In 1872, he completed a five-story structure at Madison and Water Streets (now Wacker) to house the wholesale division, but within a decade, the division was already outgrowing its space, as Field continued to add new product lines.
By May 1881 he had purchased all the lots on the block bordered by Adams, Fifth (now Wells), Quincy, and Franklin, near the location of the Chicago Board of Trade Building.
In 1885, Field contacted architect Henry Hobson Richardson with the proposition of designing a new building on the site for the Marshall Field's Wholesale Store (sometimes referred to as the Marshall Field's Warehouse Store).
Richardson completed preliminary plans by summer and in October travelled to Chicago to unveil the finished plans and sign the contract. By December 1885, the foundation was in and the stonework was underway, but the building did not even begin to approach completion before Richardson’s untimely death in April 1886.

The load-bearing outer walls were brick covered by rock-faced Missouri red granite up to the second-floor windowsills, and East Longmeadow red sandstone above. The structure was impressive both for its overall size and for the size of the stones used. Adjectives such as “enormous,” “palatial,” “Cyclopean,” “immense,” and “mammoth” were used to describe it in contemporary accounts. These terms are not surprising, given that the stones in the granite base were larger than those utilized in any other building in the city. The first-floor window sills alone were nearly eighteen feet long.

Above this was the crocketted cornice in Gothic style “vigorously and crudely cut, to be in scale with the whole mass which it terminates.” The plate glass windows, set in wood framed double-hung sash were recessed to the inner face of the walls to emphasize the thickness of the stone when viewed from the exterior.
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Packing Department |

The Merchandise Mart, built by Marshall Field & Co. and later owned for over half a century by the Kennedy family, opened in 1930.
Marshall Field & Co. engaged Graham, Anderson, Probst & White to draw up specifications for the demolition of the old building. The massive structure was reduced to rubble by mid-summer to accommodate a parking lot. Little was salvaged other than machinery and equipment, lighting fixtures, brass rails, gates and revolving doors. The granite and sandstone, so praised for its visual impact, was used as fill to create a level surface for the asphalt parking lot.
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Marshall Field Wholesale Advertisement from 1907. |
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Marshall Field Wholesale Advertisement from 1907. |
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Marshall Field Wholesale Advertisement from 1907. |
Still miss Marshall Fields! Loved reading this history!
ReplyDeletei bet the construction workers for the next building on that site had a rude awakening with all those massive stones!
ReplyDeleteThe article states: "The massive structure was reduced to rubble by mid-summer to accommodate a parking lot."
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