Stylish creative family moving from Beverly Hills to Chicago (Lincoln: home, neighborhoods)

[cdrobert]

chicago doesnt compare to SF we had a long arguement about this....And boy is it dense i was at the warf and the peirs and their was a flea market and an asian break dance competition, time from peir 7 to in and out burger i dont even know but it took forever it literally was an ocean of people.

chicago rules in public transit i must say. i was in new york in manhattan where my aunt lives and the subway was great, but i had a friend who worked and lived in brooklyn or maybe it was queens and he said you needed a car. Sf transit is good but not as good as chicago, its like chicago minus the metra but keep the L. The muni is so packed these days you dont even need to pay money anymore you can just walk in the back door and so many people are trying to get in teh front the drive cant do anything about it, much less waste the time on his route which his already behind on due to never ending traffic, awwwwww yea

[schoenfraun]

I was thinking that some folks might not know the neighborhood I was talking about --Villa--and thinking that I might have meant the 'burb of Villa Park, which I do not mean, so here's a link:

http://www.ci.chi.il.us/Landmarks/Maps/VillaDistrict.html (broken link)

http://www.ci.chi.il.us/Landmarks/V/VillaDistrict.html (broken link)

It was originally called "Irving Park Villa."

I think this is a lovely neighborhood, but houses are hard to find in here. It seems that folks who live here don't ever move!

Here's someone's blog that talks about how they had a hard time finding Villa, and that they were disappointed in it! But they posted photos which give a great idea of the variety of bungalow styles there:

http://ideas.houseinprogress.net/archives/001085.html

And here is a link to an HGTV spot that covered the Gold Coast, which it seems was recommended several times by others on this thread:

http://www.hgtv.com/hgtv/rm_architec...384005,00.html

Pictures C and D (barely) show the house designed by Andrew Rebori that I had mentioned earlier, which Bertram Goldberg lived in during the 1960s or so, when he designed Marina City. It's on State Street Parkway and it's unpainted brick. It's really spectacular. Rebori designed a similar building on the same street, a block or two away...which was painted white, but otherwise it's very much the same in appearance. Edgar Miller designed all the stained glass in it, and it was Miller who, with Sol Kogen, designed some of those wonderful, eclectic apartments in Old Town, like the ones on Burton Place, that great little courtyard.....

http://www.ci.chi.il.us/Landmarks/F/FisherStudios.html (broken link)

There! that's a link to the Fisher Apartments by Rebori on State Street Parkway.

And these are about the Kogen/Miller studios on W Burton Place, Old Town:

http://www.artic.edu/webspaces/gradthesis/mshp_frye.htm

http://www.emporis.com/en/wm/bu/?id=238243

And I also mentioned earlier in this thread the suburb of Riverwoods, which, it seems, the SF-LA family could afford.... These houses are great. Just watch the photos change as you read the text...

http://www.landmarks.org/chicago_watch_2006_8.htm

Just a little architectural tour for the "creative" and "stylish."

[domergurl]

Add Oak Park and Evanston to your list of collar communities. I'm not sure anymore, but I think the OPR (Oak Park River Forest) public schools are good. The Evanston public schools are good too. OP has the Frank Lloyd Wright/Hemingway thing going for it and Evanston has Northwestern. Since they are literally connected with a border on Chicago, you will also have private schools available and all the amenities/artistic/cultural etc. that Chicago has to offer.

[marcin25]

I don't know if there's ANY charm in the ol' midwest. I know people that moved from L.A. to Chicago and they really regret and now would like to move back but can't afford it.
Pick Houston over Chicago --> beatiful weather, not that far from the Gulf, sunny skies (in chicago its overcast every other day).

[domergurl]

Everything is rusty in Houston ...

[j33]

marcin - and I know people who moved from LA to Chicago and have loved it. Most places are what you make of them. Hell I have a friend who moved from New Jersey to LA and freakin' hates it and talks about moving back to New Jersey all the time, everyone is different and is looking for something different out of life and out of where they live.

[Drover]

Originally Posted by j33

marcin - and I know people who moved from LA to Chicago and have loved it. Most places are what you make of them. Hell I have a friend who moved from New Jersey to LA and freakin' hates it and talks about moving back to New Jersey all the time, everyone is different and is looking for something different out of life and out of where they live.

You should go read the L.A. threads here for a while. It's eye-opening. Sooo many discussions over there are about how the place is going downhill on a rocket-powered sled and about people wanting to get the hell out. (The OP of this thread describes it as an "urban death trap.") Even life-long SoCal folks are looking to get out. Even though I'd never want to live there myself, I feel bad for folks who are experiencing such a sense of suffocating hopelessness that they are scrambling to get out of their own hometown. It just seems like a thick veil of doom & gloom hangs over the entire L.A. region, which is even more unfortunate considering all the things the region has going for it. The difference in affection and appreciation of one's own city/region between the Chicago forum and the L.A. forum is stunning.

[cdrobert]

Its funny how people talk about LA going down hill like its somthing new. People were talking about this in the 80's, literally 25 years ago...remember the movie blade runner?? the main reason people dont like la is they simply cant afford it anymore, most people cant. the middle class has been drained out, you either have or you dont. its just a harsh reality of capitalism evolution.

[Drover]

Originally Posted by cdrobert

Its funny how people talk about LA going down hill like its somthing new. People were talking about this in the 80's, literally 25 years ago...remember the movie blade runner?? the main reason people dont like la is they simply cant afford it anymore, most people cant. the middle class has been drained out, you either have or you dont. its just a harsh reality of capitalism evolution.

Urban decay was rampant everywhere in the 80s, not just L.A. And at the time, it had already been going on for 20 years and there didn't seem to be any end in sight. The difference is most cities have rebounded since then. (I suppose L.A. probably has too to some extent). You don't see thread after thread of people saying "Indy is going to hell, I'm getting outta here" or "Seattle is going to hell, I'm getting outta here" or "(insert city here) is going to hell, I'm getting outta here." The only city forum where this seems to be the theme of most of the threads is the L.A. forum.

[j33]

Drover -- That is correct. I remember Chicago in the 80's wasn't all that great either. It started to rebound around the time I moved up to the city from the inner ring south suburbs, which were decaying (around 1991) and it has been on the rebound since. I hope that it (as well as most american cities) continue their rebound, what happened to them in the 70's and 80's was inexcusable.