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The James R. Thompson Center (JRTC), originally the State of Illinois Center, is a
postmodern Postmodernism is an intellectual stance or Rhetorical modes, mode of discourseNuyen, A.T., 1992. The Role of Rhetorical Devices in Postmodernist Discourse. Philosophy & Rhetoric, pp.183–194. characterized by philosophical skepticism, skepticis ...
-style civic building designed by architect Helmut Jahn, located at 100 W.
Randolph Street Randolph Street is a street in Chicago. It runs east–west through the Chicago Loop, carrying westbound traffic west from Michigan Avenue across the Chicago River on the Randolph Street Bridge, interchanging with the Kennedy Expressway (I-90/ I ...
in the
Loop Loop or LOOP may refer to: Brands and enterprises * Loop (mobile), a Bulgarian virtual network operator and co-founder of Loop Live * Loop, clothing, a company founded by Carlos Vasquez in the 1990s and worn by Digable Planets * Loop Mobile, an ...
district of
Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = List of sovereign states, Count ...
. It houses offices of the Illinois state government and serves as a secondary capitol for the State of
Illinois Illinois ( ) is a state in the Midwestern United States. Its largest metropolitan areas include the Chicago metropolitan area, and the Metro East section, of Greater St. Louis. Other smaller metropolitan areas include, Peoria and Rock ...
in the most populated city and county of the state.
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purchased the building in 2022 and expects to move in 2026 after two years and $280 million of renovations.


History

The location was previously the site of the Sherman House Hotel operated by Ernie Byfield. The hotel closed in 1973 and demolished in 1980. The building opened in May 1985 as the State of Illinois Center. It was renamed in 1993 to honor former Illinois Republican Governor James R. Thompson (the former name remains in use interchangeably, along with the "State of Illinois Building"). The property occupies the entire block bound by Randolph,
Lake A lake is an area filled with water, localized in a basin, surrounded by land, and distinct from any river or other outlet that serves to feed or drain the lake. Lakes lie on land and are not part of the ocean, although, like the much large ...
,
Clark Clark is an English language surname, ultimately derived from the Latin language, Latin with historical links to England, Scotland, and Ireland ''clericus'' meaning "scribe", "secretary" or a scholar within a religious order, referring to someone ...
and
LaSalle Street LaSalle Street is a major north-south street in Chicago named for Robert de La Salle, a 17th century French explorer of the Illinois Country. The portion that runs through the Chicago Loop is considered to be Chicago's financial district. Sou ...
s, one of the 35 full-size city blocks within Chicago's
Loop Loop or LOOP may refer to: Brands and enterprises * Loop (mobile), a Bulgarian virtual network operator and co-founder of Loop Live * Loop, clothing, a company founded by Carlos Vasquez in the 1990s and worn by Digable Planets * Loop Mobile, an ...
. In front of the Thompson Center is a 1984 sculpture, '' Monument With Standing Beast'', by
Jean Dubuffet Jean Philippe Arthur Dubuffet (31 July 1901 – 12 May 1985) was a French painter and sculptor. His idealistic approach to aesthetics embraced so-called "low art" and eschewed traditional standards of beauty in favor of what he believed to be a ...
. On February 13, 2018,
Chicago Police The Chicago Police Department (CPD) is the municipal law enforcement agency of the U.S. city of Chicago, Illinois, under the jurisdiction of the City Council. It is the second-largest municipal police department in the United States, behind t ...
Commander Paul Bauer was shot and killed, allegedly by Shomari Legghette, while Bauer was in pursuit of the suspect down a stairwell of the Thompson Center.


Design

The Thompson Center was designed by Helmut Jahn of Murphy/Jahn now called JAHN Architects. It opened to mixed reviews by critics, ranging from "outrageous" to "wonderful". The color of the street-level panels were compared to tomato soup. The 17-story, all-glass exterior curves and slopes facing a plaza on the southeast corner of the property. The design simultaneously looks forward with advanced architectural tectonics (of the time) and back to recapture the grandeur of large public spaces. Visitors to the Thompson Center's interior can see all 17 floors layered partway around the building's immense skylit atrium. The open-plan offices on each floor are supposed to carry the message of "an open government in action." Originally, the design called for curved, insulated (double paned) glass panels, but these were found to be prohibitively expensive. Flat, insulated glass had been suggested, but was dismissed by Jahn. Single-paned (non-insulated), curved glass panels were eventually used, and resulted in the need for a more expensive air conditioning system, which remains very costly to operate, and is insufficient on hot days; internal temperatures have reached as high as . The building is also bitterly cold in the winter; in its early years, ice formed on the interior of some of the wall panels. The
marble Marble is a metamorphic rock composed of recrystallized carbonate minerals, most commonly calcite or dolomite. Marble is typically not foliated (layered), although there are exceptions. In geology, the term ''marble'' refers to metamorphose ...
floor of the atrium initially developed unsightly water stains, an issue which has since been resolved.


