__NOTOC__ The NBC Tower is an office tower on the Near North Side of

Chicago, Illinois (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name ...

located at 454 North Columbus Drive (455 North Cityfront Plaza is also used as a vanity address for the building) in downtown Chicago's Magnificent Mile area. Completed in 1989, the 37-story building reaches a height of 627 feet (191 m).

NBC The National Broadcasting Company (NBC) is an American English-language commercial broadcast television and radio network. The flagship property of the NBC Entertainment division of NBCUniversal, a division of Comcast, its headquarters are l ...

's Chicago offices, studios, and owned-and-operated station

WMAQ-TV WMAQ-TV (channel 5) is a television station in Chicago, Illinois, United States, airing programming from the NBC network. It is owned and operated by the network's NBC Owned Television Stations division alongside Telemundo outlet WSNS-TV (c ...

are located here as of 1989 and on October 1, 1989, WMAQ-TV broadcast its first newscast at 10:00 that evening at its new home, NBC Tower, with the then-weeknight news team of Ron Magers,

Carol Marin Carol Marin (pronounced "''marine''") (born October 10, 1948) is a television and print journalist based in Chicago, Illinois. Career Marin began her journalism career in 1972 at WBIR-TV in Knoxville, Tennessee working as a reporter, anchor, an ...

, John Coleman, and

Mark Giangreco Mark Giangreco (born May 13, 1952) is the former sports director and lead sports anchor for WLS-TV in Chicago, Illinois. Until 2021, Giangreco had anchored the sports segment on ABC7 during the 5pm and 10pm newscasts. He remains an WMVP, ESPN Radio ...

. Later,

Telemundo Telemundo (; formerly NetSpan) is an American Spanish-language terrestrial television network owned by NBCUniversal Telemundo Enterprises, a division of NBCUniversal, which in turn is owned by Comcast. It provides content nationally with pr ...

O&O WSNS-TV has also occupied the building since its purchase by NBC in 2001. Formerly its former radio sister WMAQ/

WSCR WSCR (670 AM) – branded as 670 The Score – is a commercial sports radio station licensed to serve Chicago, Illinois, servicing the Chicago metropolitan area and much of surrounding Northern Illinois, Northwest Indiana and parts of the Milwa ...

was located here. The studios of NBC's former Chicago FM property,

WKQX WKQX (101.1 FM broadcasting, FM) is a commercial Radio broadcasting, radio station licensed to Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, featuring an alternative rock format known as "Q101". Owned by Cumulus Media, the station serves the Chicago metropolit ...

, and its sister station

WLUP-FM WCKL (97.9 FM) is a non-commercial radio station licensed to Chicago, Illinois, featuring a Christian contemporary format via the K-Love network. Owned and operated by Educational Media Foundation (EMF), WCKL serves the Chicago metro area w ...

are located in the NBC Tower. The design, by

Adrian D. Smith Adrian D. Smith (born August 19, 1944) is an American architect. He designed the world's tallest structure, Burj Khalifa, as well as the building projected to surpass it, the Jeddah Tower. Among his other projects, he was the senior architect fo ...

of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill, is considered one of the finest reproductions of the

Art Deco Art Deco, short for the French ''Arts Décoratifs'', and sometimes just called Deco, is a style of visual arts, architecture, and product design, that first appeared in France in the 1910s (just before World War I), and flourished in the Unite ...

style. It was inspired by

30 Rockefeller Plaza 30 Rockefeller Plaza (officially the Comcast Building; formerly RCA Building and GE Building) is a skyscraper that forms the centerpiece of Rockefeller Center in the Midtown Manhattan neighborhood of New York City. Completed in 1933, the 66-s ...

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the Un ...

, which is NBC's global headquarters. The tower is further enhanced by the use of

limestone Limestone ( calcium carbonate ) is a type of carbonate sedimentary rock which is the main source of the material lime. It is composed mostly of the minerals calcite and aragonite, which are different crystal forms of . Limestone forms whe ...

piers and recessed tinted glass with

granite Granite () is a coarse-grained ( phaneritic) intrusive igneous rock composed mostly of quartz, alkali feldspar, and plagioclase. It forms from magma with a high content of silica and alkali metal oxides that slowly cools and solidifies under ...

spandrel A spandrel is a roughly triangular space, usually found in pairs, between the top of an arch and a rectangular frame; between the tops of two adjacent arches or one of the four spaces between a circle within a square. They are frequently fill ...

s. The building takes additional cues from the nearby landmark

Tribune Tower The Tribune Tower is a , 36-floor neo-Gothic skyscraper located at 435 North Michigan Avenue in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Built between 1923 and 1925, the international design competition for the tower became a historic event in 20th-ce ...

with the use of

flying buttresses The flying buttress (''arc-boutant'', arch buttress) is a specific form of buttress composed of an arch that extends from the upper portion of a wall to a pier of great mass, in order to convey lateral forces to the ground that are necessary to pu ...

. A broadcast tower and

spire A spire is a tall, slender, pointed structure on top of a roof of a building or tower, especially at the summit of church steeples. A spire may have a square, circular, or polygonal plan, with a roughly conical or pyramidal shape. Spires a ...

tops the skyscraper. WMAQ and WSNS have STL and satellite facilities on the roof; the STLs link to WMAQ and WSNS's transmitter facilities atop the

Willis Tower The Willis Tower (originally the Sears Tower) is a 108- story, skyscraper in the Loop community area of Chicago in Illinois, United States. Designed by architect Bruce Graham and engineer Fazlur Rahman Khan of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill (SOM ...

