Market Square: 700 North Western Avenue Market Square

              700 North Western Avenue     Market Square (including 226 Southgate) 

Howard Van Doren Shaw, 1916 (dated in plaster relief on the second story of the southern shops facing Western Avenue) 


The plan shows the ingenious and practical character of this important complex.  The important elements in the plan are also visible in the general spatial disposition and in the architectural elaboration of the complex.  Along Western Avenue, the shop farthest north and south is set in line with the other commercial structures on the street, but the rest are set back to introduce a small forecourt at the sidewalk and to lead into the open space of the complex. Along the inside wall of the shops on either side of the open space is an open loggia with stone piers carrying timber quadrant brackets and beams.  A tower stands at each end of this stretch to make the next indentation of the plan.  The western end of the rows of shops which follow is terminated by a free standing corner column (see this element also used later at 260-72 Deerpath, lending continuity to the design of the downtown structures).  Behind the shops on either side of the broad green are service courts.  At the end of the green is a pair of buildings.  The eastern one, the only one visible from the market square itself, formerly held the First National Bank and two stores:  now it holds Marshall Field’s.  Beyond it is the recreation building, a structure of equal size with a quite different architectural treatment (see below).  The open space is lined with parking spaces next to the shop and with hedges and trees along its central greensward.  At its west end is a flag pole, its lower casing a memorial and added later.  The other original element, at the eastern end, is a polygonal herringbone brick basin with a stone fountain, this one also a memorial—to Shaw.

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