Sunday, April 18, 2010

Trip 10: Milwaukee Avenue District






















Date: April 15, 2010
Trip: 10
No. of Landmarks Visited: 1
Landmarks To-Date: 13
Landmarks Remaining: 340

On Thursday I used my lunch break to walk to the Milwaukee Avenue District, which I think most Chicagoans consider to be the heart of the Wicker Park neighborhood. The historic district includes the intersection of Milwaukee, North and Damen. Milwaukee runs diagonally to Chicago's street grid and is primarily commercial in most places. Because of the night clubs, shops and restaurants in the area, Wicker Park is probably the most popular neighborhood for people from other parts of Chicago to visit. I've been to the area many times myself, and have taken a number of out-of-town guests there as well.

Milwaukee is primarily lined with 3 to 4 story brick buildings from the 1800's. Some of the buildings still have the original iron facades for the first floor storefront. But most of the street level facades have been renovated over the years for different business uses. But I would say a majority of the buildings still have their original facades on the upper floors.

2 comments:

  1. I like the buildings in the last 3 photos. I assume the pie shaped lots and triangle buildings where caused by the diagonal street?

    ReplyDelete
  2. Yes, Milwaukee is a diagonal street so the intersection has two pie shaped corners. The one building is the Flat Iron building, and it houses artists studios. The other building is the Northwest Tower and it's an office building.

    ReplyDelete