THE FUTURE OF STATE
The Chicago Architectural Club 2026 Burnham Prize

For the 2026 Burnham Prize, the Chicago Architectural Club is partnering with World Business Chicago, the Chicago Architecture Center, the Chicago Loop Alliance, and the Loop Arts District Caucus in calling for visions for a reimagined State Street in the heart of Chicago’s Loop.

INTRODUCTION: THE HISTORY OF STATE STREET State Street has long been Chicago’s “Great Street,” serving as the city’s central spine of commerce, culture, and civic life. Its rise as Chicago’s primary retail corridor began in 1868, when Potter Palmer, Marshall Field, and Levi Leiter moved their businesses from Lake Street to State Street, extending the commercial district south toward what is now Ida B. Wells Drive. In the decades that followed, State Street became the heart of the city’s retail economy, lined with major department stores including Marshall Field’s, Carson Pirie Scott, Rothschild’s, The Fair, Goldblatt’s, and Sears. Designed by architects such as Daniel Burnham, Louis Sullivan, Dankmar Adler, and Holabird and Root, these Chicago-frame buildings featured large floor plates that have allowed them to adapt over time to new uses, ensuring their continued relevance in the life of the city.

By the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, State Street had become synonymous with Chicago itself. The completion of the Loop Elevated Railway in 1897 further concentrated activity in the downtown core, reinforcing State Street’s role as the city’s primary destination. From the period before the Great Fire, when Chicago’s population was roughly 300,000, to the mid-twentieth century, when it approached 3,000,000, State Street remained the center of department store retail and urban life. By the time Frank Sinatra sang “on State Street, that great street” in 1964, the corridor had already held that identity for nearly a century.

In the mid-twentieth century, however, the forces reshaping American cities began to alter State Street. The rise of the automobile, the growth of suburban shopping centers, and broader social changes, including the civil rights movement, transformed patterns of access and use. While State Street’s stores were among those that welcomed a broader and more diverse public, shifts in shopping habits led to gradual decline. By the 1970s and 1980s, vacancies and disinvestment had become more visible.

Efforts to respond to these changes led to a series of major interventions. In 1979, State Street was converted into a pedestrian and bus-only transit mall, part of a broader national trend aimed at revitalizing downtowns. The experiment ultimately proved unsuccessful, and in 1996 the street was reopened to cars and redesigned with widened sidewalks, trees, and planters. This streetscape, now nearly thirty years old, restored a measure of activity but reflects an earlier model of downtown centered primarily on retail.

At the same time, the Loop itself began to evolve. Educational institutions expanded their presence, adding dormitories and contributing to a growing residential population. Former office buildings, particularly those with adaptable floor plates, were converted into housing. This transformation helped shift the Loop from a predominantly 9-to-5 business district into a more active, mixed-use neighborhood, bringing new life to State Street and its surrounding blocks.

The COVID-19 pandemic brought another period of disruption. Downtown emptied as office workers stayed home, tourism slowed, and storefronts shuttered. While activity is returning, hybrid work and changing patterns of urban life have fundamentally altered how the Loop is used. Yet State Street continues to demonstrate its potential as a civic stage. Events such as Sundays on State, the Arts in the Dark parade, the Chicago Marathon, and seasonal festivals have shown how the corridor can come alive when animated by culture and collective experience. The planned reconstruction of the State and Lake CTA station further signals a renewed public investment in the corridor, reinforcing its role as both gateway and gathering place.

Recent efforts have begun to outline a path forward. The City’s Central Area planning efforts, including the Central City Recovery Roadmap, have identified State Street as a priority corridor for reinvestment and transformation. The Urban Land Institute has proposed strategies to reimagine the corridor as a more pedestrian-focused, arts-driven, and inclusive public realm. In parallel, the Loop Arts District Caucus has emerged as a new platform bringing together cultural institutions, artists, and civic leaders to align around a shared vision. Together, these efforts point to a moment of opportunity.

State Street now sits at a critical inflection point. By building on this momentum through design, it can once again become a place where Chicago’s civic, cultural, and everyday life intersect, reclaiming its role not only as a historic corridor, but as a central stage for the city’s future.

REFERENCE STUDIES Several studies in and around the State Street corridor and downtown Chicago have been conducted including but not limited to the following:

STATE STREET & LAKE STATION The planned reconstruction of the State and Lake CTA station is one of the most significant infrastructure commitments to State Street in recent years. Long overdue, the project will modernize a critical transit hub, making it safer, fully accessible, and better integrated into the flow of downtown. As the northern gateway to the corridor, the new station represents not only an upgrade in mobility but also a signal of renewed investment in State Street’s future.

EVENTS ON STATE STREET Recent programming and events have shown how the street itself can transform into a civic stage. The Chicago Loop Alliance’s Sundays on State has illustrated how closing the corridor to cars can create an energetic public realm filled with performances, markets, and cultural expression. Annual events such as the Arts in the Dark parade demonstrate the street’s capacity to host citywide celebrations, drawing thousands into the Loop to experience art in motion. Along with the Chicago Marathon, holiday parades, seasonal markets, and cultural festivals, these moments reveal how State Street can thrive when animated with activity, setting the stage for a more permanent reimagining of the corridor as Chicago’s everyday gathering place.

THE LOOP ARTS DISTRICT CAUCUS
In parallel with these findings, a Loop Arts District Caucus has been formed under the auspices of the Chicago Loop Alliance. Meeting monthly, the caucus convenes the remarkable cultural assets of downtown, museums, theaters, universities, arts organizations, public art, festivals, and creative businesses, for a common purpose: to elevate the arts as central to the Loop’s future. This competition is an opportunity to contribute design energy directly into those conversations. Submissions will not stand in isolation, but will be shared with the Loop Arts District Caucus as part of an ongoing partnership to shape a collective vision for downtown.

