Highrise Buildings Sketch, Chicago, Illinois, Perspective Sketches

Mies van der Rohe realized many influential tall buildings and is widely credited with establishing a minimalist design template for rectangular towers in steel-and-glass office buildings in American cities throughout the 1960s and 1970s. Mies’ first realized towers, however, were a series of residential buildings in Chicago, the most famous of which is 860–880 Lake Shore Drive, completed in 1951. With an economy of line, this sketch for two high-rise buildings illustrates the dynamic, perpendicular relationship of the 860– 880 towers, as well as the uniform columns supporting the buildings’ volumes at ground level, creating a joined arcade and lobbies for the apartments.