Historic Restoration

GENERAL JONES ARMORY, Historic Art Deco Stone Facade Restoration

Designed 1928, completed 1941, the General Jones Armory sits at the edge of Washington Park in Chicago and was the first to be named after an African American. Scupltures on the facade illustrate the history of the "fighting man" and my task of creating construction documents for the restoration of this Historic Landmark art deco facade was all the more enchanting because a movie production team had rented the space inside, which is larger than a football field, and filmed a movie while I conducted the stone facade inspections alongside an expert mason. We surveyed the 4 stories of the sculpted exterior facade on a cherry picker in the middle of one of the coldest Chicago Februarys I can remember.

The mason taught me to read which steel frame failure type the wear on the store revealed.