Also known as: The IBM Building Formerly: One IBM Plaza Built: 1969-1971 Designed by: Ludwig Mies van der Rohe Type: Skyscraper Stories: 52 Maximum Height: 695 feet / 212 meters Location: 330 North Wabash Street, Chicago, United States
A landmark of modern architecture, 330 North Wabash set a standard that is still being copied by architects around the world. It is undeniably one of the great works of "serious" architecture.
Perched along a slight bend in the Chicago River, the building takes stately to a new level. Its design manages to be all business, but not stuffy. When seen on a bright day from across the river its darkness contrasts with the bright stone and glittering reflective glass of its neighbors. But that presence only works when the weather is good. When things aren't at their peak the building robs the area of much needed light and manages to be little more than a massive void in the sky.
Still, the building is considered an architectural masterpiece. It keeps no secrets. Even a quick look reveals this building's bones. You can clearly see the structural steel, the mechanical floor, and the columns that make this structure possible. Unlike its new-fangled neighbors who hide their flaws beneath a skin of silver glass, this building is raw architecture out in the open.
It is also something of an engineering feat. The building had to avoid a freight rail line that brought newspaper rolls to the Chicago Sun-Times building that was once on the other side of Wabash Street. The City of Chicago even helped out a little with the engineering, shifting the path of Wabash slightly to allow the architect to pursue the building shape he desired.
This building has an unusually robust electrical system to handle the types of computers that IBM would have been using in the 1960's and 1970's when it commissioned the building.
The planned hotel would have 335 rooms.
1969: Construction begins
1971: Construction ends
1996: IBM sold this building to the Blackstone Group.
January 4, 2005: Crain's Chicago Business reports that the owners of this building were considering converting it to condominiums.
2006: IBM moves to the Hyatt Center.
2007: An idea was floated to convert the top 38 stories of this building into a hotel.
February 6, 2008: This building is named a Chicago landmark.
March, 2008: 12 floors of this building are sold to a hotel company for $46 million.
2010: Anticipated opening of the hotel component of this building.
This building used to have magnificent views of Lake Michigan. They were taken away when the old Chicago Sun-Times building was torn down and replaced with the Trump International Hotel and Tower.
The building is surrounded on all sides by a public plaza. It's a good place to sit and catch your breath and watch the city go by.
C. M.
Monday, September 29th, 2008 @ 12:44am
Rating: Five stars. Mies Van Der Rohe was revolutionary because of the way that he handled structure and proportion. He designed everything. The above description about being able to "clearly see the structural steel" is misleading because the vertical, exterior steel members are not structural but rather ornamental and are there to tell the story of the structure but not to actually utilizie the vertical pieces. He was "lying to tell the truth" so to speak.
another aaron
Monday, June 30th, 2008 @ 11:49am
Rating: One star. Someone needs to explain vad der Rhoe to me. I understand his approach was revolutionary, but his buildings seems to suck light out of their suroundsings and add nothing.
Aaron Burger
Monday, May 26th, 2008 @ 4:20pm
Rating: Four stars. I didn't used to like this building, but over the years it grew on me. I can't imagine Chicago without it.
Sam
Sunday, April 13th, 2008 @ 1:20am
Rating: One star. Mies's work is terrible. The only piece I've ever enjoyed by him is the Farnsworth House, and that's probably because it's out in the boonies and isn't ruining great cities.
David Shmuel
Thursday, July 26th, 2007 @ 10:46pm
Rating: One star. Sorry, I might be in the minority here, but, for the most part, I have not been a fan of Mies van der Rhoe's work.
Peter Nelson
Sunday, July 22nd, 2007 @ 12:41am
The current 1st and 4th pictures of the IBM Building along the left of this page, which seem to be taken from the Michigan Avenue Bridge, show exactly what is wrong about it--and most any tall Mies building, for that matter: It is a black slab that visually serves, primarily, to obliterate whatever part of your field of view it occupies. You can find design and engineering details to be impressed with on a less immediate level, but the basic reality is that the IBM Building seems to create a gaping void. # # # In the case of these two views from the east, it is like someone dropped a black screen to block out the great Marina City towers--in the next block west--and terminating any vista of the rest of the north bank of the Chicago River. To the partial credit of Mies and IBM, they did make a point to set the building back behind a plaza so the Marina City residents could still see east up the river and (many of them) to the lake.
wilson frederick
Monday, January 23rd, 2006 @ 2:55am
Rating: Three stars. Its great to witness an architectural masterpiece by a master craftsman Ludwig Mies Van der Rohe!
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C. M.
Five stars.
One star.
Four stars.
wilson frederick
Three stars.