James R. Thompson Center
The James R. Thompson Center is a postmodern-style building at 100 W. Randolph Street in the Loop district of Chicago, Illinois, United States. Designed by architect Helmut Jahn around a post-modernist rotunda, it was built to house offices of the Illinois state government in Chicago. The building occupies an entire block bounded by Randolph, Lake, Clark and LaSalle streets.
Prior to the development of the State of Illinois Center, many offices of the government of Illinois were housed at 160 North LaSalle Street. Governor James R. Thompson allocated funding for the State of Illinois Center in 1978, and Jahn was selected as the architect, announcing his plans in 1980. The building opened in 1985 after several delays and a construction accident that killed five people. It was renamed for Thompson in 1993. By the 2000s, the building was functionally outdated, prompting three successive governors to propose redeveloping or selling the building. The sale proposals elicited numerous objections from preservationists, who unsuccessfully tried to have it added to the National Register of Historic Places. Alphabet Inc., the parent company of Google, finally acquired the building in 2022 and began renovating it in 2024.
The 17-story building curves and slopes facing a plaza on the southeast corner of the property. The facade is made of glass, which was originally multicolored and single-paned; the panels were replaced with insulated glass during the 2020s. On the building's roof is a round sloped skylight, which covers the building's circular atrium. A large transparent glass extension running from the skylight down the sloped front of the building, allowed views of the surrounding skyscrapers from the rotunda. The Thompson Center's atrium overlooks all of the building's stories and originally had semi-circular balconies, with exposed stairs on three sides opposite the front, and a glass enclosed elevator column opposite the front. Office floors stretched back from the balconies to the end of the building, which extended in straight outline to the back corner property lines. The building included 19 specially commissioned artworks funded by the State of Illinois Art-in-Architecture Program, among them the Monument with Standing Beast sculpture by Jean Dubuffet. The building's unconventional design has attracted mixed reviews over the years.
Site
The James R. Thompson Center occupies the entire block bounded by Randolph, Lake, Clark and LaSalle Streets, within the Chicago Loop in downtown Chicago, Illinois, United States. The location was previously the site of the Sherman House Hotel operated by Ernie Byfield. The hotel closed in 1973 and was demolished in 1980.The Chicago "L"'s Clark/Lake station is housed between the Thompson Center and the 203 N. LaSalle building across the street. The building serves as the main entrance to the station, which is served by the Orange, Green, Blue, Pink, Purple and Brown lines, and it leads directly to the eastern end of the station. The building is linked to the Chicago Pedway, with pedestrian tunnels connecting to 203 North LaSalle Street, the Chicago Title and Trust Company, and the City Hall-County Building. When the Thompson Center was built, it was surrounded by taller skyscrapers. The Thompson Center's architecture contrasted with that of nearby buildings, which tended to be rectangular and made of stone.
History
Development
Prior to the development of the State of Illinois Center, many offices of the government of Illinois were housed at 160 North LaSalle Street. That building was insufficient for the state government's needs, so the state also had to rent space in numerous buildings, paying about $2 million a year.Planning
Governor Dan Walker initially wanted to build a replacement building on the south end of the Loop. When Walker lost re-nomination in 1976, the developer Arthur Rubloff, one supporter of Thompson, suggested constructing the building at the north end of the Loop instead. After studying various sites for 27 months, a state agency selected the Sherman House site on March 29, 1978. That August, Thompson signed a bill to allocate $15 million for a new state-government office building on the site of the Sherman House. This move followed a failed attempt earlier that year by the Illinois General Assembly, the state's legislature, to allocate $11 million for the project; the legislature had provided only $2.5 million. At the time, Thompson considered the old LaSalle Street building to be very energy-efficient. Another $12 million for the State of Illinois Center's development was allocated in August 1979.The building was initially expected to cost $85 million. Local architect Helmut Jahn was hired to design the State of Illinois Center, beating out seven other architects. Jahn called the project a great opportunity, saying that the limited number of stakeholders and the building's full block site gave him a large amount of flexibility with the design. In particular, the fact that the building's sole tenant was the Illinois government meant that they were "less likely to have their egos involved in a project the way owner is", according to Jahn. He presented three proposals to Thompson in 1979; two proposals were for more typical designs, while the other had an unusual curved, inclined facade. Thompson decided to go with the less conventional design, saying it "had presence" and signified a forward-looking mentality.
