Posted inArts & Culture

Biennial as experimentation

In 2017, a barge drifted along the Chicago River. It wasn’t carrying the usual Ozinga concrete or gravel; instead it floated a museum. Produced by the Floating Museum, an interdisciplinary collective comprised of architect Andrew Schachman, artists Faheem Majeed and Jeremiah Hulsebos-Spofford, and poet avery r. young, the museum barge showcased artwork from dozens of […]

Posted inArts & Culture

On winter and the built environment

Winter is inevitable, but it still feels like an unwelcome surprise each year. To architecture journalist Anjulie Rao, it’s a season of reevaluation, reflection, and transformation. Fascinated by what winter represents, Rao has started a small publication on the topic—a “grand experiment” whose biweekly publishing schedule will follow the length of the season, December 21, […]

Posted inArts & Culture

Building 63rd House

On August 5, 1966, near Marquette Park, the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was attacked while leading a protest to demand housing desegregation. Several blocks away from this spot stands 3055 W. 63rd, a formerly abandoned post office that turned 100 years old in 2020. This is the location where Blue Tin Production (a […]

“City on Fire: Chicago 1871”

From its humble beginnings as a settlement founded by the Haitian Afro-Frenchman Jean Baptiste Point du Sable in the late 18th century, Chicago experienced explosive growth in the 19th century to become a hub of American economic and industrial innovation and progress. As wars and the forcible removal of the region’s indigenous population opened up […]

Open House Chicago

Open House Chicago (OHC), produced by the Chicago Architecture Center (CAC), is back this October, with a multitude of ways to discover the city’s greatest treasures. Enjoy behind-the-scenes access to architecturally, historically, and culturally significant sites in over 30 neighborhoods during this free festival on October 16-17. Explore sites across Chicago, in a diverse array […]

Romanticism to ruin: The Garrick Theatre

The Wrightwood 659 exhibition “Romanticism to Ruin: Two Lost Works of Sullivan and Wright” explores two long-demolished architectural masterpieces: Louis Sullivan’s Garrick Theatre, which opened in Chicago in 1892, and Frank Lloyd Wright’s Larkin Administration Building, which opened in Buffalo in 1904. The exhibition opens on September 24. The destruction of the Garrick Theatre (originally […]

Romanticism to ruin: The Larkin Administration Building

The Wrightwood 659 exhibition “Romanticism to Ruin: Two Lost Works of Sullivan and Wright” explores two long-demolished architectural masterpieces, Louis Sullivan’s Garrick Theatre, which opened in Chicago in 1892, and Frank Lloyd Wright’s Larkin Administration Building, which opened in Buffalo in 1904. The exhibition is open through December 18, 2021. Designed for the Larkin Soap […]

Posted inArts & Culture

Studying the cityscape

This fall brings the return of the Chicago Architecture Biennial, an exposition of activities, tours, and exhibitions all over the city that highlight the power of architecture and the ways in which Chicagoans inhabit the spaces of the city. Although looking at skyscrapers and touring old houses are always edifying and fun ways to check […]