Nearby transportation

The Clark/Lake 'L' station, the second busiest in the system, is housed between the Thompson Center and the 203 N. LaSalle building across the street. Orange,
Green Green is the color between cyan and yellow on the visible spectrum. It is evoked by light which has a dominant wavelength of roughly 495570 nm. In subtractive color systems, used in painting and color printing, it is created by a combin ...
,
Blue Blue is one of the three primary colours in the RYB colour model (traditional colour theory), as well as in the RGB (additive) colour model. It lies between violet and cyan on the spectrum of visible light. The eye perceives blue when ...
,
Pink Pink is the color of a namesake flower that is a pale tint of red. It was first used as a color name in the late 17th century. According to surveys in Europe and the United States, pink is the color most often associated with charm, politeness, ...
,
Purple Purple is any of a variety of colors with hue between red and blue. In the RGB color model used in computer and television screens, purples are produced by mixing red and blue light. In the RYB color model historically used by painters ...
and Brown Line trains stop at the center. Three tunnels of the
Chicago Pedway The Chicago Pedway is a network of tunnels, ground-level concourses and bridges connecting skyscrapers, retail stores, hotels, and train stations throughout the central business district of Chicago, Illinois. With a length of more than 40 do ...
enter the building's food-court concourse, connecting from to 203 North LaSalle Street, the Chicago Title and Trust Company and
Chicago City Hall Chicago City Hall is a 10-story building that houses the official seat of government of the City of Chicago in Illinois. Adjacent to the Richard J. Daley Center and the James R. Thompson Center, the building that includes Chicago City Hall hous ...
.


Art

The sculpture at the front entrance by French artist
Jean Dubuffet Jean Philippe Arthur Dubuffet (31 July 1901 – 12 May 1985) was a French painter and sculptor. His idealistic approach to aesthetics embraced so-called "low art" and eschewed traditional standards of beauty in favor of what he believed to be a ...
sets the tone for this building that houses a tremendous art collection. The collection includes nineteen specially commissioned artworks funded by the State of Illinois Art-in-Architecture Program. The building also has over 150 of the state's 600 works collected under the
Percent for Art The term percent for art refers to a program, often a city ordinance, where a fee, usually some percentage of the project cost, is placed on large scale development projects in order to fund and install public art. The details of such programs va ...
program. Under this program 0.5% of the money designated for construction of state-funded public buildings is used for the purchase of art. The Illinois Artisan's shop is also housed inside the building.


