Ald. Brendan Reilly’s temporary reprieve for Prentice Women’s Hospital signals a new hope for those who want to see the hospital’s cylindrical structure remain in the Near North Side medical district. But the alderman’s stand is no guarantee that the building will be saved, as the fate of Prentice is still far from decided.

Reilly (42nd) recently announced that he had persuaded Northwestern University to hold off on its plans to demolish the Prentice building, at 333 E. Superior Street, in the interest of allowing the future of the building to be vetted in a public arena.

“I made it very clear that the Old Prentice Hospital building deserves a careful review,” he wrote in a statement on April 2.

Reilly, whose ward covers the Streeterville area in which the hospital is located, said that representatives from Northwestern agreed to postpone the demolition for two months, during which time the school would consider a forthcoming re-use study of the building by Landmarks Illinois, one of the groups advocating for the Prentice’s rehabilitation.

Built in 1975 by Marina City architect Bertrand Goldberg, Prentice’s four cantilevered towers, which once housed a maternity ward, have been vacant since 2007. The base of the building is currently occupied by a psychiatry institute operated by Northwestern Memorial Hospital.

Northwestern Memorial has said it will be out of the building by September; when that exodus is finalized, the hospital will then hand the keys over to Northwestern University. The school has owned the land where the building sits since the 1920s.

Citing insufficiencies in the building’s design, Northwestern confirmed in late March that it intends to raze Prentice and replace it with a new medical research facility after regaining ownership of the building.

Northwestern spokesman Al Cubbage said that the redevelopment of that property was crucial to the university’s long term goals.

“It is important for us to be able to attract research dollars, to have good facilities and to thereby attract top-flight medical researchers,” said Cubbage. He added that the Prentice’s unique layout and low ceilings make the building inadequate for the school’s research needs.

News of the university’s plans confirmed what historic preservation groups in the city have been predicting for years: Without landmark protection and a viable reuse plan in order, the demolition of Prentice would be a relatively seamless endeavor.

This being the case, Reilly’s temporary pardon was a small victory for those hoping to salvage the 35-year-old building.

“We’re very glad to hear him say that he wanted to take a close look at it,” said Landmarks President Jim Peters.

Peters said that the re-use study requested by Reilly will prove that a thorough rehabilitation of the Prentice would save the university money over a complete teardown.

“At the end of the day, we have to convince [Northwestern] that there’s a way to reuse the building and save it,” he said.

With the cards laid out on the table, the debate over Prentice’s future is growing on both sides.

Just days after the university verified its plans, Chicago Tribune architecture critic Blair Kamin voiced his opposition to Northwestern’s plans for Prentice, stating that “the very flexibility that Goldberg designed into the building could help it adapt to a new use.”

On April 11, the Tribune’s editorial board made the contradictory argument that Prentice should be torn down to make way for a more modern facility, claiming that the issue was “a conflict between art and science.”

Kamin didn’t fire a return shot at the divergent article, but preservationist Vince Michael did, writing in his Time Tells blog later that day that the Tribune’s piece overlooked the lack of vision Northwestern had for its new facility.

Michael, a faculty member at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, also questioned whether or not Northwestern had the money to bankroll a new facility and suggested that the university might sit on the property once it is demolished.

Jonathan Fine, executive director Preservation Chicago, echoed that sentiment in a letter to the Tribune’s editorial department the next day.

“City planners have not even been presented with a master plan for the campus,” Fine wrote.

Given that Prentice isn’t landmarked by the city, Northwestern’s agreement to hold off on the demolition is currently the only thing standing between the building and the bulldozers.

“That hampers the city’s leverage,” said Reilly on Tuesday.

Reilly said that, though securing a 60-day hold on the permit and having a reuse study prepared for Prentice were important components, the process would soon be out of his hands.

“The local alderman does not deny or approve applications for demolition,” he said.

Landmarks’ re-use study for the hospital is expected to be released within two weeks.