Burnham Prize winners seek to make State Street great again

It's been 30 years since the old State Street pedestrian mall was put out of its misery — a bold move that revived the "great street" and gave the Loop a bit more spark.

The 1996 makeover did things like reintroducing car traffic and upgrading landscaping and street furniture. State Street's whole vibe was changed. And the thoroughfare started to come alive.

But that was a generation ago. Today's State Street, slapped around by changing retail patterns and a pandemic that drained it and the Loop of many of its workers and shoppers, is again in need of bold moves and visionary planning.

Could help be on the way?

Under the theme The Future of State, the Chicago Architectural Club awarded its 2026 Burnham Prize to an ambitious and thought-provoking proposal to revitalize State Street.

Called "Thickness: From Corridor to Urban Field" by the Argentinian architecture firm Andres Moroni Arquitecto, the proposal includes turning the never-used $400 million transit superstation space beneath Block 37 into a cultural and performance center.

The proposals "Unlocking State Street" by Chicago's Norbert Schlotter and "Civic Mischief" by the Virginia-based architecture firm Gluten took second and third place, respectively.

Provided by Norbert Schlotter Architecture

The three schemes were awarded at a Tuesday evening event at the Chicago Architecture Foundation.

In addition to using the failed Block 37 station — built in 2009 to provide high-speed express train service to O'Hare and Midway airports —
Thickness calls for greening rooftops on State Street and turning plazas and underground spaces into civic and gathering places.

A surface parking lot on Wabash Avenue, between Balbo Drive and Harrison Street, would become a landscaped green space with trees, walking paths and rolling topography.

"It has to be not just a corridor but something larger and very [Daniel] Burnham-like," former Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events Commissioner Mark Kelly, who served as the competition’s advisor, said of State Street.

"That Wabash and Dearborn have to be incorporated [and] the streets intersecting State Street," Kelly, a longtime advocate of the thoroughfare, said. "It's not just one element or one place, but it's taking on the totality of the setting that is around State Street."

An intriguing aspect of the "Unlocking State Street" proposal suggests a brighter future for the Century and Consumers buildings at 202 and 220 S. State St., respectively.

The vintage skyscrapers have sat vacant and rotting since being bought by the U.S. General Services Administration in 2005, partly because the federal government sees the redeveloped buildings as a security risk to the Dirksen Federal Courthouse just to the west.

"Unlocking State Street" challenges the security issue by creating a more open federal plaza, reusing the two buildings and constructing a bright red, super tall mixed-use tower between them.

"It thumbs its nose at what the GSA came up with, which is to tear the down buildings to make [a security buffer]," Chicago Architecture Center CEO Eleanor Gorski, a Burnham Prize jury member, said. "This architect is saying, 'No, think about it this way instead,' and introduce people into the site. Having more people actually activates it and you need less in terms of public safety. That provokes a conversation about the nature of those federal buildings and the plaza."

The architecture firm Gluten's "Civic Mischief" proposes art, pop-up shops, community spaces and other amenities to add more fun and whimsy along and around State Street — an important factor to include.

The Chicago Architecture Club and World Business Chicago will next put the proposals on display at the Chicago Architecture Center, 111 E. Wacker Drive.

The first place winner receives $3,000. Second place gets $2,000 while third place takes home $1,000. And $100 goes to each of the 2026 Burnham Prize submittals that will be exhibited at the Chicago Architecture Center.

What happens to the proposals beyond that is anyone's guess.

But we know this: If State Street is going to measurably improve, it's time for Mayor Brandon Johnson to stand up and make its revival a signature project of his administration.

And say it with his chest, too. Just as former Mayor Lori Lightfoot did with Invest South/West, Mayor Rahm Emanuel with the Chicago Riverwalk and Mayor Richard M. Daley with Millennium Park.

The entire city benefits culturally, economically and socially from a vibrant and healthy State Street.

Getting there means going through the 2026 Burnham Prize winners and, perhaps, picking the best ideas and concepts, then rallying the city, business, philanthropic, arts and cultural sectors — and his own departments — around a new and executable State Street revitalization plan.

And while we're at it, add the Chicago Loop Alliance's wide-ranging Elevate State plan from 2023 to the mix.

Chicago is known for making no little plans, so congrats to the winners and to the Chicago Architecture Club for making this year's Burnham Prize happen.

The city is best known for what it builds, and the remaking of State Street ought to be Chicago's next big thing — if the "fifth floor" provides the vision and leadership to make it happen.