. WMAQ radio/WSCR studios and STL were located in the building until 2006 when they relocated to

Two Prudential Plaza The Two Prudential Plaza is a 64-story skyscraper located in the Loop area of Chicago, Illinois. At tall, it is currently the sixth-tallest building in Chicago and the 28th-tallest in the U.S., being only five feet from 1,000 feet, making it ...

. Located in the Cityfront Plaza area, the building contains of space and three floors of underground parking with 261 spaces. Connected to the main tower is a four-story radio and television broadcasting facility where popular shows such as '' Judge Mathis'' and WSNS's newscasts and WMAQ's newscasts are currently taped, and was the former recording facility for ''

Jerry Springer Gerald Norman Springer (born February 13, 1944) is a British-American broadcaster, journalist, actor, producer, former lawyer, and politician. He hosted the tabloid talk show '' Jerry Springer'' between September 30, 1991 and July 26, 2018, an ...

'' and '' The Steve Wilkos Show'' before their tax credit-influenced move to Stamford, Connecticut in 2009. It was also home to the 1990s syndicated improv/sketch show '' Kwik Witz'', ''

The Jenny Jones Show ''The Jenny Jones Show'' is an American syndicated daytime tabloid talk show that was hosted by comedian/actress/singer Jenny Jones. It was produced by Quincy Jones-David Salzman Entertainment and Telepictures Productions and was distributed b ...

'' until its cancellation in 2003, and ''

Steve Harvey Broderick Stephen Harvey Sr. Also aired August 16, 2015. (born January 17, 1957) is an American television host, producer, actor, and comedian. He hosts '' The Steve Harvey Morning Show'', '' Family Feud'', ''Celebrity Family Feud,'' the Miss ...

'' its move to

Los Angeles Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the List of municipalities in California, largest city in the U.S. state, state of California and the List of United States cities by population, sec ...

in 2017. Image:NBC Building 060912.jpg, Looking north at night Image:NBC Chicago.jpg, Looking east Image:NBCTowerJuly.jpg, Looking north Image:NBC Tower Entrance.JPG, Columbus Drive entrance

Tenants

WMAQ/NBC, WSNS/Telemundo are located in the building. The Consulate-General of India in Chicago is located in Suite 850. The Consulate-General of South Korea in Chicago is located in Suite 2700. The Consulate-General of Lithuania in Chicago is located in Suite 800.

CBS Media Ventures CBS Media Ventures, Inc. (formerly CBS Television Distribution, Inc. and CBS Paramount Domestic Television, Inc.) is an American television distribution company owned by CBS Studios, part of CBS Entertainment Group, a division of Paramount Glo ...

' Chicago branch is located in Suite 2910. *

newscasts (1989–present) * WSNS-TV (2002–present) *

(1989-2001; 2016–present) * WCKL (formerly WLUP-FM) (2016–present) * WLS (2017–present) * WLS-FM (2017–present) The tower was also the world headquarters of

Navistar International Navistar, Inc is an American holding company created in 1986 as the successor to International Harvester. Navistar operates as the owner of International-branded trucks and diesel engines. The company also produces buses under the IC Bus b ...

until 2000 when the company announced plans to relocate to west suburban

Lisle, Illinois Lisle ( ) is a village in DuPage County, Illinois, United States. The population was 22,390 at the 2010 census, and in 2019 the population was recorded to be 23,270. It is part of the Chicago metropolitan area and the Illinois Technology and Resea ...

. From the tower's opening to 2006, WMAQ/WSCR radio studios were also located in the building; the stations relocated. In February 2016, alternative station

and sister classic rock station

announced that they will be moving from their longtime home in the

Merchandise Mart The Merchandise Mart (or the Merch Mart, or the Mart) is a commercial building located in downtown Chicago, Illinois. When it was opened in 1930, it was the largest building in the world, with of floor space. The Art Deco structure is locate ...

to a new studio in the tower. WKQX and WLUP-FM operated temporarily from the former WLS studios at 190 N. State St. On August 4, 2016, the move of WKQX and WLUP-FM to the tower was finalized.

Shows recorded

In addition to housing these entities, the studios were/are home to the following shows: * ''

iVillage Live iVillage, Inc. was a mass media company that operated the ”most popular female-oriented sites” on the internet in the 1990s. In addition to ivillage.com, the company operated iVillage UK, Astrology.com, GardenWeb, and the NBC Digital Health ...

'' (2007) * ''

'' (1991–2003) * ''

'' (1991–2009; originated and recorded here from 1992 to 2009) * '' Judge Jeanine Pirro'' (2008–2011) * '' Johnny B... On the Loose'' (1991) * '' Judge Mathis'' (1999–present) * '' Kwik Witz'' (1996–1999) * '' Merv Griffin's Crosswords'' (2007–2008, pilot shows only) * ''

Sports Action Team ''Sports Action Team'' was a half-hour comedy television series that ran for two seasons in 2006–2007. It was aired by some affiliates of the NBC network and the high definition channel HDNet. It was a semi-improvisational mockumentary A mock ...

'' (2006–2007) * '' The Steve Wilkos Show'' (2007–2009, moved to Connecticut in 2009) * ''

'' (2012–2017)

References

External links

Emporis listing

Official website

Skidmore, Owings, and Merrill

WMAQ's official website

WSNS' official website

WSCR's official website
{{Chicago skyscrapers Skidmore, Owings & Merrill buildings Comcast National Broadcasting Company NBC buildings NBCUniversal Skyscraper office buildings in Chicago Mass media company headquarters in the United States Television studios in the United States Art Deco architecture in Illinois Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design basic silver certified buildings Office buildings completed in 1989 1989 establishments in Illinois

Tenants

Shows recorded

See also

References

External links