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Daniel H. Burnham Memorial Competition Entry
Chicago, Illinois

Opticos was one of only twenty design firms nationwide chosen to participate in the Burnham Memorial Competition, a contest celebrating the centennial of Daniel Burnham’s Plan for Chicago. The resulting Burnham Memorial proposal provides a framework for the long-term evolution of Burnham Park, not just as a memorial, but also as a place of education, inspiration, and relaxation for Chicago residents and visitors. The plan, landscapes, and buildings of the design juxtapose the formal and the informal, the built and the natural.

The Memorial incorporates the classical Terrace of the Muses, featuring a statue of Daniel Burnham and arches representing some of the people and places that inspired him; Burnham Hall, an adaptable museum and exhibition space; and a restored prairie landscape stocked with flowers and grasses which attract indigenous wildlife. Functional as well as beautiful, these structures and environments utilize the latest in green building and planning applications, from geothermal heating and cooling in Burnham Hall to the natural filtration and absorption of stormwater runoff in the prairie grasses.