Last week, Berglund Construction celebrated two successful projects at the Chicago Building Congress Merit Awards.
Our restoration project at the Chicago Cultural Center won the top prize for its category: Renovation & Adaptive Reuse Under $20 Million. And the new office building we constructed for the Electrical Insurance Trustees Fund was a finalist for Commercial Construction Under $50 Million.
The Chicago Building Congress Merit Awards have celebrated the building industry since 1956 by singling out the outstanding projects in greater Chicagoland built during the past three years. Winners are selected by a jury of peers who judge the projects based on four criteria:
• Distinctive, functional, or innovative design
• Quality of construction
• Impact of the project on the community and inclusion initiatives
• Safety record
Our winning project at the Chicago Cultural Center restored the Grand Army of the Republic Rooms and the Healy and Millet stained glass dome. In the 1970s, these once vibrant rooms decorated by Tiffany were painted over in muted tones. The dome, composed of 62,000 pieces of glass and spanning 40-feet-wide, was covered in dirt and artificially lit by electric bulbs. Over the course of a year, the project team removed and restored the stained glass from the dome, removed the artificial lighting and exposed the dome structure to natural light utilizing an exterior skylight. In the Grand Army of the Republic Rooms, preservation teams restored the Tiffany paint scheme, performed historic plaster repairs, cleaned all mosaic floors, restored the historic wood doors and hardware, and replicated the historic light fixtures.
Our second honored project, which received a nomination for its category, included the construction of a new office building for EIT, the organization that manages the benefit fund for the electrician’s union in Alsip, IL. This project was a one-story building, approximately 21,500 sqft. It contains office and conferencing spaces as well as a health and wellness clinic that offers immediate services for the union and their families.
