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Chicago Late-Summer Tour

A visit to Chicago rarely disappoints, with so much going on year-round.

Millennium Park Cleome - Pritzker Pavilion Photo © Alice Joyce

While the neighborhoods teem with great restaurant choices and cultural activities, the downtown area is an open-air museum, landscaped to look stunning at any time. I find it especially enticing Spring through Fall, when the gardens are incredibly lush.

I’ve featured the city’s green highlights, art and landscape architecture here in the past.

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BP Bridge designed by Frank Gehry [Photo © Alice Joyce

I haven’t previously featured Millennium Park’s BP Bridge. Designed along with the park’s Pritzker Pavilion by architect Frank Gehry, the bridge represents a fabulous feat of engineering in a lyrically engaging form. I expect the bridge will leave its contemporary mark on Chicago, standing up handsomely over time.

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Gehry Design [Photo © Alice Joyce]

The Modern wing of the Art Institute of Chicago encompasses a small-space gem in the Prtizker Garden. The design’s refined simplicity is refreshing.

AIC Pritzker Garden - Kelly's White Curve [Photo © Alice Joyce

Contemporary Landscape Design…

: AIC Pritzker Garden [Photo © Alice Joyce]

Artist Pae White created the colorful installation: Restless Rainbow … It was being taken down the day I visited. I had planned to walk along the Nichols Bridgeway from the Lurie Garden to the upper terrace of the AIC’s Modern Wing designed by Renzo Piano. Although the terrace was closed off, I had still had a great view of the artwork from the bridgeway expanse.

Restless Rainbow Pae White [photo © Alice Joyce]

Barcelona artist, Jaume Plensa’s Crown Fountain has ever-changing displays that captivate and delight.

: Crown Fountain by Jaume Plensa Photo © Alice Joyce

: Lurie Garden Photo © Alice Joyce

The Lurie Garden plantings created by Piet Oudolf complement Kathryn Gustafson’s cool and orderly landscape design. A happy habitat for wildlife, the garden continues to mature as it increases in beauty.

Cruising Chicago Architecture

Expect terrific views of Chicago’s Centennial Fountain when you take a

Chicago Architecture Foundation River Cruise aboard Chicago’s First Lady Cruises

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Chicago: Centennial Fountain [Photo © Allice Joyce

Sorry, I’m getting ahead of myself. During my annual visit to Chicago – always greatly anticipated – I pondered arrays of t ours offered by the Chicago Architecture Foundation. An organization you can count on to provide entrée to the city’s finest cultural highlights.

Santa Fe Building Atrium Photo © Alice Joyce

Ensconced in the landmark Sante Fe building designed by Daniel Burnham, the CAF headquarters is a great place to start the day. You can take in an exhibition, peruse intriguing, beautifully designed items in the CAF shop, or scan the upcoming programs and talks that might fit into your schedule. You can also select a tour and get ticketed, be it a walking, bus, or boat tour.

Chicago’s First Lady Cruises: Photo © Alice Joyce

I’ve found the CAF river cruise to be the most enlightening, having once through my own error, taken one operated by another company. It’s an experience that opens one’s eyes to the construction history of iconic Chicago buildings and newly completed skyscrapers viewed from the river aboard Chicago’s First Lady Cruises. Passionate about the city’s architectural history, foundation volunteers share their knowledge and enthusiasm as tour guides.

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Chicago's First Lady - Riverwalk Photo: Bob Agra

Once ticketed, you’ll make your way to the Riverside Gardens Dock – look for the blue awnings – on the lower level of the Michigan Avenue bridge at Wacker Drive.

333 N Wacker Drive Building Photo © Alice Joyce

The 333 North Wacker Drive building has always made my heart skip a beat – it’s that magnificent. I have to say, seeing it from the river is unforgettable.

Chicago River/DuSable Bridge Photo © Alice Joyce

A great sense of the city’s growth and importance unfolds on the cruise. You witness a panoply of buildings, bridges and architectural styles. Quite spectacular even on a day with light rain like the one I encountered last week. As a group, we did happily soak up the sunshine that appeared by the end of the cruise.

Of course you can visit the Chicago Architecture Foundation web site before you arrive in town if you prefer to buy tickets online. You might want to add a terrific walking tour of Millennium Park, too.

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Anyone who revels in art, gardens, architecture or the landscape will find tours to turn a Chicago sojourn into an extra special trip. And the same applies to locals. I wonder why we so often fail to explore the riches in our own back yards.

Exuberant Millennium Park .. Chicago

Chicago – Growing Greener and More Vibrant With Each Passing Year

Gehry-designed Pritzker Pavilion (Alice Joyce photo)

Gehry Glam! – The Frank Gehry-designed Pritzker Pavilion in Millennium Park: Gehry’s exuberant architecture seems to have taken the world by storm. I’ll personally vouch for the architect’s design of the Walt Disney Concert Hall in downtown Los Angeles. The building proved to have superb acoustics when I heard a string quartet play in the Hall. Even before attending the concert, I’d been won over by Gehry’s exuberant style, impressed by the Concert Hall’s open-air gardens, which are open to the public.

But here the focus is on CHICAGO! In September last year I took in a performance at the Park’s Pritzker Pavilion. Each year during the World Music Festival, venues around the city offer free performances. In the photo above, Tambours San Frontieres is performing one afternoon: A Congolese group now based in Chicago.

Crown Fountain - Chicago (ALICE JOYCE Photo) Millennium Park

Millennium Park’s Crown Fountain is a crowd pleaser! Upright 50-foot towers deliver a welcoming splash and flow!

Jaume Plensa, a Barcelona artist, designed the multi-media water feature.

Chicago - Millennium Park Plantings (Alice Joyce photo)

Along the Magnificent Mile – Chicago’s Michigan Avenue, and throughout the landscape of Millennium Park, lush planting beds enliven the scene with the bold forms of grasses, tropical specimens, and brilliant annuals rich with color and texture.

Crown Fountain by Jaume Plensa (Alice Joyce photo)

A shallow pool spans the space between the glass-block towers, their colorful video projections featuring a panoply of faces. 1,000 Chicagoans are featured… their changing expressions create a riveting display.

Millennium Park – Art & Architecture

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