Michigan Avenue- Chicago, IL - VirtualTourist.com

As with the '35 East Wacker' building, I only later learned how quirky the present Intercontinental Chicago hotel building really was. On my very first excursion onto Chicago's streets my eyes were drawn upward to the roof of a building with a strange golden dome and what looked like an old stone chimney - I thought, maybe this is the famous 'Water Tower'! In the end, with not enough spare time, I wandered here and there over a period of a few days but never did make a special trip to see the building up-close.

According to Wikipedia: "The InterContinental Chicago hotel...currently occupies two Multi-story buildings. The historic tower, or "South Tower," is a 471 foot, 42 story building which was completed in 1929 originally as the home of the Medinah Athletic Club. The main tower, or "North Tower" is a 295 foot, 25 story addition, completed in 1961. Before the stock market crash of 1929, the United States was experiencing a building boom and one of these projects (the South Tower) was to be the future home of the Medinah Athletic Club in Chicago.

The...building was intended to combine elements of many architectural styles. At the eighth floor, its Indiana limestone facade was decorated by three large relief carvings in ancient Assyrian style. The exotic gold dome, which is Moorish in influence, originated as part of a decorative docking port for dirigibles - a notion conceived before the Hindenburg disaster in 1937 (in which 36 people died when the dirigible caught fire while docking in New Jersey). Years later, the building would lose several feet with the dismantling of an ornamental canopy on the small turret north of the dome. This chimney-like structure was originally intended to assist in the docking of these air ships, but it was never put into use. Inside the dome, a glass cupola and spiral iron staircase resembling the top of a lighthouse led down (for the airship passengers) to the hotel’s upper elevator landing.

In the tower beneath the great dome, the club featured a miniature golf course on the twenty-third floor, complete with water hazards and a wandering brook; also a shooting range, billiards hall, running track, gymnasium, archery range, bowling alley, two story boxing arena, and a junior Olympic size swimming pool - all this in addition to the ballrooms, meeting rooms, and 440 guest rooms which were available for the exclusive use of the club’s 3,500 members and their guests

Four years after the Wall Street Crash of 1929 the Shrine Organization filed for bankruptcy protection. In the following year they lost control of the building, and in the decades after, the building went through various incarnations, including as a hotel and a brief stint as residential apartments. In 1988, InterContinental Hotels and Resorts purchased the property outright and completed the first phase of extensive renovations prior to its re-opening in 1990."

The history of some of these buildings is amazing!

Michigan Avenue, Chicago

Chicago Hotels

Michigan Avenue, Chicago

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Visiting Chicago?

Chicago Hotels