We don’t cover a lot of renovations here on the Chicago Architecture Blog, but what’s happening on the edge of Ogden Slip in Streeterville is a little more than your averages self-certified toilet installation.
Bill O’Kane is turning the 106-year-old River East Center (401 East Illinois Street), formerly known as the North Pier Terminal Building, into about 300 fancy loft apartments. It’s just the latest incarnation for the building which has also been a supermarket, an art gallery, a museum, and an office building.
City records show that 32,000 square feet of the retail space will become a bowling, bocce, and banquet facility. Plans for a Mrs. Green’s boutique supermarket have withered and died, according to DNAInfo.
These pictures sent in by Streeterville Spy Jody show the residential conversion is well underway. Much of the building has lost its windows, and part of the water side is getting what appears to be glass sunrooms layered over the brick facade. You can also see places where the window openings have been augmented. City permits show these will get balconies and juliet balconies.