Jahn announced his plans in February 1980, and a model of the proposed structure was unveiled at the same time. By then, the building was to cost $115 million and accommodate 4,200 staff of 54 state agencies after its expected completion in 1983. The construction cost included around $90 million for constructing the building itself, as well as $25 million for furnishings. At the time, the building was intended to contain of offices, of commercial space, a rotunda, and a glass facade. Vickrey, Ovresat, Awwumb, Inc. were hired as the interior architect. The demolition of the Sherman House and several nearby buildings began that year.
Construction
When the building's construction was announced, Thompson pledged to hire a large number of minority business enterprises for the project, and a review board was convened to ensure that the project was hiring minority contractors. By early 1981, the site was being excavated. The general construction contract was awarded to a joint venture of Newberg Construction and Paschen Contractors in May 1981. The project was delayed because not enough contractors had submitted bids to build the structure's exterior curtain wall; contractors were reluctant to bid on the panels, which were required to be both curved and resistant to leakage. State officials considered awarding the curtain-wall contract to a foreign firm, but the contract was eventually awarded to an American company, H. H. Robertson Co., that September. Work was also delayed due to a labor strike that year, and water accumulated in the foundation during the strike, forcing workers to pump out the water. The cost of the building had increased to $150 million by late 1981, making it the most expensive state-funded building ever built in Illinois, while the opening date had been pushed back to mid-1984.On December 11, 1981, five workers were killed when a steel cage at the construction site plummeted to the ground. Preliminary investigations found that the cage suffered from metal fatigue. This accident did not delay construction of the building. Construction of the foundation was completed by March 1982, and the steel frame had reached the sixth floor by the next month. The project was not hindered by rain, and since the frame used little concrete, there was no need for workers to wait for warmer weather before pouring concrete. While the project had caused part of LaSalle Street to sag, workers planned to repair the road. Meanwhile, several Chicago artists had asked the French sculptor Jean Dubuffet to create a sculpture for the State of Illinois Center. By early 1982, Dubuffet had agreed to construct a sculpture for $750,000. The steel frame topped out on September 1, 1982, at which point the construction cost had increased to $172 million. Other estimates in 1983–1984 put the cost at around $118 million.
State officials revised the plans in 1983 to save about $9 million. Nonetheless, the cost had risen further to $176.2 million by 1984, making it the costliest governmental building ever built in Illinois. Due to budget overruns, the state government substituted the facade's double-paned glass panels with single-paned glass, and they considered canceling a proposed art gallery inside the building. The state saved money by canceling earlier plans to install hundreds of doors. Kitchenettes and padded floors were omitted from the plans, and the offices were outfitted with secondhand furniture rather than new furnishings. To comply with a state law mandating that part of the construction cost be used for artwork, the state government commissioned 19 artists to design $367,000 worth of art for the building.
Completion
State Building Venture was selected to operate a mall on three of the lower stories; rent from the mall was expected to produce $14 million in revenue for the building over its first 15 years. By February 1984, the building's mall was 80% leased. That June, Mayor Harold Washington requested that the Chicago City Council exempt State Building Venture from having to acquire a building permit for the mall. City council members expressed concerns that the shopping mall did not meet building codes and that the emergency systems were inadequate. In addition, the Illinois Attorney General's office said that the building's floors could not support the weight of the office's law library, requiring up to $150,000 in reinforcement work.The incomplete building was briefly opened to the public when Dubuffet's Monument with Standing Beast sculpture was dedicated outside the building in November 1984. Employees began moving into the State of Illinois Center near the end of that year, including the governor himself, who alternately worked in Chicago and the state capital of Springfield. Thompson first invited visitors to his new office at the building in February 1985, and two-thirds of the building's employees had moved in by April 1985. The same month, firefighters were stationed outside the new building after the city government filed a lawsuit alleging that the building was unsafe for occupancy. The final cost of the building totaled $172 million, nearly twice the original cost estimate, which later prompted an investigation from state auditors.