18. September 2017
All photographs by John Hill/World-Architects
As part of the Chicago Architecture Biennial, Rotterdam’s Monadnock has fitted out a portion of one of the Chicago Cultural Center’s monumental stairs with large signs expressing famous quotes by Daniel H. Burnham.
The words of Burnham, planner of the 1893 Columbian Exposition and, fittingly here, one of the architects of the city’s famous Monadnock building, have become mantras that Chicago’s architects and planners have a hard time shaking. Monadnock took two familiar phrases from Burnham and turned them into signage (our emphasis): "Make no little plans. They have no magic to stir men’s blood and will probably themselves not be realized. Make big plans; aim high in hope and work, remembering that a noble, logical diagram once recorded will never die…" These words are mounted on armatures that look like they could be plopped atop a Loop building or serve as a model for a skyscraper projecting Burnham’s words for miles around. In place, they give people a reason to stop as they move to and fro the exhibition halls by appropriately threading themselves into the staircase's low and tall spaces.
