Apparently a company called Willis Group is going to be moving into over 140,000 square feet of the Sears Tower, and they’ll be taking the name along with all of that office space.
The Willis Tower? Really? Ugh.
I tend to agree with Rob Powers, who recently commented on his flickr, “I am of the opinion that a building should only be allowed one name change in its lifetime. After that, it can only revert back to the original name.” Hear hear! Sears Tower, you’re about to use up your one free name change pass, and you were completed in 1973! Think very carefully: Is this something you really want to do?
Things get renamed all the time, and I know name changes are a way for building owners to make money in an awful economy, but the Sears Tower isn’t just some crumbling old carburetor factory with a nondescript name in the middle of nowhere. It’s one of the most famous buildings in the United States, to say nothing of Chicago. Do we really want to get all Scottrade Center on it?
In all fairness, the Sears Corporation is not even in the Sears Tower anymore. They moved out to the ‘burbs a while back. I, for one, am happy to have one of our country’s most iconic structures having tenants moving in instead of fleeing to the ‘burbs or avoiding buildings due to threat of terror. If the naming rights are there to sweeten the deal, then so be it. It’s better than building ownership hitting local government up for tax abatements to make the bottom line.
“There are people who go to great lengths to prove that they own some part of Skyscraper National Park, putting their names on buildings or whatever, but they might as well put their names on things like the Grand Canyon or Old Faithful ….[cities are] a geological phenomenon.”
- Kurt Vonngut Jr. “Fates Worse Than Death”