He Designed the Mile High Illinois, Which Would Still be the World’s Tallest Building Any Chicagoan would be lying if he or she said losing the title of city with the tallest building didn’t make their broad shoulders droop a bit. Well, if the city had built the Illinois, Frank Lloyd Wright’s theoretical skyscraper concept, the Burj Khalifa would just be second best. Make that second by a long shot, since the proposed mile-high skyscraper, meant to have room for more than 100 helicopters, 100,000 people, and atomic-powered elevators, would have dwarfed anything since constructed or conceived. Not a man for small gestures, Wright presented his idea for the tripod-shaped beauty in 1956 with a 26-foot-tall rendering done up in gold ink. When he spoke about the plan with Mike Wallace, he said, “Everybody would have room, peace, comfort, and every establishment would be appropriate to every man. It's an ideal that I think that goes with democracy, isn't it?” Photo courtesy Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation Photo 2 of 10 in 9 Things You Didn’t Know About Frank Lloyd Wright

9 Things You Didn’t Know About Frank Lloyd Wright

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He Designed the Mile High Illinois, Which Would Still be the World’s Tallest Building

Any Chicagoan would be lying if he or she said losing the title of city with the tallest building didn’t make their broad shoulders droop a bit. Well, if the city had built the Illinois, Frank Lloyd Wright’s theoretical skyscraper concept, the Burj Khalifa would just be second best. Make that second by a long shot, since the proposed mile-high skyscraper, meant to have room for more than 100 helicopters, 100,000 people, and atomic-powered elevators, would have dwarfed anything since constructed or conceived. Not a man for small gestures, Wright presented his idea for the tripod-shaped beauty in 1956 with a 26-foot-tall rendering done up in gold ink. When he spoke about the plan with Mike Wallace, he said, “Everybody would have room, peace, comfort, and every establishment would be appropriate to every man. It's an ideal that I think that goes with democracy, isn't it?”

Photo courtesy Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation