Jeanne Gang, FAIA, leads a project meeting with (left to right) Stephen Claeys, Weston Walker, and Beth Zacherle. The group is discussing a mixed-use project for Mumbai, India, and debating, specifically, how the project's base will meet the ground. In this session, the group resolved to combine elements from two preliminary models to move forward. Even at an early design stage, Studio Gang's engagement with topography is evident. The first monograph on Studio Gang, Reveal, to be published this month by Princeton Architectural Press, reveals the process behind eight projects—including key hometown works such as the Aqua Tower, a residential skyscraper near the Chicago River, and the SOS Children's Villages in Chicago's reemerging South Side.
The model shop at Studio Gang, which is on the second floor of an old office building in Chicago's Wicker Park neighborhood, includes a study model for a recent project. "We're trying to make the inside of the building part of the landscape," Gang says.
The design for the education pavilion at Chicago's Lincoln Park Zoo emerged from the selection of wood and fiberglass to build the lattice. "We were looking for the best performance from materials," Gang says.
The white concept models for a Vancouver high-rise are the earliest studies for the project. The more colorful column is a structural study.
"I love this neighborhood," says Gang, a Chicago-area native. Studio Gang Architects started with one space in the building in 2002 and quickly took over the entire floor. While Chicago winters are bleak, the firm's work is colorful—and so is the neighborhood, she says. "It's one of the most diverse neighborhoods in the city."
