Saved this for black & white Wednesday, with my challenge from Hope ( @mzzhope ) in mind -- to look at small architectural element rather than the broad view. This is Chicago's main post office front entrance. It's a fairly uninteresting building with a nondescript plaza so my goal was to make it look more intriguing by converting to b&w and emphasizing pattern. In fact, I'd never even really noticed the columns or the glass window panes or the tiles before. When you walk by the building, I suspect the most common reaction would be 'blah.'
ONS7 photo 1 was reflection -- stretching it a bit, there are reflections in the windows.
Lovely composition and your processing really works - you have made the building beautiful! Where are all the people? Did you go out at the crack of dawn?
One of the things I love about the PO Plaza is that, when Mies van der Rohe designed the PO, the lines in the outside pavement area match the lines in the PO floor perfectly. There's so much glass on the outside walls that it's easy to discern and a marvel to behold!
@voiceprintz I actually had to google the plaza to figure out what you meant as I couldn't imagine Mies van der Rohe being responsible! Mystery solved. This is not the main post office in the loop. It's the one on Harrison which is the one with all the storage, etc. MUCH less attractive than the one downtown!! I'll correct in description!
The only large PO I recall was near where my daughter first lived in Presidential Towers and it spanned the highway I think... Surely this isn't that one? I love that your image looks as though it were hand-drawn by an architect. Your skills seem boundless!
@Weezilou That one is totally abandoned now, sold once to become mixed use office/condo but that went bankrupt and now the building is just sitting there. I don't want to think about who or what is occupying it -- and it's still huge and imposing. This photo is the building that replaced it.
Your photo makes it look like an architectural rendering.....one of those early perspective sketches to show spatial relationships! The floor grid and the lack of human element emphasizes that! And, yes, I do see the reflections in the windows! ;-)
a work-a-day beauty. I bet whoever designed this building did not imagine that it would end up being nondescript as they carefully planned all the lines and angles.
@riverlandphotos Heehee!! Right about now wanting to be there in the dark...but with the wonderful world of post-processing, I actually have a shot that looks like I took it at night and it's quite moody and scary, in contrast to this one.
Instant fav! The pic gave me directly the feeling being upside down :) I love the vertical lines made by the pillars and the square patterns on the ground. Great emptyness too!
