The Fulton Market Historic District has become the trendiest neighborhood in Chicago for restaurants, retail, residential and offices. Once the home to meatpacking and processing facilities, the unique collection of masonry warehouses, factories and lofts proved irresistable to devlopers who created a vibrant mixed-use district. Many of these masonry buildings were included in the district along with a few vacant lots in prime locations. The Randolph Office Center, 730-732 West Randolph, was one such development. It is a new 8-story plus penthouse concrete loft addition to an exisiting 6-story timber loft office building, built on a narrow and long vacant parcel of land that was once a parking lot.
For the new building, each of the 6, 000sf floors were designed to align with the same sized floors of the exisiting loft, allowing a direct connection and 12,000sf combined footprint that appeals to small companies wanting a full floor identity (typically reserved for much larger tenants), but necessary in this post-pandemic office slowdown.
A setback amenity space with roof deck on the ninth floor, a fitness center in the basement, new restaurant space on the first floot (with a folding glass storefront to open the space up to the extra wide sidewalks on the block for outdoor dining), and a shared lobby were provided as amenities for the tenants of both the exisiting and new buildings.
The exterior, clad in brick with deeply inset windows and stepped brick surrounds, was designed to be a modern interpretation of the traditional masonry lofts found in the district. Its two-story expression relates directly to the facade of the exisiting building, setting up a dialogue between old and new. The straight, deeply inset east sides of the window openings relate to the exisiting building while the west side opening erodes as a nod towards the Fulrton Market Historic District. The inset bricks are of a darker color than the field, accentuating the proportions of the facade and appearing as permanent shadows.
Both the exisiting building and new site had fontages only on their narrow 40' wide south and north sides, making the building difficult to layout for office tenants wanting natural light and views. Working with the building department, full height windows were provided on the west side even though not allowed for walls on an interior property line. Adjacent to historic 2-story building, the windows were protected with an immersion sprinkler system and provided with integral blinds for sun control, allowing the narrow, column-free space of the addition to be flooded with natural light.
