Capable of existing in any American city, ‘off-grid scenarios’ is tested in Chicago, the city that has been historically described as the endless city. In Chicago, disturbances within the grid provide foundations for opportunities and create difference for the city. In order to emphasize these moments, we propose turning them into a new monumental system or infrastructure, which reflects its context and re-uses it in a new, experimental way. These new urban monumental infrastructure questions ‘building-as-landscape’ scenarios, begging the question of what kind of building the city becomes. Historically, the pre-existing layered infrastructures of American cities like Chicago have already informally addressed this phenomenon. Our proposal takes this notion of city-as-building to the next level, giving it a sense of monumental importance. In addition, the proposed scenarios establish new connections with the existing urban grid, a defining characteristic of American cities.


American cities, like Chicago, are about to gain new additions to their skylines. Except this time it is different: no one can find them; they seem to be invisible and unnoticeable amongst a crowded downtown.


The buildings’ height is revealed; an astonishing (negative) 1200 ft. Slowly an inversion occurs, skylines no longer tower to the clouds, but instead, extend far below the surface of the earth. Alleys turn to bridges, garages to entries and what we used to know as ground turns to rooftop. They have become endless cities surpassing any norms of traditional urban planning.


Because these inverted moments exist within the grid but act beyond it, they allow for new freedoms to evolve. The strange duality of these inverted monuments is that, for all practical purposes, they remain invisible to a city’s skyline, but at the same time the grid and the city cannot exist without them.


Their substantial presence within the city gives them a monumental quality, becoming not upright monuments, but inverted ones. Within the inversion, the existing infrastructures and buildings become integrated into a single interconnected space, which acts simultaneously as a new infrastructure, architecture and city. Transportation no longer exists as a freestanding system, but becomes an interconnected built mass.


These new urban monumental infrastructures begin to challenge ‘building-as-landscape’ scenarios, begging the question of what kind of building the city becomes. Off-grid scenarios take this notion of city-as-building, building-as-city to a suggestive level, giving it a sense of monumental importance with monumental ramifications.




Urban Interpretations at UIC, Chicago – 12 Basic Points
by Alex Lehnerer

1. A city can never be seriously researched – there can only be elaborate interpretations on it.
2. The interpretation results in products of specific form and (architectural) expression.
3. Our projects are very site specific – although they do not have a specific location.
4. We only cope with aspects of reality while exaggerating their repercussions.
5. It is rules not plans that drive our projects: because plans can only be simulated – rules need to be played.
6. We believe that the contemporary metropolis is the greatest building mankind created so far.
7. Serious misreading of our environment is the most difficult part to do.
8. Urban history is just another set of regularities.
9. As professional amateurs, we voluntarily assume the status of subversive civil servants.
10. We do not differentiate between real possibilities and possible realities.
11. Our work is about individual freedoms and universal qualities, about urban indeterminacy and architectural specificity.
12. We want to make an urban appearance.

Left: Chicago Is All There Is: Urban Interpretations on the city - Studio Alex Lehnerer (click here for hi-res image)

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UIC School of Architecture