Chicago Art Deco Madness Walking Tour

• Visual arts/architecture/design
• Appeared in France before WW 1
• Shortened from Arts Décoratifs
• International Exhibition of Modern Decorative & Industrial Arts
• Held in Paris in 1925

• An art form
• Influenced the design of buildings
• Planes, Trains & Automobiles 
• Theaters, fashion & furniture
• And ocean liners!

• York Theatre – Elmhurst, IL
• Waterfall curves
• Vertical/horizontal lines
• Modern font

• S. S. Normandy Shipliner
• Circa 1932
• World’s largest for 5 years

• S.S. Normandy dining room
• Dancing female/male figures
• Stair-stepped chandelier/lighting

• Consistent modern language
• Integrated tech into daily life
• Started a design transformation
• Good design to the masses 
• Trickled down to everyday objects 
• Radios/Toasters/Vacuum cleaners!

• The Charleston    
• Flapper Dresses 
• Jazz 

• Spirit of a new era
• Rejection of classic design
• Brand new style emerged
• Celebrated modern life
• New Machine Age  

• Undisturbed for 3000 years! 
• Egyptian imagery became popular
• Scarabs 
• Hieroglyphics 
• Pyramids
• Sarcophagus solid gold – 243 lbs!
• Headpiece lines
• Geometric patterns

• Early 1920s zoning changes
• Overall building heights increased
• 264 ft (26 stories)
• Unoccupied towers to 400 ft
• 1923 zoning changed again
• Occupied towers to 400 ft
• Need for air and sunshine
• 1926 zoning changed again
• After 264 ft towers had to step back
• Could not take up more than 50% of the lot’s frontage width

• Holabird & Root circa 1930
• Oldest grain futures exchange
• Grain traded before harvesting
• Tall windows facing north
• Best light for inspections
• Steel window panels
• Different tones to trick the eye
• Emphasize the height

• Pyramid shaped roof 
• Originally free observation deck
• Telescopes & glass skylights
• Ceres – Greek Goddess of grain 
• 3 stories tall
• Her left hand – a sheaf of wheat
• Her right hand – grain trader bag 
• Her forms are overly-simplistic
• No face
• Garment made up of vertical lines
• Folds emphasize verticality

• Ceres panel
• Wall of the trading floor
• Observation deck

• Mesopotamian man – sheaf of wheat
• Native American – stalks of corn
• Deco-styled eagle 
• Symbolizes strength & freedom
• All details flattened

• Limestone banding with bulls
• Tongue-in-cheek reference to a bull market

• Octagonal trading pits
• Elegant lighting fixture mimics octagonal design
• Inspectors desks against the windows

• Changing of prices done by hand
• These people wore suits

• Trading floor chaos
• Paper thrown
• Shouting
• Hand signals

• Colored uniforms indicated your role on the floor

• St. Michaels Church in Oldtown
• Built in 1869
• 290 feet
• Tallest building in the USA for 16 years!

• Original BOT building – 1885
• Note statues above main doorway

• Clock tower added same year
• 300 feet tall
• Out ranked St. Michaels by 10 ft!

• 5 1/2 ton granite statues
• Placed over the main entrance
• 1885 BOT Building
• Symbolize Agriculture & Industry
• Building demolished in 1929
• Considered lost forever
• Found in 2005 (75 years!)
• Discovered at Hidden Lake Forest Preserve
• Graciously returned to their origins
• Former estate of Arthur Cutten
• Prominent BOT speculator of the early 1900’s 

How the statues made the journey from LaSalle Street to the Cutten estate is a mystery!

• Bank Of America Building 
• (Marshall Field Office Bldg)
• Graham, Anderson & Probst – 1934
• Art Moderne Style (vs. Deco)
• 45-story skyscraper 
• Last building built before Great Depression
• First building in the city with AC
• Water fountains on each floor
• High Speed Elevators 
• Latest leveling devices

• Previously on the site
• First skyscraper in the world
• Home Insurance Building – 1885
• William LeBaron Jenney
• Invented the steel skyscraper

• Style: Art Moderne
• Plain version of Art Deco 
• Uses Only geometric shapes  
• No decorative motifs 
• Simple Deco font on signage
• 4-story base that covers the entire site 
• Polished black granite. 
• Windows framed with pol. aluminum  
• White Yule marble pilasters
• Zig zag patterns separate the bays

• Hexagonal flag poles
• no expenses spared

• Vitzthum & Burns – 1930
• 49 stories
• Chicago’s tallest building – 30 years
• Significant history
• René-Robert Cavelier, Sieur de LaSalle’s 17th-century camp  
• Themed exterior and interior details 
• Early explorers
• interaction with Native Americans
• Main motif:  stylized headdresses

