Some cities are known for their buildings, and then there’s Chicago.
Its relationship with construction was shaped through adversity when, exactly 155 years ago in October 1871, the Great Chicago Fire ripped through the city, destroying more than 18,000 homes and structures and leaving around a third of Chicago’s population homeless. It was devastating, but what followed became an extremely important part of the Chicago we recognise today.
Chicago rose from the ashes.
It didn’t happen overnight, and the fire itself didn’t suddenly create the skyscraper, but rebuilding a city on that scale brought change. Architects, engineers and designers all had to think differently about materials, fire protection and how a rapidly growing city would be built.
Within just a few years, Chicago was rebuilding at an extraordinary pace. In 1885, the ten-story Home Insurance Building was completed. Today, ten stories would hardly turn heads on the Chicago skyline, but at the time it represented something very different. Its pioneering metal-frame construction meant the building’s weight no longer had to be carried by thick masonry walls.
Construction possibilities suddenly changed. Buildings could go higher, and space could be opened up inside. What started in Chicago helped create the thinking behind the modern skyscraper and the vertical cities we now see around the world.
Take a look at the skylines of New York, Toronto, London or Dubai, and somewhere in their story, you can find the heartbeat of those early Chicago buildings.
But there’s another part of that story that’s just as interesting. Those buildings didn’t rise because of architecture alone. Architects could imagine the buildings and engineers could work out how they might stand, but eventually someone had to build them. As buildings became taller and more complicated, everything inside them had to develop as well. Heating, water, drainage, ventilation, electricity, elevators and all the other services that turn a structure into a functioning building all had to move forward. And tradespeople had to install it.
Chicago Build and InstallerSHOW Chicago
Perhaps this is why Chicago feels like such an appropriate place for what’s happening at McCormick Place on October 28 and 29.
Chicago Build will bring together tens of thousands of people from all across construction, architecture, engineering, design and the wider built environment. It’s a substantial event in its own right, bringing all the various parts of the construction industry together under one roof.
Co-located with Chicago Build this year is InstallerSHOW Chicago. There’s something rather fitting about that.
If you consider any building. We see its shape, materials and finished spaces, but behind those visible elements is another world. Heating, cooling, ventilation, plumbing, electrical services and countless other systems are all working inside that building. And behind all those systems are the tradespeople and installers who put them there. The beating heart of the building.
The same concept works with these two shows. Chicago Build provides the wider structure and brings architecture, engineering, design, and construction together. Inside that wider conversation, InstallerSHOW brings us closer to the people, the products and the services that actually make the buildings work.
I have been involved with InstallerSHOW for several years in the UK, speaking and chairing conversations around kitchens, bathrooms, installation, skills, apprenticeships and the future of the trades. Earlier this year I also had the opportunity to speak at the very first InstallerSHOW in New York.
One of my biggest takeaways from New York was that the value of an installer-focused event is not limited to installers. In fact, I would argue that designers, architects, manufacturers and specifiers can gain just as much from getting closer to the installation conversation.
A kitchen or bathroom may begin with a design and a vision of what the finished room will look like, but eventually someone has to make it work in a real building. Water has to go somewhere; ventilation has to go somewhere else; electrical services have to be safely installed; and products have to fit into spaces that are never as perfect as they looked on the original drawing.
That space between what is designed and what is eventually built can be a little complicated. But the more we understand each other’s role in that journey, the greater chance we have of improving the end result.
Don’t look at InstallerSHOW Chicago and think it’s simply an event for HVACR technicians and plumbers. Those people absolutely belong there, but so does everyone working around them. If you’re an architect, come and speak to the people installing the systems you specify. If you’re a kitchen or bath designer, spend some time understanding what happens beyond your finished design. If you’re a contractor, an engineer or a developer, come and see what manufacturers and installers are dealing with at the practical end of the project. And likewise, if you’re an HVACR professional, plumber, electrician, installer or skilled tradesperson, step into that bigger construction conversation as well.
We spend a lot of time talking about collaboration in the construction industry, and events like this offer the ideal opportunity to actually do it. That doesn’t just mean sitting at a conference. It can be the conversation beside a product demonstration, asking a manufacturer a technical question or meeting somebody working in a completely different part of construction who might see a problem differently from you.
Those conversations matter.
InstallerSHOW Chicago is building on an established UK event and follows its move into New York earlier this year. Its focus remains very practical at its roots, particularly around HVACR, plumbing, products and people. Visitors getting hands-on with products, asking manufacturers questions and learning directly from installers in the industry. Combine that with the scale and wider audience of Chicago Build, and we have a very interesting mix.
For anyone involved in any part of construction, October 28 and 29 are worth putting in the diary.
Chicago has spent generations showing us what can happen when building problems force people to think differently. After the fire came new ideas, and a period of architectural and engineering development that helped change the skyline not only of Chicago but of cities around the world.
Today, the challenges are different. It’s all about energy, efficiency, sustainability, changing technology and workforce skills. It’s about how we attract the next generation of people capable of delivering it all.
Behind every architect’s drawing, every designer’s concept and every new product is someone who eventually has to turn that idea into something that works.
So, if you are anywhere around Chicago and you work in construction, architecture, design, HVACR, plumbing, engineering, kitchen and bath, building services or installation, come and be part of it. Walk Chicago Build. Step inside the heartbeat that is InstallerSHOW. Talk to somebody from another part of the industry. Look at what is changing, ask questions and make connections.
More than 150 years ago, Chicago faced the enormous task of building again, and what followed helped change the way the world looked at buildings.
For me, that seems like a pretty good place to be talking about what we build next.
—Mark Conacher is CEO of KBB Momentum, a consultancy serving kitchen and bath installation businesses and retailers
