLY IMPORTANT...
i was given a small window of time to document the upper floors (3-5) of adler and sullivan's s.a. maxwell loft building (commonly known as the jewelers' building) by the current owners last week. during that time i focused solely on finding any and all...
the following collection of images (posted in chronological order) of howells and hood's gothic style chicago tribune tower are from multiple visits over the past two months (fall, 2018). the tribune tower is one of many projects i've carved out time to revisit time and again...
less than 24 hours after securing three historically important 19th and early 20th century chicago building artifacts, i've researched, photographed, and cataloged them for future exhibit in the bldg. 51 museum. images and brief descriptions below. the early 20th century glazed terra cotta rearing lions were...
the stevens-davis advertising company building (completed, 1921) is set to be smashed. i was alerted this morning through cityscape's demo tracker (see link below). the facade is adorned with exquisite polychrome glazed terra cotta ornament executed by the midland terra cotta company. i'm curious whether the...
the following image 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 40,000 catalog listings to date). the newly acquired items have been documented, cleaned/refinished (if need be)...
documenting louis sullivan's national famers' bank of owatonna (1908) was exhausting. pouring over and carefully selecting hundreds of images cataloging sullivan, millet, and elmslie's ornament has left me with extreme eye fatigue. the ornament's energy was intense, but at the same time, calming. hard to explain,...
the latest efforts to digitize notable chicago architect john vinci's collection of kodachrome and/or ektachrome slides presented below. to see the first installation or gallery of images from this ever-growing collection, please click on the link below. captions will be added to the slides as...
an original and historically important john wellborn root-designed ornamental cast iron pilaster fragment, salvaged during the removal the the building's adams street entrance staircase, is the latest addition to the bldg. 51's every-growing museum architectural ornament collection. construction of the rookery building took place between...
additional scaffolding erected against facade of chicago's cook county hospital (1914) since my last visit a week, possibly two weeks ago. i will continue documenting the facade's transformation, which began with its cleaning, until the final product is delivered. ...
the following image 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 40,000 catalog listings to date). the newly acquired items have been documented, cleaned/refinished (if need be)...
with cook county hospital's facade - comprised mainly of ornamental terra cotta - now scrubbed clean, scaffolding is being erected to being the arduous task of repairing and replacing the massive facade's damaged elements. in addition to addressing the building's existing terra cotta, the restoration...
with some "downtime" (whatever that means) this evening, i decided to slowly begin processing the enormous mountain of data generated from the seemingly unending residential demolitions that happened back in april. it should be no surprise that nearly every blog post lately mentions my ongoing battle...