Culture of Chicago

[reppin_the_847]

The hoity toity scene is alive & kicking in areas such as the Gold Coast, River North, maybe even West Loop (as far as nightlife goes). Good luck trying to get into The Underground or Privet (the old Le Passage) with a baseball cap on. A decent pair of jeans that looks like designer gear maybe, but definitely no Wranglers lol!

Originally Posted by Savoir Faire

Chicago is a blue collar and laid back town and it permeates the city, even on the north side. The night life de rigueur for an exclusive hood like Lincoln Park is a baseball cap and jeans. However, this is a city of 3 million people,and laid back it may be, you can find a hoity-toity scene, though I don't know how easy it is for a California teen to break into it.

[ToriaT]

I'm not sure what she means by the finer things of life but we have all that here...culture, museums, great architecture, art, world class restaurants, wonderful neighborhoods, fancy stores, suburbs with mansions........etc. True we don't have the mountains and ocean but we have just about every thing else here if you want to find it.

[Attrill]

I'm also wondering what you mean by the "finer things" - Cultural? Shopping? Restaurants? Boston has many of the same things that Chicago has, but on a much smaller scale. Newbury St. has plenty of high end shopping, but maybe a tenth as many stores as Michigan Ave./Gold Coast. Boston has a comparable classical music scene, but Chicago has much larger and broader theater, dance and general music scenes. Boston doesn't compare to Chicago for dining options. Again - what do you mean by "finer things"?

If you've never lived in a city (i.e. taking public transit everyday, figured out areas to avoid, etc.) Boston may be a better city to start with. Chicago is not that hard to figure out though, and is perfectly safe (especially if you'll be starting out in Evanston).

[emathias]

Originally Posted by Attrill

...
If you've never lived in a city (i.e. taking public transit everyday, figured out areas to avoid, etc.) Boston may be a better city to start with. Chicago is not that hard to figure out though, and is perfectly safe (especially if you'll be starting out in Evanston).

I don't know about that. Boston certainly has big-city aspects to it. It's not as big as Chicago, but it's not some little college town, either. Cambridge is certainly more college-town like, but even then they've had some real crime issues this year right around campus (I get Harvard's campus security alerts).

But Boston proper is walkable but not tiny, and with it's much more geographically laid-out street system (as opposed to Chicago's mostly grid system), it can be a challenge to figure out for a newcomer. Frankly, I figured out Manhattan more easily than I figured out Boston, and Chicago is easier than Manhattan to figure out.

[Attrill]

Originally Posted by emathias

I don't know about that. Boston certainly has big-city aspects to it. It's not as big as Chicago, but it's not some little college town, either.

It is certainly not a small town (I grew up there and moved to Chicago in my mid-20's). Boston is certainly much harder to figure out, but I think that makes it much harder to end up in a bad part of Boston by accident. No one is going to accidentally find themselves in Grove Hall from BU. Someone COULD find themselves in a sketchy part of the Westside in Chicago if they take the Green line or fall asleep on the North Ave. bus. It would be tough to accidentally find yourself in a rough area in Chicago as well, just not as tough.

Most college students in Boston end up on the Green Line (B, C or D) or the Red Line. There aren't many bad parts of Boston you can get to without really trying from those lines, no matter how drunk you are

As a side note, I wouldn't recommend that anyone drive in Boston. Ever.

[5Lakes]

Originally Posted by Savoir Faire

Chicago is a blue collar and laid back town and it permeates the city, even on the north side. The night life de rigueur for an exclusive hood like Lincoln Park is a baseball cap and jeans. However, this is a city of 3 million people,and laid back it may be, you can find a hoity-toity scene, though I don't know how easy it is for a California teen to break into it.

I don't know. Yeah, Chicago has blue collar roots, but I don't think it feels all that blue collar these days. Then again I grew up near Cleveland, which is probably about as blue collar as it gets. However, I did live in San Diego for a while, and I think San Diego is just as blue collar as Chicago if not more. Although, parts of SoCal certainly have a pretension about them.

[DANNYY]

Chicago's culture is cosmopolitan, nothing short of it.

[emathias]

Originally Posted by DANNYY

Chicago's culture is cosmopolitan, nothing short of it.

Pink martinis for everyone!