As Navy Pier, the iconic Chicago landmark gets revamped with a hotel of its own, Newcity sits down with Jackie Koo, founding principal of architecture, interior design and urban planning firm, KOO, for a glimpse at the design process. “Creating a design that could be stitched into the historic profile created the right balance between old and new,” Koo says about Sable at Navy Pier, the hundredth property in the Curio Collection by Hilton, that takes its name from the USS Sable, a vessel that called the pier home during World War II. The nod to the location’s historic past doesn’t stop there. It informs the design process at-large—from using a color palette grounded by mixed neutrals and highlighted by a spectrum of blues and blue- greens like the colors of Lake Michigan, to incorporating subtle nautical cues like weathered brass, shipbuilding materials and the use of smooth curves similar to those of a ship’s interior cabin. Sable at Navy Pier was launched as part of the 2016 Navy Pier centennial celebration and renovation so it’s safe to say that “The People’s Pier”—a civic and cultural destination for Chicago locals and visitors alike—started the second hundred years with a bang.
Credit:
NewCity Design