I have long admired Jeanne Gang’s Aqua Building – ever since we glided by it on an Chicago Architectural Foundation boat tour along the Chicago River several years ago. Now comes word that I can get to see it up close and personal when the new Radisson Blu Aqua Hotel opens on 11/1/11 at 221 North Columbus Drive. The hotel will take up 18 floors of Gang’s 81-story tower with its distinctive white wavy-gravy balconies. By the by, I learned in an interview with Gang in the NYT that those smooth white curved-floor balconies, irregularly shaped to create the rippled effect, are not only for cool effect but cool purpose – to produce energy savings. Each balcony doubles as solar shade for the room or apartment below – and interrupt the breezes whipping off the lake so balconies on higher floors are feasible. Not for nothing did Gang,a Chicago native, recently receive a MacArthur genius award.
TakeBetsywithyou 