At ULI Chicago’s October 2024 gathering at the new 73-story 1000M apartment tower, located at 1000 S. Michigan Ave., key members of the building’s development, architecture and construction teams hosted a tour of the project and enlightened attendees with a panel discussion on the history behind the skyscraper’s signature cantilever.
Staying true to ‘form follows function,’ 1000M’s cantilever stretches over its landmark-protected, neighbor-to-the-south—the terracotta-sheathed Lightner Building—allowing the building to maximize views and its unit count, while simultaneously respecting the historic significance of the Michigan Avenue Streetwall. Also called the Historic Michigan Boulevard District, this 12-block row of protected buildings, mostly built between the 1880s and the 1920s, looks out onto Grant Park and Lake Michigan.
According to Jordan Karlik, principal of JK Equities, 1000M began on Thanksgiving 2014, when Karlik accepted a broker invitation from Sperry Van Ness International Corp. to tour the Lightner Building at 1006 S. Michigan Ave., which was for sale. During the tour, Karlik spotted an old 2004 sales flyer on the elevator wall highlighting the opportunity for buyers of the vacant lot at 1000 S. Michigan Ave. to buy the air rights above the Lightner Building. That 10-year-old flyer sparked the idea for 1000M, which at 805 feet high gracefully cantilevers over the 100-foot-tall Lightner Building.
“I knew the key to developing 1000 S. Michigan was being able to control 1006,” Karlik said during the panel. So, he teamed up with Time Equities and Oak Capitals as co-developers of 1000M and purchased the Lightner Building at 1006 S. Michigan, giving them claim to its air rights, and paving the way to develop the adjacent lot at 1000 S. Michigan.
There was just one small obstacle for the new owners of the Lightner Building—in 2014 its adjacent vacant lot to the north was no longer on the market. Undeterred, Karlik and his team queued up historic aerial photos on Google Earth and saw an image with a Rick Levin auction sign on the vacant parcel. “So, we called Rick, and he put us in touch with the owner,” Karlik told the audience. “A flyer from 1006 S. Michigan turned into this unbelievable project.”
Architects Helmut Jahn and Philip Castillo took photos of the future 1000M site in January 2015 and traveled to New York to present schemes. The duo presented different versions every three weeks, totaling 17 different schemes to the development team.
“We weren’t married to the design, and they knew we would do what it took to max out FAR [floor area ratio],” said Philip Castillo, executive vice president of Jahn, during the panel.
Following a pandemic pause, construction restarted on the 738-unit luxury apartment tower in late 2021. Architecture firm Jahn; project engineer Magnusson Klemencic Associates, and general contractor McHugh Construction, together with mechanical, electrical, and plumbing subcontractors worked in a full design-build approach.
At the building’s rectangular base facing Michigan Avenue, Castillo explained the design considerations behind its horizontal, 30-inch bands of aluminum “that give the building a stronger horizontal expression with more metal and less glass. It reflects in a modern way what’s at 910 and 1006 [adjacent buildings]. So, we have this more rectilinear building below that respects the Michigan Avenue Streetwall, and this more slender, sleek tower above it.”
Creative limits were pushed, especially with the south façade’s cantilever—the project team’s unique solution for unit density and building resiliency. McHugh Construction worked with concrete subcontractor McHugh Concrete and concrete formwork supplier Peri Formwork Systems, Inc. to build the cantilever, with each floor extending 1½ feet further south over the floor below it. To resolve the lateral forces induced by the cantilever, a concrete shear wall core and buttress wall system was used. The sloping columns are tied to this system via heavy bands of high-strength reinforced steel in adjoining slabs. This design approach allowed the square footage of each floor to increase on every floor from level 11 to level 74.
“We’ve been doing business with McHugh since 1999,” Karlik said. “You don’t build a $300 million project with a GC you met for the first time. And we knew they’d be doing the concrete for sure. We’ve enjoyed a 25-year relationship with McHugh, and we plan to continue that.”
McHugh Project Executive Dave Steffenhagen was also on the 1000M panel and noted how the dynamic team approach created an environment where McHugh was able to offer suggestions or alternative materials that performed equally as well or better and culminating in a high-quality finished product. One example includes the installation of a highly polished black lacquer ceiling in the building’s disco room that cost $40,000 less than the originally specified metal material and created an aesthetic that panelists said they liked even better.
“The relationship we had as a team is truly unique,” Steffenhagen told the audience. “We see that collaborative approach throughout the details of the building that has resulted in a unique high-end building that stands out in the marketplace.”
Closing out the panel discussion was Shaylyn Cullen, president of Cullen Construction Management, the owner’s rep, who noted the advantages of using the design-build method. “We spent hours as a team placing things like lighting in the kitchen layouts for example. And with the subcontracting team in there with us, we were able to keep making updates as we were moving up the building.”
1000M’s first residents moved into their new units in May 2024 and have access to the building’s more than 80,000 square feet of indoor and outdoor amenity space including a 73rd-floor rooftop deck, a Zen Garden, year-round swimming, a two-story fitness and wellness facility, private event spaces, social lounges and co-working areas.
