Chicago Early Skyscrapers, Chicago, Illinois

Chicago, in my humble opinion, is the most architecturally impressive big city in the US. Walk around its central area and you will come across monumental eye-catching buildings on nearly every block. The Great Chicago Fire that destroyed much of the city center in 1871 gave a huge impetus to rebuilding, which was supercharged by the technological advances in construction, especially the introduction of steel-reinforced structures. That led to the advent of a new type of building, the skyscraper. Nine exemplars of that are part of a serial tentative World Heritage entry, Early Chicago Skyscrapers. On my recent visit to town, I plotted a walk around the Loop area with a target of stopping by all nine.

It goes without saying that photographing massive buildings from the street level is a thankless proposition. Especially when your ability to step farther back is limited by the buildings on the other side of the street and the perspectives are occasionally obscured by the elevated train tracks. Only in a couple of instances, there was enough open space between me and the skyscraper for a passable full-scale shot, at Ludington Building and later at Marquette Building.

Auditorium Building is the only one facing a wide expanse, so I could stand far enough to get it into a non-crooked shot. I even included its neighbor, known as the Fine Arts Building, in the picture. The latter is on the right side in this perspective. You may be forgiven for thinking, just as I do, that it actually looks more attractive and feature-rich than the candidate for the World Heritage inscription on the left. ...... (follow the instructions below for accessing the rest of this article).