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With its imposing black high-rises framing Alexander Calder’s bright red “Flamingo” sculpture (left), the Chicago Federal Center is one of the nation’s pre-eminent ensembles of mid-20th Century modernism. Yet for all its steely grandeur, the complex has woven itself into the life of its rambunctious city.

Loop office workers flock to the center’s farmers markets, just as reporters gather like hawks whenever a major trial is underway in the center’s Dirksen courthouse building. For years, last-minute tax filers have streamed to the center’s low-slung post office, which was designed, like the rest of the complex, by Ludwig Mies van der Rohe. The center, which lines Dearborn Street in the South Loop, was completed in 1975, though it has since expanded.

Now, with little fanfare, the federal government is pouring more than a quarter of a billion dollars into four projects that seek to replace failing mechanical systems, make the center more energy-efficient, reduce maintenance costs, renovate the center's elegant but aging plaza and further expand the complex into a former department store along neighboring State Street. Three of the four projects are backed by the federal stimulus program, accounting for $155 million of the overall $276 million cost. The Dirksen building rehab was funded separately from the controversial program.

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who is bozo texino?

more via vz
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smiley


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juan gris checkerboard 1915


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helyes.fi


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nendo: thin black lines + blurry white surfaces


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buick skylark w/ lowered beltline was americas answer to the european sportscar


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How to Turn Your Old TV Into a 60's Light Show


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moss acres / ferns and allies

fiddlehead fern species: Matteuccia struthiopteris 'The King' (Perennial Ostrich Fern)
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ecomodder


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never mind the bullets


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the mavericks

surfing a dangerous spectator sport at half moon bay


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A pristine toy train station made in 1905 shines in an exhibition of 3,500 antique locomotives and railroad buildings at Sotheby’s in New York.

The group is part of the Jerni Collection, which includes more than 27,000 toys made between 1850 and 1940.

The auction house is offering the entire collection as a single lot in a private sale estimated to bring more than $10 million. Other experts put the value much higher.

“I think $40 million to $50 million is a very comfortable number for that collection,” said Noel Barrett, an appraiser on PBS’s “Antiques Roadshow” and president of Noel Barrett Antiques & Auctions.
more images (the bridges!!!!) and merklin (tm) collectors discussion
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mid-century architecture / woodstock hand made houses

via things mag


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jackson bros. drag racing videos


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40th aniv barrett jackson auto auction speed network


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"Reacting to the tradition of neo-classicism as early as the 1830's, English architects and decorators took a renewed interest in the art of Gothic cathedrals. This movement, called Gothic Revival, shaped the whole Victorian era and was on a scale that had no equivalent in other European countries. In the midst of the industrial boom, the enthusiasm for the Gothic period, seen as an exemplary society in which the arts blossomed in a mystical and fraternal spirit, was set against the effects, considered degrading, of mechanisation.

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Works from the Collection of Michael Crichton

via greg org on his quest for the missing johns flag painting
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tesla 4 door S model


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MLK streets project


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Bernard Ratzer “Plan of the City of New York” in its 1770 state


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knights tour

man ray, knights tour '44-46

chessboard had been a key image in Man Ray's work since as far back as 1911., when he had made the Tapestry, as well as other compositions based upon grids of squares. The famous Lips had begun as a similar grip upon a photograph of Kiki's mouth, "It helps you understand the structure, to master a sense of order," he wrote at the time. "When the ancient masters composed a painting, they used to divide the surface into regular squares."
the imagery of chess
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wild grapevine and how to get rid of it

6 step
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pre-pop


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