Speculation has been running around ever since Chesapeake Energy announced their purchase of the Pier 1 Place skyscraper from Pier 1 Imports that the gas drilling company would relight the building’s distinctive night lighting system, which has been turned off for months due to money troubles at Pier 1 (I took the above photo on February 11, 2007, at which point the lights were still on).

Now, a fairly strong rumor is running around that Chesapeake will be holding an event of some sort on June 9th to relight the tower. Love them or hate them, it looks like the lights of Pier 1 Place (or should that be Chesapeake Plaza?) will once again be shining into the night sky over downtown Fort Worth.

We’ll let y’all know as we learn more.

Big real estate news - Chesapeake Energy has purchased the Pier 1 Tower.

“The purchase of this architecturally significant building in downtown Fort Worth clearly demonstrates Chesapeake’s commitment to a very long-term presence in the Barnett Shale play,” said Julie H. Wilson, Chesapeake’s vice president of corporate development, in a written statement. “This building will allow us to provide much needed office space to support our rapidly growing Barnett Shale activities and will give our employees the space, amenities and resources they need to perform their jobs at the highest level.”

Pier 1 will continue to occupy about 250,000 square feet and plans to enter into a seven year lease agreement at closing. The anticipated transaction closing is no later than June 30. The $104 million purchase price was disclosed in a Pier 1 filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Interesting. I wonder if they’ll be turning the lights back on? There will surely be much discussion amongst us Fort Worth architecture geeks about this, not to mention the gas drilling angle.

Tip of the hat to Crystal Forester at the Fort Worth Business Press.

UPDATE: Chesapeake is making some fairly obvious hints that the building’s signature crown lighting will be coming back.