DESIGN CHALLENGE This competition calls for bold, future-facing proposals that reclaim State Street as Chicago’s Great Street, an active, mixed-use corridor in the heart of the Loop. The competition seeks strategies to revitalize and reimagine retail, housing, office, business, schools, culture, entertainment, and the arts, supporting a more resilient and diverse downtown. State Street should be welcoming to residents, workers, families, students, and visitors alike, capable of supporting both everyday use and citywide events. Proposals should demonstrate how design, preservation, landscape, culture, and/or community, alongside economic and policy strategies, can transform State Street from a thoroughfare into a destination that serves a broad range of needs and belongs to everyone.

The task ahead is to reconnect State Street, and its network of historic and cultural landmarks, to the broader rhythm of the city, reinforcing its role as both a vibrant mixed-use spine and a central civic stage for Chicago. Proposals should demonstrate how sustained, year-round activity can be supported through retail revitalization, increased residential presence, adaptive reuse, evolving workplace models, and a more diverse mix of programs and businesses, integrating physical, operational, and policy strategies to strengthen economic activity and reestablish State Street as a consistently active corridor within the Loop. Submissions may focus on one or multiple topics and operate at the urban or building scale, and will be assessed on the clarity of the issues identified and the effectiveness of the proposal in addressing them through bold, future-facing visions.

SITE State Street corridor from the Chicago River to Roosevelt Road.

PROGRAM Program to be determined by entrants as an integral part of proposals.

SCHEDULE

April 22, 2026: Competition Announcement and Jury Introduction
May 6, 2026: Workshop with Loop Arts District Caucus
May 15, 2026: Early Registration Deadline
May 1-30,2026: Question Period
July 15, 2026: Competition Registration Deadline
July 20, 2026 at 5:00 PM CT: Competition Submission Deadline
August 2026: Jury deliberations and Winners Announced
August - September 2026: Publication/Exhibition prep of selected entries
October 17, 2026: Public Exhibition and Arts Fest on State Street

SUPPLIED MATERIALS To support this work, we have prepared a set of base materials, including a CAD plan of the corridor and key background resources. These are provided as a common framework for participants and can be accessed here: The Future of State-Supplied Materials.

DELIVERABLES Submissions are due at 5:00 PM CT on July 20, 2026. Submissions are electronic and submitted via email only. The following materials should be submitted:

A single 24-inch x 36-inch poster, in portrait orientation. The poster must include the 5-digit assigned registration number in the lower right-hand corner and be submitted in PDF format. The file should be named with the 5-digit registration number, for example “12345.pdf.”
A written statement of no more than 500 words explaining your ideas. The file should be named “Statement_12345.doc.” This file must be a .txt, .doc, or .rtf file, NOT a .pdf.
A single page document with team identification and contact information. Include: Project title, names of team members, leader’s telephone number, and email address. The file should be named “ID_12345.doc.” This file must be a .txt, .doc, or .rtf file, NOT a .pdf. The source of any third-party materials incorporated in the entry must also be included; this source information may exceed one page if necessary.

All three files must then be saved in a single ZIP file named with the 5-digit registration number “12345.zip.” This zipped file should not exceed 10MB. The single ZIP file should be sent via email to: competitionentries@chicagoarchitecturalclub.org

The email subject line should read “Registration Number_12345.” Upon announcement of the winners, higher resolution images may be requested from winning submissions and selected entries. Following jury deliberation, shortlisted entries will be contacted to coordinate materials for the subsequent exhibition.

AWARDS

First Place: $3,000
Second Place: $2,000
Third Place: $1,000
Published Projects: $100

Selected work will be featured in a public exhibition and programming, in partnership with the Chicago Architecture Center, and all teams whose projects are selected for exhibition will receive an honorarium for their contribution. Winning entries will be shared with project partners as part of an ongoing dialogue about the future of State Street. At the discretion of the jury, one proposal may be selected for possible implementation, pending available funding through grant applications led by the Chicago Architectural Club in collaboration with the selected team.

FEES & REGISTRATION

Early Registration Fee: $50 ($25 Students)
Regular Registration Fee: $75 ($50 Students)

Please email a pdf copy of a valid current student ID for student rates.
To register, follow the link below:

REGISTER HERE

JURY A distinguished jury of architects, planners, designers, critics, and civic leaders will guide the selection of winning proposals. The jury reflects a broad range of expertise across design, landscape, urbanism, preservation, and public leadership. Confirmed jury members include:

Carol Ross Baney, FAIA, Design Principal and Founder, Ross Barney Architects
Elizabeth Blasius, Historian, Writer, Partner, Preservation Futures
Phil Enquist, FAIA, University of Illinois at Chicago, College of Urban Planning and Public Affairs, Former Partner, Skidmore Owings & Merrill
Reed Kroloff, Dean, College of Architecture, Illinois Institute of Technology
Anjulie Rao, Journalist and Critic
Irene Sunwoo, John H. Bryan Chair and Curator, Architecture and Design, The Art Institute of Chicago
Ernest C. Wong, PLA, FASLA, APA, Founding Principal, Site Design Group

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
The Chicago Architectural Club thanks our generous sponsor, World Business Chicago, and our partners:

PRESS RELEASE
To download the press release for the competition: The Future of State - Press Release.