The Willis Tower, formerly known as the Sears Tower, is a 110-story skyscraper in downtown Chicago that stands out for its sleek black steel exterior and distinctive design.
Who built the Sears Tower?
In the late 1960s, Sears, Roebuck and Company was the largest retail company in the world. Sears employed nearly 350,000 workers, mostly in the Chicago area, and decided to build a central headquarters there that would stand as a monument to the company’s soaring success and ambitions.
As CEO Gordon Metcalf explained in 1970, “Being the largest retailer in the world, we thought we should have the largest headquarters in the world.” When the Sears Tower was completed in 1974, it was the world’s tallest building at about 1,450 feet tall.
How long was the Sears Tower the world’s tallest building?
At the time it was built, the tower was the maximum construction height allowed by the Federal Aviation Administration. Architect Bruce Graham and structural engineer Fazlur Khan of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill used an innovative method called “bundled tube” architecture to support such a massive structure capable of withstanding Chicago’s high winds. The top of the tower sways an average of six inches, but is designed to sway a maximum of three feet.
The Sears Tower held the title of world’s tallest for 22 years, until it was dethroned by the twin Petronas Towers in Malaysia, each standing at 1,483 feet. The 1996 declaration by the Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat was controversial, because the antennae of the Sears Tower extended higher than the spires of the Petronas Towers, but the council stood firm.
Today, the Willis Tower is the 25th tallest building in the world and the third tallest in North America.
Why did the Sear Tower Change to the Willis Tower?
In 2009, a London-based insurance company called Willis Group Holdings struck a deal with the skyscraper’s owner to lease 140,000 square feet of office space in exchange for naming rights to the Chicago landmark. To the chagrin of Chicagoans, their beloved Sears Tower was now the Willis Tower.
To be fair, Sears hadn’t been a tenant of its own tower for decades when the renaming decision was made. In its glory days, the first 50 floors of the Sears Tower were occupied entirely by the Sears merchandising department. But in 1988, as part of a restructuring effort, Sears sold the building and moved out its approximately 8,000 employees.
Although many Chicagoans still refuse to call the iconic skyscraper by any other name, the Sears Tower officially became the Willis Tower on July 16, 2009.
