Fall architecture: Several grand openings on deck for major cities

The fall architectural calendar is packed with major events in Chicago, New York and Shanghai. Here are 10 worth watching.

Reclaiming the lower Manhattan skyline: More than 13 years after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, the 104-story One World Trade Center will open and officially replace Chicago's Willis Tower as America's tallest building. The new skyscraper, designed by David Childs of the New York office of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill, rises from a square, security-conscious base to a faceted, light-reflecting tower consisting of eight tall isosceles triangles. Billed as a symbol of American resilience, One World Trade Center will contain an observation deck in addition to its office space. The first tenants are expected to begin occupying the tower in November.

Lucas Museum China designs Chicago: In a much-anticipated unveiling, whose date is not yet set, "Star Wars" creator George Lucas will make public plans for his controversial Lucas Museum of Narrative Art on Chicago's lakefront. Beijing architect Ma Yansong is designing the building, while Chicago architect Jeanne Gang is responsible for the landscape of the 17-acre site and of a pedestrian bridge linking the museum to nearby Northerly Island. The open-space advocacy group Friends of the Parks, which claims the site for the museum violates Chicago's lakefront protection ordinance, has threatened to file a lawsuit against the project.

Shanghai Nature Museum Chicago designs China: In the latest chapter of the Chicago-China architectural exchange, the Shanghai Nature Museum, designed by Chicago architect Ralph Johnson of Perkins+Will, is expected to open in the fall or early winter. The most distinctive feature of the nautilus-shaped building is a bowing metal-and-glass wall that suggests a cluster of human cells. The building's interior revolves around a light-filled, multilevel atrium in which the museum will display one of the prize items of its collection, a dinosaur skeleton that is almost 20 feet high by 80 feet long.

Maggie Daley Park and the city that plays: The first phase of Maggie Daley Park, a 27-acre public space that combines playful and pastoral areas, will open to the east of Millennium Park in late fall. Designed by New York landscape architect Michael Van Valkenburgh, the new park will include an undulating ice skating loop that will double as a walking path, sculptural climbing structures and a 3-acre "play garden" with a miniature lighthouse and other things for children to explore. The park will also have quiet places for picnicking, nestled in gently sloping "lawn valleys." Final plantings will be put in place next year, according to the Chicago Park District.

From God to Mammon at U. of C.: The University of Chicago has converted the former Chicago Theological Seminary building into the new home of its economics department and the Becker Friedman Institute for Research in Economics. Boston architect Ann Beha has remade the red-brick, Collegiate Gothic building at 5757 S. University Ave. and linked it with two neighboring row houses and a sleek new modern building that she designed. The complex's classrooms will get their first regular use with the start of the U. of C.'s fall quarter on Sept. 29, according to a university spokesman.

"The God Box" has a second coming at IIT: Its official name is the Robert F. Carr Memorial Chapel of St. Savior. Its irreverent nickname, bestowed in recognition of its simple, rectilinear geometry: "the God Box." On Oct. 1, the Illinois Institute of Technology will rededicate the Ludwig Mies van der Rohe-designed chapel, which has been restored by Chicago architect T. "Gunny" Harboe. The chapel, completed in 1952, is Mies' only ecclesiastical building. The Mies van der Rohe Society raised nearly $1 million for the project.

Coverup at Northwestern's new garage: Many Evanston residents were furious when Northwestern University cut down a stand of trees to make way for a new parking garage and visitor center at the southeast end of its campus. Now, that building, designed by Perkins+Will's Johnson, is here, and it is no ordinary parking garage. On the south and west sides of the building, glass walls camouflage the garage's interior. On the north and east facades, lightweight fabric does the screening. The garage is open; the visitor center is likely to make its debut in late September, according to a university spokesman.

A peek at Navy Pier's new face: Illinois' most popular attraction is dialing down its Coney Island commercialism as it remakes itself for its 100thth anniversary in 2016. Visitors may have noticed changes to its south dock promenade, including new trees, a new pavement material (herringbone-patterned concrete), clean-lined pavilions that will house a variety of pier-related uses and a new, curving grand stairway (complete with glass risers) that connects the promenade and the Ferris wheel. These changes, from a design team led by New York landscape architect James Corner, won't be done until next summer, according to a pier spokesman, but we'll take a first look in the fall.

The Auditorium turns 125: Chicago's Auditorium Building, a masterwork of Dankmar Adler and Louis Sullivan, will celebrate a major milestone with a Dec. 9 concert, to be precisely 125 years after the Auditorium Theatre's original opening night. Among the performers: Broadway star Patti LuPone, whose great-grand aunt sang from the same stage at the original opening.

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Fall architecture: Several grand openings on deck for major cities