By mixing modern building techniques such as metal framing, fireproofing, elevators and plate glass, together with traditional ones such as brick facades and elaborate ornamentation, Burnham and Root sought to create a bold architectural statement that would nonetheless survive as a commercially successful office building. Of particular note was a "floating" foundation - a reinforced concrete slab that provided the building's weight with a solid platform atop Chicago's notoriously swampy soil. The term for the type of foundation that Root designed is grillage foundation, a foundation where iron rails and the structural beams are combined in a crisscross pattern and encased in concrete to support the building's immense weight without heavy foundation stones. Wright received the commission, in 1905, to redesign the lobby in the building; at the time considered the grandest in Chicago. Wright's work on the Rookery recast the entryway in his Prairie style and added a sense of modernity through his simple but effe
work_description_source
By mixing modern building techniques such as metal framing, fireproofing, elevators and plate glass, together with traditional ones such as brick facades and elaborate ornamentation, Burnham and Root sought to create a bold architectural statement that would nonetheless survive as a commercially successful office building. Of particular note was a "floating" foundation - a reinforced concrete slab that provided the building's weight with a solid platform atop Chicago's notoriously swampy soil. The term for the type of foundation that Root designed is grillage foundation, a foundation where iron rails and the structural beams are combined in a crisscross pattern and encased in concrete to support the building's immense weight without heavy foundation stones. Wright received the commission, in 1905, to redesign the lobby in the building; at the time considered the grandest in Chicago. Wright's work on the Rookery recast the entryway in his Prairie style and added a sense of modernity through his simple but effe
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