Three R's - Rothschild, Renovation & Reuse
[A.M. Rothschild & Co. (1912) Holabird & Roche, architects /Image & Artwork: designslinger]
When A.M. Rothschild & Co. moved into their new department store building at the
southern end of Chicago's State Street in 1912, the street was the retail hub of the city, an avenue lined with large mercantile buildings. Holabird & Roche designed a distinctive exterior for the massive block, to replace the exsiting Rothschild building, and clad the new structure in decorative white terra-cotta with a series of heraldic R's adjacent to the second story arches.
[Rothschilds/Davis/Goldblatts Department Store, 333 S. State Street, Chicago /Images & Artwork: designslinger]
Abraham M. Rothschild and his brother Max were both involved in the wholesale clothing business. After Max committed suicide in 1893, A.M. opened a large retail establishment on this piece of property in 1895. Although the business appeared to be thriving, A.M.'s father-in-law, and principal owner of the store Nelson Morris, was uncomfortable with the state of his son-in-laws mental health and its affect on the company, and asked him to retire. Abraham left the store in the care of is son Melville and cut his connections to the store. On July 28, 1902 Rothschild took his own life, two months after resigning from the company that bore his name. The Rothschild operation survived until 1923 when the business was purchased by a neighbor up the street, Marshall Field & Co. Field's used this purchase to create a subsidiary, Davis Dry Goods, selling less expensive merchandise not offered at the upscale Field operation. The southern end of the great retail thoroughfare eventually became the home of other large, lower priced merchandisers. Sears Roebuck took over the lease of the large department store building across the street, and the Field/Davis operation vacated the former Rothschild building for working class neighborhood favorite, Goldblatts.
[De Paul Center, (1993) Daniel P. Coffey & Associates, renovation architects /Images & Artwork: designslinger]
By the 1980s the once mighty retail district had seen better times. The large department store owners who had been selling goods on State Street for generations were folding their tents and saying goodbye. Goldblatts closed up shop in the Rothschild building, and the block-long structure stood vacant for several years. Finally De Paul University took over, spent time and money on an extensive renovation, and found a new use for the building turning it into a center for retail, offices and classrooms. Many people still wonder why there is an R on a De Paul building. Well, it starts with Rothschild, to the university's Renovation program, and ends with a great example of adaptive Reuse.
See more of State Street's retail heritage at: A Flexible Structure, Retail Revived, Relics of Retail, Lytton's Department Store Building, and The Boston Store, Chicago.
Posted by designslinger at 5/20/2010 2:34 AM 
Categories: Architecture, History, Adaptive Reuse, Preservation
Tags: Goldblatts A.M. Rothschild and Co. De Paul University Holabird and Roche
Categories: Architecture, History, Adaptive Reuse, Preservation
Tags: Goldblatts A.M. Rothschild and Co. De Paul University Holabird and Roche
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