• Bas relief limestone panels
• French sculptor Leon Hermant
• Legion d’honneur award 1928
• Highest civil and military award of merit 
• Indian Chief
• William Clark (Lewis & Clark)
• Jacques Marquette (Marquette & Joliet)
• Christopher Columbus
• Indian Chief

Transportation Panel 

• Scales Of Justice Panel  
• Indian Chief
• Rene-Robert LaSalle
• Louis Joliet
• William Clark (again)
• Indian Chief

• 1917 Municipal symbol “Y”
• Hidden Y in iron work

• Bronze elevator doors
• Female mythology figures
• Prosperity 
• Abundance 
• Success and Reputation
• Native American Thunderbird 

• Elevator cabs original
• exotic birds-eye maple
• Stair stepped, pyramid-shaped lighting fixtures

• First United Methodist Church
• Chapel In The Sky
• Chicago’s oldest congregation
• Established 1831
• Started in log cabin on the river
• Circa 1924
• Holabird & Root
• Neo-Gothic
• 568-foot tall skyscraper 
• Tallest church in the world 

Seats approx. 30 people

Deco/Mayan ceiling patterns

• Commonwealth Edison Substation
• God Of Lightning 
• Sculptor Sylvia Shaw Judson
• Sculpted in 1931
• Refrigerator in the center
• Workers cottages at the bottom!!

• Judson gained fame
• 16 years after her death
• 1994 book sparked interest
• Midnight in the Garden cover
• Featured sculpture – Savannah
• Bird Girl Sculpted in 1936
• Tourists flocked to Savannah
• NY Times 216 bestseller list – 216 weeks!

• 1997 movie
• Murder of a male hustler in 1981
• (Young Jude Law)
• By antiques dealer Jim Williams
• (Kevin Spacey)
• Tried in 4 different murder trials
• Lasted more than 8 years
• Others in the movie
• John Cusack
• The Lady Chablis (Chablis Deveau)
• One of the first Transgender club performer’s in NYC
• All of the scenes in the movie were filmed at the Mercer-Williams House on Monterey Square in Savannah Georgia

• Daniel Burnham 1902-1906
• Third largest store in the world
• Clock Legend
• Field noticed notes in windows
• Notes listed meeting times/places
• He added a clock as solution
• Clock became meetup spot
• Tribune quoted: “Meet me under the clock at Marshall Field”

• Deco-styled elevator doors 
• Fluted stainless steel panels
• Bronze Deco-themed plaques 

• Burnham Brothers – 1929
• Lavish Art Deco design
• Black granite & green terracotta
• Sleek black granite base
• Rumored to mimic champagne bottle
• Top actually inspired by battery
• Battery used the chemicals by C&C

• Spire – thin layer 24-carat gold
• Gold-leaf not an imitation
• 1/5000 of an inch thick! 

Frozen Fountain Motif

“Quirky” Frozen Fountain Motif

• Holabird and Root – 1928
• Dubbed The Temple of Transport 
• Slim 17-story tower 
• Built at record-breaking speed
• Just 234 days
• including demolition of bldg
• Almost demolished in 2012
• Everything about the building screams money, power and progress, especially the lobby.  

• Exterior motifs
• Wave/sunburst patterns
• Limestone base of the building
• Around the fabulous entrance doors
• Zig-Zags
• Frozen Fountains

• Limestone Panels
• Square and diamond panels:
• Pelicans and other birds
• Round panels: 
• Chickadees and Peacocks
• Metaphors for luxury car ownership

• Close up of a peacock
• More frozen fountains/rosettes

• Wonderful frozen fountains/rosettes
• The original club logo

• Lobby once busy with travelers
• Guests lined up at Travel Buruea
• TourBooks/Triptiks/Atlases
• Guided trips on new highways
• Floor mimics road markings
• Original Terrazzo floor remains
• Light fixtures resemble clouds

• 20 foot x 30 foot mural of USA
• John Norton, a widely known Chicago muralist
• Modern, cubist style (Picasso-esque)
• Land masses: flat planes of pale gray and tan
• Bodies of water: cubist patterns in pale green and blue
• Cities: deep-orange squares 
• 19 transcontinental highways: a network of light gray lines connecting the cities
• Mountain ranges: blue chevrons 
• National Parks: bolded blue squares around chevrons

• Legend noting elements in the mural
• Font is very modern, sans serif and cubistic in nature

• Norton had a studio in the historic Tree Studio building
• Artist’s Enclave
• Famous people

• Chicago Tribune Article
• January 1929
• Same modern, deco font used

• Social Media Creator Services
• Professional Interior Design Services
• Walking Tours and Private Tours
• Architectural Photography Prints & Greeting Card Collections
• Route 66 Content Coming Soon
• Doorways Of Chicago Coffee Table Book Launching in 2026 – Trope Publishing
• I’m taking my tours abroad! My curated trip to Peru launches in 2026. Architecture, Ancestry & Ancient Doorways: Peru with Ronnie