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Aqua

Architect
Jeanne Gang
Year
2009
Style
Contemporary Modern
City
Chicago, IL
Aqua
Photo: Urbaneddie, CC BY-SA 3.0
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Aqua is an 82-story mixed-use skyscraper in Lakeshore East, designed by a team led by Jeanne Gang of Studio Gang Architects, with James Loewenberg of Loewenberg & Associates serving as Architect of Record. Completed in 2009, it rises from an 80-story, 140,000-square-foot base topped by an 82,550-square-foot terrace landscaped with gardens, gazebos, pools, hot tubs, a running track, and a fire pit. When it opened, Aqua was the world's tallest building designed by a woman, a title it held until the nearby St. Regis, also in Chicago, surpassed it in 2020.

the building

The terrace and its balconies. Aqua's distinctive undulating balconies wrap the tower up to its 80th floor, culminating in an 82,550-square-foot terrace above the base with gardens, gazebos, swimming pools, hot tubs, a walking and running track, and a fire pit.

Underground and up. Each of Aqua's floors covers about 16,000 square feet, and the tower descends five levels below ground for parking.

the style

Aqua's style is contemporary architecture, defined less by ornament than by the sculptural, undulating balcony profile that wraps the tower, a form that has drawn comparisons to 8 Spruce Street in New York.

More on Contemporary Modern

the architect

Jeanne Gang led the design team at Studio Gang Architects, with James Loewenberg of Loewenberg & Associates serving as Architect of Record. Aqua made Gang's studio internationally known: when it was completed in 2009, it was the tallest building in the world designed by a woman, a record it held until 2020.

significance

Aqua won the Emporis Skyscraper Award as 2009 Skyscraper of the Year and was shortlisted for the 2010 International Highrise Award. For the 2018 Illinois Bicentennial, AIA Illinois named it one of the Illinois 200 Great Places, and USA Today Travel included it among Illinois' 25 Must-See Places. It was the world's tallest building designed by a woman until 2020, when the nearby St. Regis in Chicago surpassed it.

nearby

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