COLUMBIA COLLEGE 618

Chicago, IL

Client
Columbia College

Recognition
Chicago AIA Interiors Award, 2011

Role
Design Principal in Charge
Gensler

Photography by Steve Hall, Hedrich Blessing

Columbia College, one of the nation’s preeminent art schools, owns an impressive collection of buildings in Chicago's South Loop. This low-rise tower is located across from Millennium Park and is part of the cliff wall that forms the Historical Michigan Avenue District. William Zimmerman designed the building in 1913 with a terra cotta facade. When IBM bought the building in the 1950's, the original facade was replaced with a modernist aluminum curtain wall system. Our project was a full nine-story restoration with new systems and infrastructure to support classrooms, offices, archives, and a learning center at the pedestrian level. The design provides a state-of-the-art academic building while maintaining a relationship to the historical context of Michigan Avenue. Using a digital ceramic printing process, we printed an image of the original terracotta facade onto a new, energy efficient curtain wall system. This allowed us to expose the building's past while also giving it a contemporary face.