Proposed sale

When he first came to office, Illinois Governor
Rod Blagojevich Rod Blagojevich ( , born December 10, 1956), often referred to by his nicknames "Blago" or "B-Rod", is an American former politician, political commentator, and convicted felon who served as the 40th governor of Illinois from 2003 to 2009, when ...
proposed selling the building to assuage the state budget. The proposal was heavily criticized. Lawmakers at first agreed to the plan, but later a $200 million
mortgage A mortgage loan or simply mortgage (), in civil law jurisdicions known also as a hypothec loan, is a loan used either by purchasers of real property to raise funds to buy real estate, or by existing property owners to raise funds for any ...
was agreed to instead, payable over 10 years. The plan was declared unconstitutional by Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan in June 2004. The plan was set aside, although it had already cost the state $532,000 in legal fees. In 2015, and again in 2017, Governor
Bruce Rauner Bruce Vincent Rauner (; born February 18, 1956) is an American businessman, philanthropist, and politician who served as the 42nd governor of Illinois from 2015 to 2019. Prior to his election, he was the chairman of R8 Capital Partners and chai ...
also proposed selling the property, and a legislative committee to explore his request was announced by Democratic House Speaker
Michael Madigan Michael Joseph Madigan (born April 19, 1942) is an American politician who is the former speaker of the Illinois House of Representatives. He was the longest-serving leader of any state or federal legislative body in the history of the United Sta ...
in February 2017, though it was effectively a non-starter under his administration due to his two-year state budget impasse, which itself led to more deferred maintenance in regards to the Thompson Center. In 2016–2017, filmmaker and cultural heritage activist
Nathan Eddy Nathan Eddy is an American documentary filmmaker, journalist and cultural heritage activist. Life Eddy was born and raised in Rhode Island, United States. He studied film at Northwestern University, also taking classes in journalism and archite ...
directed a short documentary film about Thompson Center – ''Starship Chicago''. Architect Stanley Tigerman appears in the film. In 2019, Illinois governor J. B. Pritzker signed a bill to begin the sale of the Thompson Center, with a proposed three-year timeline to find a buyer. This sparked activism from preservationists and architects concerned about the future of the building. In March 2022, Pritzker announced an agreement to sell the building to JRTC Holdings. The State of Illinois was to receive an initial payment of $70 million for the purchase of the property and would still retain of office space. However, in August 2022, Pritzker announced a revised deal in which
Alphabet An alphabet is a standardized set of basic written graphemes (called letters) that represent the phonemes of certain spoken languages. Not all writing systems represent language in this way; in a syllabary, each character represents a syllab ...
would acquire the building for $105 million. Of this amount, $30 million would be a cash payment and the remainder would be used to purchase the Harris Bank Addition II which would be renovated to become the new home of state offices in Chicago.


Tenants

* Chicago district office of the
Governor of Illinois The governor of Illinois is the head of government of Illinois, and the various agencies and departments over which the officer has jurisdiction, as prescribed in the state constitution. It is a directly elected position, votes being cast by p ...
(Suite 16-100) * Illinois Court of Claims (Suite 10-400) * Illinois House Republican Staff (Suite 16-700) *
Illinois State Board of Education The Illinois State Board of Education (ISBE) administers public education in the state of Illinois. The State Board consists of nine members who are appointed by the Governor with the consent of the Senate. Board members serve four-year terms, with ...
(Suite 14-300) * Chicago branch of the
Illinois Attorney General The Illinois Attorney General is the highest legal officer of the state of Illinois in the United States. Originally an appointed office, it is now an office filled by statewide election. Based in Chicago and Springfield, Illinois, the attorn ...
(Floors 11-13) * Chicago office of the
Illinois Department of Financial and Professional Regulation The Illinois Department of Financial and Professional Regulation (IDFPR) is the Illinois state government code department that through its operational components, the Division of Banking, Division of Financial Institutions, Division of Profession ...
(Floors 5 & 9)


In popular culture

The Thompson Center has been a filming location in several motion pictures, including 2000's '' The Watcher'' and 1990's ''The Kid Who Loved Christmas.'' The climax of 1986's '' Running Scared'' was filmed there. It also served as the exterior for Gotham Square Garden in 2022's ''
The Batman Batman is a fictional superhero appearing in comic books published by DC Comics. Batman or The Batman may also refer to: Art, entertainment, and media Characters * Batman (Terry McGinnis) * Batman (Thomas Wayne) * Batman (Earth-Two) * Bat ...
'', though interior shots were filmed at London's
O2 Arena O2 Arena may refer to: *The O2 Arena (London) *O2 Arena (Prague) *The 3Arena The 3Arena (originally The O2) is an indoor amphitheatre located at North Wall Quay in the Dublin Docklands in Dublin, Ireland. The venue opened as The O2 on 16 Decemb ...
.


See also

*
Chicago architecture The buildings and architecture of Chicago reflect the city's history and multicultural heritage, featuring prominent buildings in a variety of styles. Most structures downtown were destroyed by the Great Chicago Fire in 1871 (an exception being t ...
* Helmut Jahn


References


External links


Commerce, Culture, & State Offices Under Glass



James R. Thompson Center


* ttps://web.archive.org/web/20061208053122/http://www.emporis.com/en/wm/bu/?id=thompsoncenter-chicago-il-usa Emporis.com page
Google Maps page
{{Authority control Government buildings in Chicago Skyscraper office buildings in Chicago State government buildings in the United States Government buildings completed in 1985 Office buildings completed in 1985 1980s architecture in the United States Helmut Jahn buildings Postmodern architecture in the United States 1985 establishments in Illinois Google Alphabet Inc.