The 55 East Erie Street Building is a Contemporary skyscraper designed by Fujikawa Johnson & Associates, in association with Searl & Associates Architects., and built between 2001 and 2004 in Chicago, IL.
Its precise street address is 55 East Erie, Chicago, IL. You can also find it on the map here.
Fujikawa Johnson & Associates was the architecture firm in charge of the architectural design, in association with Searl & Associates Architects..
Fujikawa Johnson & Associates is the closest to a continuation of the firm Mies van der Rohe ran in Chicago almost from the day he left Germany until he passed away in 1969.
The Chicago-based firm, which still remains active, designed many buildings which one could easily mistake for Mies’s. Both founding partners worked for Mies and even remained as partners at his practice after he died, until they left to form their own practice in 1982.
Fujikawa in particular was known to be a big advocate of the “less is more”, steel and glass aesthetic that Mies promoted. In the words of his associates, sometimes it even seemed like Fujikawa wanted to be more like Mies than Mies himself!
That being said, architecture is a complex discipline involving many professionals from different fields, without whom this building would have not been possible. We will surely be leaving out a lot of names here, but here is a list of the people we do know also played their part in making the 55 East Erie Street Building a reality:
The 55 East Erie Street Building can be categorized as a Contemporary building.
Contemporary style architecture builds on top of the principles of Modernism and Postmodernism, but incorporates other variables which might not have been that important in the past, but certainly are today, such as technology, sustainability, inclusivity, and others.
From a historical point of view, it is hard to categorize things from a not-so-distant time, and therefore we choose to categorize most buildings built after the year 2000 as "Contemporary". It is possible that as time goes by and we, as a society, gain perspective on the things happening today, we'll be able to look back and recategorize all these buildings into more concrete subsections, some of which might not even exist today.
The 55 East Erie Street Building reaches an architectural height of 647ft (197.2m). It has a total of 56 floors.
In regards to parking space, the building has a total of 425 spots available, which roughly equals 8 spots per floor (above ground).
Ever since opening its doors to the public in 2004, the 55 East Erie Street Building has mainly been used as Residential space.
The 55 East Erie Street Building has a total of 194 residential units throughout its 56 floors. If you are interested in learning more about the residences and their availability, you can check the 55 East Erie Street Building's website.
The 55 East Erie Street Building uses a frame structure made of steel columns and concrete slabs.
A frame structure uses a combination of beams and columns to sustain the building's weight. The walls in this case are non-load bearing, which allows for more flexibility when distributing the interior spaces.
From an aesthetic point of view, the facade features a harmonious interplay of two predominant materials: concrete and glass. The precast concrete blocks, distinguished by their light hue, serve as the guiding elements that seamlessly adhere to the architectural structure. These blocks not only lend a sense of order to the facade but also establish a foundational aesthetic. In tandem, the floor-to-roof glass panels, functioning as the enclosing components, delicately follow suit, adding a refined touch to the overall composition.
The facade undergoes various design operations, each contributing to the distinctive personality of the building. for example, the process of dematerialization where the balconies appear, stands out as a defining operation employed to sculpt the singular identity of the tower.
