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Smith Museum of Stained Glass Windows
The owners of Navy Pier don't promote this free, impressive attraction very well, but visitors who wander along the lower-level terraces of Festival Hall will discover the country's first museum dedicated entirely to stained glass. Many of the 150 pieces on display were made in Chicago (a stained-glass hub in the late 1800s, thanks to the influx of European immigrants), and most hung at one point in Chicago churches, homes and office buildings.
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Soldier Field
Built between 1922 and 1926 to pay homage to WWI soldiers, the oft-renovated edifice has been home to everything from civil rights speeches by Martin Luther King Jr to Brazilian soccer games. It got its latest UFO-landing-upon-a-Greek-ruin look in a controversial 2003 makeover. Prior to that, the stadium's architecture was so noteworthy it was named a National Historic Landmark. Unfortunately, the landmark lacked corporate skyboxes and giant bathrooms.
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Spertus Museum
Located in a mod, brand-spanking-new facility, Spertus explores 5000 years of Jewish faith and culture. The Zell Holocaust Memorial - the country's first permanent museum exhibition of its kind - features oral histories from survivors who emigrated to Chicago, as well as the names of Chicagoans' relatives who died.
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Swedish American Museum Center
The permanent collection at this small storefront museum focuses on the lives of the Swedes who originally settled Chicago. In that sense it reflects the dreams and aspirations of many of the groups who have poured into the city since its founding. You can see items people felt were important to bring with them on their journey to America. Butter churns, traditional bedroom furniture, religious relics and more are all included in the collection.
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The (First) Playboy Mansion
The sexual revolution pretty much started in the basement 'grotto' of this 1899 mansion. Chicago magazine impresario Hugh Hefner bought it in 1959 and dubbed it the first Playboy Mansion, even hanging a brass plate over the door warning 'If You Don't Swing, Don't Ring.' Alas, Chicago became too square for Hef by the mid '70s, so he packed up and built a new Playboy Mansion in LA, which is where he remains today, in his pajamas.
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Tribune Tower
Colonel Robert McCormick, eccentric owner of the Chicago Tribune , collected - and asked his reporters to send - rocks from famous buildings and monuments around the world. He stockpiled pieces of the Taj Mahal, Westminster Abbey, the Great Pyramid and 120 or so others, now embedded around the Tower's base. And the tradition continues with a twisted piece from the World Trade Center wreckage and a piece from Sydney's Opera Hobricks in 2006.
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Ukrainian Institute Of Modern Art
The 'Ukrainian' in the name is somewhat of a misnomer, as this bright white storefront showcases local artists regardless of ethnicity (along with a host of works by people of Ukrainian descent). The space has earned a reputation for putting together some of the best exhibits in Chicago. Shows here range from playfully pretty to perplexingly cerebral works, done in a host of media.
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Union Station
This wonderfully restored 1925 building, designed by Graham, Burnham & Company (Daniel Burnham's successors), looks like it stepped right out of a gangster movie. In fact, it's been used to great effect in exactly this way. Remember director Brian de Palma's classic The Untouchables , when Elliott Ness loses his grip on the baby carriage during the shoot-out with Al Capone's henchmen and it bounces down steps? Those steps are right here, baby.
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United Center
Built for around US$180 million and opened in 1992, the United Center arena is home to the Bulls and the Blackhawks and is the venue for special events such as the circus. The statue of an airborne Michael Jordan in front of the east entrance pays a lively tribute to the man whose talents financed the edifice. The area is unsafe at night unless there's a game, in which case, police are everywhere.
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University Of Chicago
Some universities collect football championships. The University of Chicago collects Nobel Prizes - 80 so far and counting. In particular economics faculty and former students have pulled in 23 prizes since the first Nobel for economics was awarded in 1969. University of Chicago economics faculty member and Nobel Prize winner Merton Miller explained the string of wins to the Sun-Times: 'It must be the water; it certainly can't be the coffee.'
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Washington Square
This plain-looking park across from the Newberry Library has had both a colorful and a tragic history. In the 1920s it was known as 'Bughouse Sq' because of the communists, socialists, anarchists and other -ists who gave soapbox orations here. Clarence Darrow and Carl Sandburg are among the respected speakers who climbed up and shouted.
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Water Tower
Believe it or not, the 154ft Water Tower, a city icon and focal point of the Mag Mile, once dwarfed all the surrounding buildings. Built in 1869, the Water Tower and its associated building, the Pumping Station (aka the Water Works) across the street, were constructed with local yellow limestone in a Gothic style popular at the time. Owing to this stone construction, they were the only downtown buildings to survive the great fire in 1871.
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West Loop Galleries
Tucked between meatpacking plants and warehouses, the galleries of the West Loop are the beachhead for contemporary art in Chicago. Though less entrenched than their River North peers, the lower rents here mean larger showrooms. Generally speaking, the galleries also take bigger chances on up-and-coming and controversial artists. Most venues are awkward to reach via public transportation; consider a cab.
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Wicker Park
Sure, Chicago invented the zipper and a handful of other useless bric-a-brac. The city's true legacy, though, will be in a strange softball game invented here. Aptly named, 16-Inch Softball uses the same rules as normal softball, but with shorter games, a bigger, squishier ball and a complete lack of gloves or mitts on the fielders. Wicker Park is a prime place to see the uniquely Chicago sport played by die-hard fanatics.
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Wrigley Building
The Wrigley Building glows as white as the Doublemint Twins' teeth day or night. Chewing-gum-guy William Wrigley built it that way on purpose, because he wanted it to be attention-grabbing like a billboard. More than 250,000 glazed terra-cotta tiles make up the facade; a computer database tracks each one and when each needs to be cleaned and polished. Banks of mega-watt lamps on the river's south side light the tiles up each night.
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Wrigley Field
Built in 1914 and named for the chewing-gum guy, Wrigley Field - aka The Friendly Confines - is the second-oldest baseball park in the major leagues. It's filled with legendary traditions and curses, as well as a team that suffers from the longest dry spell in US sports history. The hapless Cubbies haven't won a championship since 1908, a sad record unmatched in pro football, hockey or basketball.
