Marina City Is One Step Closer To Become An Official City Landmark
By Kate Shepherd in News on Nov 6, 2015 10:42PM
Wilco made Marina City a landmark with their Yankee Hotel Foxtrot album cover but now the city is closer to making it official. On Thursday, the Commission on Chicago Landmarks voted unanimously to recommend Chicago Landmark status for Marina City, according to Loop North News. Now a resolution for landmark status has to face a City Council vote, first a committee and then the full council, for approval.
It wasn't a hard decision for the commissioners and voting was over in three minutes and 23 seconds.
"I think that as [I've heard] from previous meetings, everybody recognizes those buildings around the world, that the moment that they see it, they see Chicago," Rafael Leon, chairman of the Commission on Chicago Landmarks, said. "I'm so glad that we have gotten to the point of designating these buildings as landmarks."
There hasn't been any formal opposition to the landmark designation and no one spoke against it at a public hearing last month. LaSalle Hotel Properties, which owns the Hotel Chicago and most of Marina City's other commercial property, is officially neutral on the designation, an attorney for the company said at the October hearing.
The landmark status means that building permits for work to exteriors and other spaces that can be seen from the outside will be highly scrutinized by the Commission on Chicago Landmarks. All building permits will be free though.
Local architect Bertrand Goldberg designed the iconic "corncob" buildings in the 1960s. Another one of his most recognizable buildings, the old Prentice Women's Hospital in Streeterville, was controversially torn down last year.
[H/T Curbed]