Urban Remains Chicago News and Events

latest photos from my ongoing documentation of howells and hood's chicago tribune tower (completed, 1925) restoration taken in december of 2018 and january of 2019. if i recall correctly (see additional posts below), i began shooting the building in august when the first crews arrived.  since my last visit, i see additional scaffolding being erected around the tower as restoration...

a closer look at john root's exterior ornament adorning st. gabriel's church (1887). i mainly focused on carved brownstone (cannot recall if the sandstone was quarried in michigan) ornament located on the north and west facades of church. building alterations, including additions (e.g., vestibule and entry were added to north of church), and interior renovations (e.g., replacement of windows, pews...

trinity evangelical lutheran church sits near the corner of west highland avenue and north 9th street. originally established by german immigrants in 1847, the building, as it stood until may 2018, was designed by architect frederick velguth in german romanesque or gothic revival style. what remains of the cream city brick, a lightly colored brick manufactured locally, and sandstone details can be seen...

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 45,000 catalog listings to date). the newly acquired items have been documented, cleaned/refinished (if need be) and photographed prior to being added to their respective urban remains website categories.

urban remains recently bought out a large assortment of late 19th and early 20th century plumbing fixtures and parts from a well-established plumbing company that's in the process of closing its doors after nearly a century in business. based in oak park, the company outfitted, replaced, and restored many residential and commercial building bathrooms in and around chicago. there services were...

i didn't think demolition of these adjoining 19th century rowhouses on webster (documented in an earlier post) would happen so quickly. a bit jarring to say the least.  one of the two italianate style houses has been mostly reduced to rubble. the one to the east is still standing, but the cornice is mangled and minton tiles ready to fall...

another year has come to a close and looking back, the bldg. 51 museum collection  managed to secure several historically important architectural fragments, along with the addition of a rapidly growing archive, consisting of period photographs, books, documents, and other related materials, to compliment the museum's ornament for future exhibitions. highlights from 2018 are listed below as links with "hero" banners. CHICAGO'S...

two 19th century post fire two-story italianate style brick rowhouses on webster await the wrecking ball. the well-maintained masonry homes are accentuated with seldom seen richly colored enameled minton tiles with visually striking designs.  in addition to photographing the facade in great detail, i stepped back and shot the neighboring homes – all built around the same period. the continuity...

a trip to milwaukee last weekend led to a much-needed, albeit abbreviated photographic survey of architectural building ornament (primarily terra cotta) adorning three historically significant 19th century buildings i've repeatedly visited for the last 20 years while traveling on my carefully curated "circuit" of structures within the confines of late 19th and early 20th century milwaukee architecture. in my humble opinion, the kalvelage mansion - also...

as 2018 draws to a close, i culled the urban remains/bldg. 51 blog post archive to create a carefully curated collection of information, images, and acquisitions capping a year of relentless, unforgiving, and exhaustive work. the creation of this ever-expanding american architectural history database - revolving around 19th and early 20th century chicago construction materials and methods - has slowly morphed...

highlights: finally, i found an original early 20th century chicago athletic association "cherry circle" profusely illustrated year book, providing seldom seen images of the club's various rooms (including schmidt, garden & martin's 1907 annex), before they were moderately altered in subsequent years, including the 1921 addition, cherry circle bar, etc. by this time, the "drooping tip" ceilings in the grand...

photographic survey of interior cast bronze ornament in the lobby of one lasalle street building, completed in 1930. tone lasalle street building was built in 1930 by architects vitzthum & burns – replacing the tacoma building by holabird & roche. the building is located across madison street from roanoke building. it was designated a chicago landmark on april 16, 1996, and added...

the scope of burnham and root’s 1888 rookery building isn’t something that can be understood in a few visits. with each visit, one leaves with a greater insight, a better understanding and also plagued by a perpetual need to ask for more – more detail, more questions. it’s allure is mystifying and has kept me coming back, searching for additional...

i managed to revisit where i left off, documenting the exterior restoration work on the 40-story chicago jewelers building's southwest corner over weekend.  i focused on areas where installation of replicated cream-colored glazed terra cotta (executed by boston valley) is underway. a few additional images were taken of the southwest turret - one of four originally used to conceal water tanks...

seldom seen 1950s photographic print (not by richard nickel) of adler and sullivan's garrick theater when it was converted from theater to tv studio. there are additional images from this "series," so i will be sure to post them. the ornamental balcony plaster looks polychromed, but it's likely shadows.  courtesy of the ryerson and burhnam archive. additional photographic images (8...

the latest efforts to digitize notable chicago architect john vinci's collection of kodachrome and/or ektachrome slides presented below. to see previous installations or galleries of images from this ever-growing collection, visit the links below. captions will be added to the slides as time permits. additional images (other than kodachromes) i digitized include: the illinois institute of technology in the 1940s, kristian...

once again, i've revisited richard nickel's archive on adler and sullivan's 1892 schiller building, demolished in 1961. the "salvaging the garrick" book is slowly coming together as i continue to gather archival material, digitize photographic images, and acquire any and all ornament salvaged during its demolition.  a selection of the latest images i digitized over the past two weeks is...

during my very brief visit to boston in late november, i took thousands of images of focusing on h.h. richardson's architecture, late 19th century ornament (e.g., carved brick) adorning houses located in the backbay neighborhood, mit chapel, a small selection of building on harvard's campus (e.g., sever hall, austin hall, ware and van brunt's victorian gothic memorial hall) and finally, brattle...

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 45,000 catalog listings to date). the newly acquired items have been documented, cleaned/refinished (if need be) and photographed prior to being added to their respective urban remains website categories.

unfortunately, i haven't had much time to visit neighboring wisconsin this year to photograph architecture in cities and town across the state. i did have a chance to revisit louis h. sullivan's farmers and merchants union bank in columbus (1919) while in madison shooting the two bradley houses - the first by sullivan (1908) and the second by purcell, feick...