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demolition of the former art deco style salerno cookie factory nearly completed

on saturday afternoon i arrived at the salerno cookie factory, or rather what was left of it, after a wrecking company hastily tore down the long stretch of the building's facade. this was comprised of red brick divided by cast concrete columns, accentuated with brightly colored inlaid tile. the once visually stunning art deco "machine age" streamlined style entrance was nearly destroyed and the flanking entrance sconces stripped off and likely scrapped.

i've seen several hundred demolitions in my career, and spent countless hours observing anything from a modest wood-frame house pulled down in an afternoon to a gargantuan commercial structure imploded in an instant. in my humble opinion, i would categorize the salerno cookie factory demolition as one where haste is of utmost importance, in order to facilitate the obliteration of the most critical and/or distinctive architectural features before preservationists cry foul.

the now-demolished art moderne style salerno-megowen biscuit company (founded in 1933 by fred salerno) factory and administration building was listed on the city's 90 day demolition delay list, but was released before that period had been reached, according to preservation chicago. the factory site was the former home to the salerno butter cookie company, which, like the wrigley chewing gum factory and brachs candy factory (both demolished in the past few years), contributed to making chicago the "candy capital of the world." several preservationists revealed that they were not made aware of the demolition until the facade was knocked down by the wrecking company.

ward miller of preservation chicago stated that the "former salerno cookie factory, home of that familiar and delicious butter cookie, at 4500 w. division, an orange-rated building, has apparently been cleared for demolition, despite the fact that it is a rare example of famed architect harold zook in an industrial context." commenting further, ward stated that "the building appeared on the city's mandatory demolition delay hold list, that typically requires buildings of significant architectural merit to be held for 90 days. that doesn't appear to have happened in this case. the application to demolish the building was received by the city on june 29 and was released little more than one week later, on july 8." miller ended his statement with the hopes that the main entrance will be preserved and readapted. as the bulk of the images taken over the weekend are a brutal testament to the fact that saving any and/or all of the building's entrance would not come to fruition.

i managed to grab a fragment, consisting of two alternating color entrance facade face bricks held firmly together with mortar. i made sure to photograph the region where it fell from and also where other similarly arranged bricks remain "in situ." i lightly cleaned the fragment and photographed it in my studio. the images are shown below.



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