Posted 5 months ago in Trending
2 MIN READ – Many walking past CBS’s State and Washington studio may wonder, what’s to be unveiled? Now we know. Crain's recently reported CBS's new street level studio A, unveiled during the July 8 afternoon newscast.
Reporter Corli Jay details the transformation of the storefront studio, dormant for over seven years in a recent Crain’s Chicago Business article.
“Studio A, which overlooks Daley Plaza at the corner of Washington and Dearborn streets, will be the main set for the CBS-owned station. The studio, which was initially planned to be a weather studio center, will be the set of all the station's newscasts beginning [July 8].
‘We started with the idea of building a weather center, and then we ended up adding our main studio set. So (we've built) a whole new set in there. All the newscasts will be broadcast out of there. It'll be the storefront studio,’ CBS 2 Chicago President and General Manager Jennifer Lyons told Crain's. ‘So people walking by can watch the magic of TV happening. We'll have the weather center there, as well as the main anchor desk. We'll have a couple of reporter presentation areas and then an area where we can use for a demo or if we have a local group come in that wants to perform.’
Opening in 2008, as part of the Block 37 development, one of the largest commercial properties along State Street and downtown shopping mall, the news station shuttered the 3,500-square-foot space in 2017.
When CBS 2 Chicago President and General Manager Jennifer Lyons joined the team in 2021, she wanted to breathe new life into the project, breaking the fourth wall and allowing viewers into the set. According to leadership at CBS 2 Chicago, the new studio features significant upgrades in technology that offer a deeper connection with viewers beyond the glass, including “a speaker function that allows anchors to speak directly to outside viewers, which Lyons says adds to their mission of engaging with the community.”
The Crain’s article details CBS’s commitment to Chicago in additional conversation with Lyons.
"We're just putting our CBS stamp on the storefront studio,” said Lyons. “We're right out in front of Daley Plaza, where the farmers market is, the Christkindlmarket is, so many other viewers will really be able to read, react and interact with us."
"We're bringing that corner of Washington and Dearborn back to life, and it's very exciting. It's an exciting time for our station," she said. "We were proud to be in that location. And we're proud to serve the city of Chicago and this is just one more way to express our gratitude."
