Old Chicago Post Office

The Old Chicago Main Post Office is a nine-story office building in downtown Chicago, originally built in 1921 by the architecture firm Graham, Anderson, Probst & White. The building's historic brick facade was massively expanded in 1932 to handle the city's enormous volume of mail, which was driven by the rise of mail-order giants such as Montgomery Ward and Sears. This expansion increased the usable floor space to more than 60 acres and left a lasting mark on the neighborhood's skyline. One architectural detail from the planning phase is an opening reserved in the foundation, which was used two decades later for the extension of Congress Parkway. Today the building is listed on the National Register of Historic Places as a historic landmark and stands as a testament to Chicago's economic heyday.

After the postal service moved to a modern facility in 1997, the building sat unused for years before it was sold to a real estate developer in 2009. Following a comprehensive restoration and conversion by the firm 601W, the building reopened in October 2019. The renovation, completed on a budget of $800 million, transformed the former postal terminal into modern office space, complemented by a rooftop garden and a riverwalk. The project received LEED Gold certification for sustainable building. Today the building houses the offices of well-known companies such as Uber, PepsiCo, Cisco Systems, Ferrara Candy Company, and Walgreens. The conversion shows how historic infrastructure can be integrated into modern urban uses, while the original Beaux-Arts lobby on Van Buren Street preserves the building's historic character.