DPI pulls plug on new headquarters at The 78

The Discovery Partners Institute has announced that they are pulling the plug on their planned new headquarters at The 78 megadevelopment. Set to be located at 1519 S. Wells, the project was set to anchor the south end of the 78 fronting the future intersection of W.15th St and S. Wells St. Since it was set to be funded by the state, the Illinois Capital Development Board has been overseeing the project.

With OMA as the design architect and Jacobs as the architect of record, the project was supposed to take the form of an eight-story building that would have encompassed approximately 213,000 square feet of space. Rising 136 feet, the building was to house classrooms, meeting and event spaces, labs and offices for research, development and startups, as well as collaboration space interspersed throughout the building. 

The announcement comes after years of work to get to a point where the beginning of construction was imminent. Local contractor Clark Construction had already begun fencing off and locating equipment on site to begin site work for the building. 

DPI has announced they will split their new headquarters into a new building at the planned Illinois Quantum & Microelectronics Park on the US Steel South Works Site while also maintaining a downtown presence in their 200 S. Wacker location while exploring options for a new downtown location.

As DPI leaves The 78 property, developer Related Midwest is already exploring new options with the concept of co-locating the new White Sox stadium and a dedicated soccer stadium for the Chicago Fire. Chicago Fire FC owner Joe Mansueto recently announced his intent to build a soccer-specific stadium and included that he intends to fund it with entirely private funds.

With the DPI’s exit and the exploration of the new stadiums, the future development of The 78 is going back to the drawing board with no timeline for the construction of any buildings.