Jan 2013 SITS Re-Imagining Prentice

For the first Saturday in the Studio of 2013, we had students think about how an old building can be reused and redesigned for a new life. We considered a building that was hot in the news - the Prentice Women's Hospital that has since lost the fight on gaining Landmark Status.

To get ideas going, we looked at Competition entries for the Future Prentice Exhibition going on at CAF. This competition, by the Chicago Architecture Club, invited many local architects to create ideas for adaptive reuse. Winners of the competition presented their final design to the studio. We also walked over to the new City Target in the historic Carson Pirie Scot building designed by Louis Sullivan. This was a good example of recent adaptive reuse in the loop.

We had the teens describe how the could re-imagine the floor plans of the hospital into student dorms for Northwestern University (who owns the hospital). We were able to tape these plans out on the floor to see how possible the plans were and what they would look like. The solutions were presented to a local jury and winners were awarded based on the best use of space.

BIG THANKS to Brian Strawn and Karla Sierralta of the Chicago Architecture Club.