Blair Kamin – Page 2 –

City officials on Wednesday revoked a demolition permit for a building at 1393-1399 W. Lake St., that was mistakenly issued. The building is the former home of the Italian restaurant La Luce, pictured in 1998.

Column: Former Fulton Market restaurant and Schlitz tavern is safe from wrecking ball — for now — after city revokes demolition permit

December 7, 2020 at 11:03 a.m.

A surviving Victorian building in Chicago's rapidly developing Fulton Market district, originally a Schlitz tavern and later the home of the Italian restaurant La Luce, has been temporarily spared a...

Artist Pablo Serrano paints a massive mural on the sidewall of Carnitas Don Pedro on 18th Street in Pilsen on Oct. 30, 2020. The mural of residents and essential workers is set to be Pilsen s largest piece of art.

Column: The despised Pilsen landmark plan gets a hearing today. Here’s how to save the treasured neighborhood.

December 1, 2020 at 9:01 a.m.

There's no doubt Chicago's Pilsen neighborhood has the stuff to become an official city landmark district. Yet a plan to do just that is widely despised in the community, viewed...

Concrete workers top out the Vista Tower on the 101st floor on April 26, 2019.

Column: From Vista Tower to St. Regis Chicago — another Chicago case of naming rights whiplash

November 25, 2020 at 6:48 p.m.

Holy Sears Tower! Names clearly are not forever on Chicago skyscrapers, unlike the Chrysler Building, the Empire State Building and even One World Trade Center in New York City. Sears...

Architect Jeanne Gang participates in a discussion during the Expo Chicago international contemporary and modern art exhibition in 2018 at Navy Pier.

Column: Jeanne Gang on Vista Tower, gender equality in architecture and the future of downtown Chicago

November 23, 2020 at 9:58 a.m.

Chicago's Jeanne Gang, architect of the nearly complete Vista Tower, the city's third-tallest building and the world's tallest building designed by a woman, spoke to the Tribune last week about...

Column: An exclusive look at Jeanne Gang’s Vista Tower, now Chicago’s third-tallest building

November 27, 2020 at 12:23 p.m.

Chicago's nearly complete Vista Tower comes wrapped in superlatives — the city's third-tallest building and the world's tallest building designed by a woman — as well as seemingly curving, multicolored...

An aerial view of Wrigley Field and Wrigleyville before the Chicago Cubs host the Cleveland Indians in Game 3 of the World Series, Oct. 28, 2016.

Column: Wrigley Field national landmark listing will likely mean millions for the Cubs-owning Ricketts family

November 20, 2020 at 9:46 a.m.

It's not quite like winning the World Series, but getting listed as a National Historic Landmark, as Wrigley Field was Thursday, is pretty sweet stuff. There are only about 2,600...

Independence Library, 4000 block of N. Elston Avenue in Chicago, Aug. 21, 2019.

Column: Amid a pandemic that isolates us, Chicago architecture awards recognize designs that build community

November 13, 2020 at 6:00 p.m.

Shifting its awards program online for the first time, the Chicago chapter of the American Institute of Architects on Friday will present honors for a wide range of buildings, many...

A lakefront wall at Northwestern University's Ryan Fieldhouse and Walter Athletics Center has won a design award from the American Institute of Architects' Chicago chapter. The wall protects the fieldhouse from the pounding of Lake Michigan waves.

Column: Now THAT’S a big, beautiful wall; award-winning lakefront barrier at Northwestern shows how to upgrade infrastructure

November 15, 2020 at 9:27 a.m.

The subject of today's column: a big, beautiful wall. Not that wall, the one President Donald Trump claimed we needed along the Mexican border. We're talking about a 400-foot-long wall...

Airickca Gordon-Taylor, center in purple, and the Rev. Wheeler Parker Jr., both cousins of Emmett Till, speak outside Roberts Temple Church of God In Christ in Chicago on Aug. 28, 2015. They led a motorcade to Burr Oak Cemetery in Alsip to commemorate the 60th anniversary of the death of Emmett Till. Till's funeral took place at Roberts Temple in September 1955.

Column: Emmett Till house makes strides toward becoming an official city landmark and a museum

November 6, 2020 at 2:29 p.m.

The South Side house of Emmett Till, whose brutal murder helped spark the civil rights movement, has taken key steps toward becoming an official city landmark and a museum. The...

The Rev. Michael Enright presides over the 10 a.m. Mass at St. Adalbert Roman Catholic Church in Chicago's Pilsen neighborhood on June 26, 2016. The Chicago Academy of Music is interested in purchasing the church and renovating it into a music conservatory.

Column: In a shift, city will take first steps to grant landmark status to Pilsen’s shuttered St. Adalbert Catholic Church

October 30, 2020 at 1:57 p.m.

As debate has raged over a proposed landmark district in Pilsen, activists kept asking why the city was moving to protect 900 buildings in the Near Southwest Side neighborhood, but...

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