GreenBean

Cook County Domestic Violence Courthouse

Location
555 W. Harrison Map

Owner
Cook County, IL

Architect
Campbell Tiu Campbell
(Architect of Record)
Booth Hansen (Design)
Photo: Mark Ballogg

The Cook County Domestic Violence Courthouse is a 4-story, 169,000 sf building housing 10 courtrooms, social services, childcare facilities, and public agency office space. The building opened in October 2005 and is seeking LEED Silver certification. It is a replacement for the previous courthouse building at 13th and Michigan with woefully inadequate facilities. The building is the first constructed under Cook County's ordinance requiring LEED certification for all new county-owned buildings and won the 2006 Chicago Building Congress Merit Award for Rehab Construction.

Center on Halsted

Location
3656 N. Halsted Map

Owner
Center on Halsted

Architect
Gensler
Image courtesy of ImageFiciton

Center on Halsted is a 3-story, 175,000 sf community center serving Chicago's LGBT community with offices and meeting space, a gymnasium, and a small performance space. A Whole Foods supermarket is on the first floor and there are two levels of underground parking. Construction began in summer of 2005 and is scheduled for completion in late 2007. The project is seeking LEED Silver certificatiion.

Greenworks

Location
457 N. Sacramento Map

Owner
Christy Webber Landscapes

Architect
Farr Associates
Image ©Farr Associates | Architecture | Planning | Preservation, Chicago, IL

Greenworks is a new 18,000 sf 1-story office and industrial building for Christy Webber, one of Chicago's leading landscape contractors. In addition to front-office space, the building includes tool maintenance and storage areas, a rooftop greenhouse, and outdoor truck and landscape storage areas. Construction began in the fall of 2005. The project is seeking LEED Gold certification and will be featured in the MCA's companion to the visiting Massive Change exhibition.

Wentworth Commons

Location
11045 S. Wentworth Map

Owner
Mercy Housing Lakefront

Architect
Harley Ellis Devereaux

Wentworth Commons is a 4-story, 65,800 sf apartment building with 51 units and supportive services on the first floor. The building opened in June 2005, was designed to be green from its initiation, and is seeking LEED Certification. Detailed case studies are available here and here, and there is a brief Blair Kamin review. Most case studies highlight the brightly-colored graffiti-resistant exterior.

Discussion: Where is Chicago's marquee project?

GreenBean has seen a nice jump in readership today thanks to Payton Chung on Gristmill. So, this is a good time to experiment with an occasional discussion feature I've considered including.

Chicago has been generating tons of positive press for its green efforts, including green buildings. There are lots of green building projects in process, but we lack an all-out, cutting-edge, high-publicity project, such as The Solaire or Bank of America tower in NYC. Their green elements are at the core of the public image of these projects. We have large and high-profile projects that are green, but they don't shout about it, and we have some very cutting-edge projects, but they aren't large enough to generate the right kind of attention.

Chicago is ready for and needs a project like this to help elevate green building. We're famous for leading the way in architecture, and our overall collection of green buildings does, but that's only half the story. Among other things, a highly visible demonstration project could spur competition between developers and demand among building purchases. Right now many Chicagoans think green roofs are the end of the story.

So, why doesn't Chicago already have it? We're not a corporate headquarters? The residential market's not the same as New York's? What will it take to make it happen?

Comments are encouraged on all posts, but especially here - let's hear your thoughts!

Rubloff Hall

Location
10204 S. Central Park Map

Owner
St. Xavier University

Architect
Solomon Cordwell Buenz

Rubloff Hall is a new 5-story, 37,000 sf residence hall on the campus of St. Xavier University seeking LEED Silver certification. The 26 unit, 87 bed building is opening to students this month and is the third of a series of similar dormitories recently completed, but the only one built as a green building. The dorms form a new quadrangle on campus and accommodate a growing demand for student housing. In addition to the residential units there are some office and event spaces.

One South Dearborn

Location
1 S. Dearborn Map

Owner
Hines

Architect
Richard Keating (Design)
DeStefano + Partners (Architect of Record)

One South Dearborn is a 40-story, 820,000 sf office tower that has earned LEED for Core and Shell Silver certification. The building was completed in late 2005 and like any new loop high-rise has been extensively reviewed and discussed (e.g. general information here, Blair Kamin's review here {fee}, and construction discussion here).

Clybourn Point

Location
1322 N. Clybourn Map

Owner
Rada Development

Architect
Rada Architects

Clybourn Point is a four-story mixed-use building with six residential units and a first-floor commercial space. This is one of the smallest projects currently seeking LEED certification (goal of LEED Silver) in Chicago, and is owned by a first-time developer. Many smaller green residential projects are owned by new developers who recognize green building as a way to differentiate their product, and Clybourn Point is certainly in that group. The project is also just up the street from Near North SRO (to be discussed in a future post) and City Farm, making this stretch of Clybourn one of the greenest areas in the city.

Norsman Residence

Location
1729 W. Potomac Map

Owner
HN Builders

Architect
Norsman Architects

The Norsman Residence is another example of a higher-budget single family home with a carefully considered green and design sense. The project is new construction on a substandard Chicago lot (23.5’ x 100’). It includes many of the features we are increasingly seeing for these semi-demonstration projects, such as a ground-source heat pump HVAC system, rooftop wind turbines (not shown in the image), highly insulated walls and windows, rainwater harvesting for irrigation, and a green roof.