Chicago day 1, back to the Loop and some marble halls
On our return to the Loop we had some lunch and then went for a tour around the financial district in the heart of Chicago. Here is a view looking down LaSalle Street towards the Chicago Board of Trade, a 45 storey art deco building with a statue of Ceres at the top, showing the importance of the vasty fields of grain to the wealth of Chicago. The Board of Trade was designed by Holabird & Root and built 1929-30. A 24 storey wing by Helmut Jahn that was added in 1980. I shall now show you the tour, as we took it, courtesy of Michael. A little meandering, but very accomplished. Michael wanted us to see the inside of some of the buildings, especially the banks which were resplendent in brass and marble. The first one we visited was the One North LaSalle Building. A fantastic art deco building erected in 1930 with design by architects Vitzthum & Co and John Burns. It cost , for the time, a staggering amount of 30 million dollars. We passed...