TERRA
—VERTICAL CONNECTION | STRUCTURAL REINFORCEMENT | URBAN INFILL
PRACTICE AREA
Commercial Advisory
LOCATION
River North | Chicago, IL
SCOPE
Two-Floor Combination | Timber Preservation | Architectural Metalwork | Phased Occupancy | Urban Logistics
— THE PROJECT
A staircase that
hangs
where it could not stand.
In a six-story River North building from the early twentieth century, TERRA Engineering had outgrown its office. The firm needed room for a growing staff and a workplace that would draw that staff together, all within the heavy-timber loft character that gives the building its identity: exposed framing and fourteen-foot ceilings. Integro combined the third and fourth floors into a single workplace of roughly 10,000 SF, setting a vibrant palette against the cool tone of the timber, reimagining the lighting across both levels, and adding a lower-level recreation space sized to convert into a gathering area for the entire firm. Low-voltage lighting was integrated into the timber framing, lighting both floors while keeping the original frame the focus. A set of practical finishes carried the working day: dry-erase paint for writable walls, upgraded bathrooms on both levels, and custom signage carrying the TERRA brand through the space.
The work proceeded while TERRA kept operating, which set the terms for everything that followed. Integro sequenced the renovation around a fully occupied office, moving staff through temporary positions so no part of the firm went dark, and holding the trades to a schedule that allowed little slack through weekly on-site coordination. The hardest problem sat between the floors. A custom steel staircase, fabricated by the Integro team, would join the third and fourth levels, and the original reinforcement plan carried new beams up from beneath the third floor, through the space of the second-floor tenant, in a way that would have compromised those high design offices.
Working closely with our own client, TERRA, Integro built the staircase to hang instead. Rather than bear weight from below, the stair suspends from the fourth-floor joists on custom-fabricated steel brackets and rods, sized to carry the load and detailed for the fastening conditions of a century-old timber frame. The second-floor offices stayed untouched, the schedule held, and approvals from the City of Chicago followed the revised design.
None of our effort shows in the finished space: two floors now read as one, and a growing firm has room to work as a single team.
— CONSTRUCTION DOCUMENTATION
The finished project tells one story. The process tells another. These images and clips document the conditions we encountered, the decisions we made, and what it actually took to bring these visions to life.
It took the manpower of two laborers to hang each custom fabricated, load-bearing bracket of the staircase.
Making complicated drawings approachable for the trades is a hallmark of Integro’s work.
Urban infill projects can be a tight squeeze!
TERRA is located in the heart of the design district in the River North neighborhood of Chicago. Heavy urban infill at the corner of a major intersection leading to a primary interstate highway.
This project came together with the help of our own clients, TERRA. Phased occupancy turned out to be as much of a benefit as it was a challenge to the schedule.
Integrating custom low voltage lighting with timber beams was a primary focus alongside the structural installations.
TERRA provided a revised solution for the structural staircase, literally hanging it from the timber rafters in lieu of bearing its weight from the separate tenant floor below.
On-site welding was required for structural connections of the hanging staircase.
At Integro, we believe an ounce of pretention is worth a pound of manure. Sometimes, the best way to communicate complicated details are through simple sketches.
In progress installation of the custom fabricated, steel staircase.
— PROJECT PHOTOGRAPHY
PHOTOGRAPHY BY Tom Rossiter
PRACTICE AREA
Commercial Advisory
TERRA sits squarely in Integro's commercial advisory practice: structural complexity inside a building that cannot stop operating, resolved without disrupting the business that occupies it. The principle holds across every Integro engagement. The technical scope is defined with rigor, and Integro executes to it.