Spiegel Office Building
- Architects
- Battey & Kipp Epstein, A. & Sons
- Year
- 1937
- Style
- Streamline Moderne
- City
- Chicago, IL
The Spiegel Office Building went up in 1936-37 at 1038 W. 35th Street in Bridgeport for Spiegel Inc., the Chicago mail-order company founded in 1865. Spiegel built it while repositioning itself from an easy-credit retailer toward higher-quality goods for wealthier customers, and the new building let it consolidate several scattered offices into one for better customer service. Engineers Battey & Kipp gave it a Streamline Moderne shell wrapped around an industrial loft plan of open floors; a 1940s addition by engineer Abraham Epstein let Spiegel keep its whole operation under one roof.
the building
Industrial loft plan. Behind the streamlined facade, the building was laid out as an industrial loft, with open floors rather than a maze of partitioned offices, so Spiegel's consolidated staff could work efficiently under one roof.
the style
Battey & Kipp designed the building in the Streamline Moderne mode fashionable for forward-looking commercial architecture of the mid-1930s, giving Spiegel's headquarters the sleek, modern image it wanted as it moved upmarket.
More on Streamline Modernethe architect
Engineers Battey & Kipp designed the original 1936-37 building; engineer Abraham Epstein, of A. Epstein & Sons, added onto it in the 1940s so Spiegel could keep all its offices together.
significance
The building was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on February 18, 2009, and is also a Chicago Landmark.
nearby
- Ramova Theater
- St. Barbara in Chicago
- Crown Hall
- Chicago Bee Building
- Saint Gabriel Catholic Church
- McCormick Tribune Campus Center