The Railway Exchange Building, also known as Santa Fe Building, is a 17-story office building in the

Historic Michigan Boulevard District The Historic Michigan Boulevard District is a historic district in the Loop community area of Chicago in Cook County, Illinois, United States encompassing Michigan Avenue between 11th (1100 south in the street numbering system) or Roosevelt ...

of 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, ...

community area 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 ...

Cook County, Illinois Cook County is the most populous county in the U.S. state of Illinois and the second-most-populous county in the United States, after Los Angeles County, California. More than 40% of all residents of Illinois live within Cook County. As of 20 ...

, United States. It was designed by

Frederick P. Dinkelberg Frederick Philip Dinkelberg (June 30, 1858 – February 10, 1935) was an American architect best known for being Daniel Burnham's associate for the design of the Flatiron Building in New York City. Other important projects he worked on include, C ...

of D. H. Burnham & Company in the Chicago style. Dinkelberg was also the associate designer to Daniel Burnham for the Flatiron Building in New York City. The building is recognizable by the large "Motorola" logo on the roof, which is visible from Grant Park across Michigan Ave and from

Lake Michigan Lake Michigan is one of the five Great Lakes of North America. It is the second-largest of the Great Lakes by volume () and the third-largest by surface area (), after Lake Superior and Lake Huron. To the east, its basin is conjoined with that ...

. It is also notable for the round, porthole-like windows along the

cornice In architecture, a cornice (from the Italian ''cornice'' meaning "ledge") is generally any horizontal decorative moulding that crowns a building or furniture element—for example, the cornice over a door or window, around the top edge of a ...

. The center of the building features a lightwell, which was covered with a

skylight A skylight (sometimes called a rooflight) is a light-permitting structure or window, usually made of transparent or translucent glass, that forms all or part of the roof space of a building for daylighting and ventilation purposes. History Ope ...

in the 1980s.

Architecture

The formal entrance to the building is located on Jackson Boulevard, which in 1904 was a more important street than Michigan Avenue. The impressive entrance is believed to have been required by Daniel Burnham, head of the architectural firm and the building's main stockholder. The firm moved its offices to the fourteenth floor, and Burnham's descendants continued ownership in the building until 1952.Clarke, Jane H., Saliga, Pauline A. and Zukowsky, John
''The Sky’s the Limit: A Century of Chicago Skyscrapers''
New York: Rizzoli International, 1990. With updates by John Cramer of the Society of Architectural Historians. This Chicago School of Architecture building with Beaux Arts detailing is organized as a classicization of

John Wellborn Root John Wellborn Root (January 10, 1850 – January 15, 1891) was an American architect who was based in Chicago with Daniel Burnham. He was one of the founders of the Chicago School style. Two of his buildings have been designated a National ...

's Rookery. A street-level, two-story enclosed court designed in a symmetrical Beaux-Arts style was surmounted by an open lightwell which was surrounded by a ring of offices. By the formal arched entrance on Jackson Boulevard, a large staircase led to shops and a second-floor balcony. White-glazed

terracotta Terracotta, terra cotta, or terra-cotta (; ; ), in its material sense as an earthenware substrate, is a clay-based unglazed or glazed ceramic where the fired body is porous. In applied art, craft, construction, and architecture, terracotta i ...

sheaths the exterior façade and interior court and the lightwell is lined with white-glazed brick. Classical designs were used for the ornamental

dentil A dentil (from Lat. ''dens'', a tooth) is a small block used as a repeating ornament in the bedmould of a cornice. Dentils are found in ancient Greek and Roman architecture, and also in later styles such as Neoclassical, Federal, Georgian ...

s, balusters, and column capitals. The building is completely

steel-framed Steel frame is a building technique with a "skeleton frame" of vertical steel columns and horizontal I-beams, constructed in a rectangular grid to support the floors, roof and walls of a building which are all attached to the frame. The developm ...

. In July 2012, the Santa Fe sign was replaced with an illuminated Motorola sign when Motorola Solutions began a lease on one floor of the building. The Santa Fe letters were given to the Illinois Railway Museum. After a four-year restoration, the sign was put on display at the museum in 2016. The building is significant as a historic site because Daniel Burnham and his staff made the 1909 Plan of Chicago in a penthouse on the northeast corner of the roof.

Tenants

The building was originally built as a railway exchange for the Santa Fe railway. Burnham & Company had offices on the 14th floor. Though the firm's successor, Graham, Anderson, Probst & White, has moved, a number of architectural organizations still practice there, including the Goettsch Partners, VOA Associates, Harding Partners, and the Chicago offices of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill and landscape architecture and planning firm, Design Workshop.Santa Fe Building, Chicago, Illinois (D.H. Burnham & Company) - American Architecture
/ref> The building was purchased by the

University of Notre Dame The University of Notre Dame du Lac, known simply as Notre Dame ( ) or ND, is a private Catholic university, Catholic research university in Notre Dame, Indiana, outside the city of South Bend, Indiana, South Bend. French priest Edward Sorin fo ...

in 2006. The university's

Mendoza College of Business The Mendoza College of Business is the business school at the University of Notre Dame, a private university in Notre Dame, Indiana. Founded in 1921, it offers both undergraduate and graduate degrees. It is ranked among the top 30 business school ...

began holding classes there in 2008. From 2009 to 2018, visitors enjoyed the 320-square-foot

Chicago Architecture Foundation The Chicago Architecture Center (CAC), formerly the Chicago Architecture Foundation, is a nonprofit cultural organization based in Chicago, Illinois, United States, whose mission is to inspire people to discover why design matters. Founded in 19 ...

scale model of central Chicago in the building's atrium. [An expanded model — with accompanying light show and interpretation — is now at 111 East Wacker Drive, where the CAF moved in 2018; CAF simultaneously changed its name to the Chicago Architecture Center or CAC. CAC continues to update the expanded city model to reflect architectural changes in the downtown area.] In 2011, Anacostia Rail Holdings Company, Anacostia Rail Holdings moved its corporate headquarters to the Railway Exchange Building.

Position in Chicago's skyline

The Railway Exchange Building appears (unlabelled) in front of Three First National Plaza in the image below:

References

External links

Santa Fe Building
- Hamilton Partners
The Santa Fe Building
- emporis.com *Gold, Anita.
Historic Santa Fe Building proper site for benefit
" ''

Chicago Tribune The ''Chicago Tribune'' is a daily newspaper based in Chicago, Illinois, United States, owned by Tribune Publishing. Founded in 1847, and formerly self-styled as the "World's Greatest Newspaper" (a slogan for which WGN radio and television a ...

''. May 15, 1992. Friday Section, Start Page 71. {{National Register of Historic Places Commercial buildings on the National Register of Historic Places in Chicago Skyscraper office buildings in Chicago Chicago school architecture in Illinois 1904 establishments in Illinois Office buildings completed in 1904

Architecture

Tenants

Position in Chicago's skyline

See also

References

External links