Merchandise Mart

The Merchandise Mart is a commercial building located in the Near North Side of Chicago, Illinois, United States. When it opened in 1930, it was the largest building in the world, with 4000000sqft of floor space. The art deco landmark is located at the junction of the Chicago River's branches. The building is a leading retailing and wholesale destination, hosting 20,000 visitors and tenants per day as of the late 2000s.Built by Marshall Field & Co. and later owned for over half a century by the Kennedy family, the Mart centralized Chicago's wholesale goods business by consolidating architectural and interior design vendors and trades under a single roof. It has since become home to several other enterprises, including the Shops at the Mart, the Chicago campus of the Illinois Institute of Art, Motorola Mobility, and the Chicago tech startup center 1871.The Merchandise Mart is so large that it had its own ZIP code until 2008, when the Postal Service assigned it to part of the surrounding area. In 2010, the building opened its Design Center showrooms to the public for the first time.