Gabriel X. Michael

It is one of about 15 extant Loop buildings erected immediately following the Great Chicago Fire. But a third of those, including 209 West Lake, have not been protected by city landmark ordinance. It's estimated this building dates to 1872-1874, supported by the presence of tiered window hoods detailing an Italianate limestone facade.

Plans for redevelopment of this site include a 33-story apartment tower. 

Near West 13th Street and South Oakley Avenue, Illinois Medical District

In the top photo from the UIC Digital Collection, you see the demolished Oakley station on the CTA Lake Street elevated rail and many 19th-Century storefronts that served this former heavily residential neighborhood. Today, none of the buildings remain, and the area is completely industrial, except for the Westhaven Park residences that replaced the Horner Homes public housing project in the early 2000s.

3 Years Ago Today: photographs I made at the 2012 NATO Summit protests in downtown Chicago. Chicago Police Department Superintendent Garry McCarthy is seen in the first and last photographs.

street art, 1400 block of South Wood Street, Illinois Medical District

West Lake Street at North Oakley Avenue, Near West Side

Workers Cottage style buildings and Italianate incised designs have been on my mind a lot recently. The Workers Cottage was designed to provide an elegant, efficient & replicable, and therefore low-cost, single family home for Chicago’s emerging working class in the 1870s-1880s. The stone incisions decorating window hoods and doorways are a classic Italianate motif, depicted in geometric, floral and abstract designs. There is a sense of romantic mystery to these patterns, unintelligible and viscerally appealing at the same time. These photos were taken over the past week in East Garfield Park.

824 South California Avenue, built 1894, former Wm. Ruehl’s Hall, East Garfield Park

3860 West Washington Boulevard, built 1889, West Garfield Park

operational safety signage in former Brach's Candy Factory, 2010-2012, part three

operational safety signage in former Brach's Candy Factory, 2010-2012, part two

operational safety signage in former Brach's Candy Factory, 2010-2012, part one

700 block of West 47th Street, Back of The Yards

rail embankment wall, 2500 West Warren Boulevard, Near West Side

(January 2014, May 2014, July 2014, December 2014)