May 10, 2021

The Legacy of Helmut Jahn's Thompson Center

Show Notes

Less than one week after Gov. JB Pritzker announced the James R. Thompson Center was for sale, its architect was tragically killed in a biking accident. Helmut Jahn’s most famous building in Chicago has also been a source of controversy. It’s been derided for its retro colors, its inefficient heating and cooling system, and its spaceship-like facade among neo-classical architecture. But Jahn’s designs were integral in ushering a new era of design known as post-modernism. We discuss Jahn’s legacy and style with one architecture buff who says Chicago had never seen anything like the Thompson Center when it was first built.

Guest: Lee Bey, Photographer, former Chicago Sun-Times architecture critic, author, Southern Exposure: The Overlooked Architecture of Chicago's South Side (Second to None: Chicago Stories) (@LEEBEY)

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