On the Market: In Lake View, a Brewster Building Condo

List Price: $272,900
The Property: This two-bedroom condo, nicely renovated in the past year and a half, is on the third floor of one of the city’s most distinctive 19th-century residential buildings, The Brewster. Situated at the northwest corner of Pine Grove Avenue and Diversey Parkway and originally known as the...

Comments (0) | Read more »

Libertyville Gets Sauced

New ’Cue

Main Street Smokehouse (536 N. Milwaukee Ave., Libertyville), a promising 35-seat spot slated to open the first week of January, plans to put its own spins on barbecue styles around the country. “I’m pairing pork shoulder with my own apple cider ale barbecue sauce, and ribs with maple chipotle sauce, and brisket with a sweet Tennessee-style sauce,” says the owner, Eddie Moore, a culinary school graduate who has been working as a caterer in...

Comments (0) | Read more »

Housing Bulletin: The Expanding Impact of the Housing Crisis

Two recent reports from expert analysts of the Chicago housing scene shed new light on the impact of the recent troubles affecting the local residential real-estate market. One report shows that renters of high-end apartments are benefiting from the downtown condo glut, while the other indicates that the foreclosure wave is sweeping into Latino neighborhoods after initially hitting African American neighborhoods hardest...

Comments (0) | Read more »

Casual and Affordable in Lincoln Park

One Fish, Two Fish

Founded in 2007 by the husband-and-wife team Mandy and Tal Moise, the Chicago-born clothing brand vfish is known for comfortable styles that are reasonably priced. Recently, the couple opened their Lincoln Park flagship store (2937 N. Clark St.; 312-423-7839), also serves as their atelier and showroom. We love the preppy-chic Tara Jacket ($120) as well as the sleek Ava...

Comments (0) | Read more »

Foreign Grocery Stores and the Ugly American

During my travels abroad, I was obsessed with supermarkets. As hard as I tried, I couldn’t shake my deep-seated Ugly American tendencies, making the names of products on shelves endlessly amusing. I got so carried away that a suspicious security guard in Hanoi escorted me and my camera out the door. Eventually, Sarah forbade me to bring the camera in, and I was forced to do actual shopping rather than snicker at the tiny cultural differences that bring out the 19-year-old boy in me...

Comments (13) | Read more »

Weekend Photos: Tumans

Picture this: It's Friday night and your buddies have bailed. What to do when the weekend is upon you and you've got no plans? Our nightlife guru Sarah Preston recommends Tumans (2159 W. Chicago Ave.) in Ukrainian Village. Despite a facelift a few years back, this one-time grimiest of dives still offers dirt-cheap beer and a true Chicago icon, DJ Jesse De La Peña, on the turntables a couple of times each month. We visited the cozy corner tavern last Friday; check out photos...

Comments (0) | Read more »

Sale of the Week: Two Steps Toward a Quick Lincoln Park Sale

List Price: $2.395 million
Sale Price: $2.2 million
The Property: Although just four years old, this 13-room house in west Lincoln Park got a $50,000 makeover before going on the market in September. What’s more, the residence was priced $75,000 below what its sellers had originally paid for the...

Comments (1) | Read more »

Once and Future Dives

The Best of Today . . .
From a hole in Vegas to a microscopic bar in our very own backyard, Playboy.com has compiled a list of the top ten American dives. As Steve Dollar writes in the article, "Nothing satisfies man’s tortured soul and restless craving for misadventure quite like the dive bar." We couldn't agree more.

Comments (3) | Read more »

One Size Fitz All

Great Scott!
F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby is a classic tale of wealth, privilege, consequence, and the schism between the haves and have-nots. It’s also, as you probably remember from high school, a full-length book—which means Gatz, a marathon theatrical staging of the unabridged novel by the New York troupe Elevator Repair Service, runs a good six-plus...

Comments (0) | Read more »

Check Back Friday

Nightspotting 2.0 will post on Friday, in time for a weekend update. Check in tomorrow for the latest from the nightlife front.

Comments (0) | Read more »

On the Market: B. J. Armstrong’s Highland Park Home

List Price: $2,802,500
The Property: The retired NBA star B. J. Armstrong has owned this six-bedroom house on a secluded street in Highland Park for 14 years, during which time he played for the Bulls and three other teams, worked in the Bulls’ front office, and provided commentary for a TV sports show. He listed the residence for sale late this past summer with an asking price of $2.95 million; in late October he cut the price to...

Comments (0) | Read more »

Bottle Fatigue

A Measured Approach

“The logo is a carafe pouring wine into a goblet; then the sign in the window says it’s BYO,” says a sharp-eyed FOD who noticed Uptown’s new Fontana Grill (1329 W. Wilson Ave.; 773-561-0400). OK, to be fair, the Italian wine bar/restaurant doesn’t have its liquor license yet. But when it arrives, expect a unique concept: 24 bottles, changing monthly, each priced at either $22 or $44, and you will be charged by...

Comments (0) | Read more »

Some Potential Condo Deals—and a Turkey Call

Downtown developers aren’t the only ones troubled by a drastic downturn in condo sales.
Many suburban developers are also struggling to unload condo inventory. In Lombard (at 310 South Main Street), one developer is offering 18 condos at auction later this month—and the terms of the auction suggest a handful of buyers could walk away with bargain-basement...

Comments (2) | Read more »

Weekend Photos: The Zoo & Red Ivy

If you thought Twisted Spoke was wild, get a load of The Zoo (3369 N. Clark St.). Wrigleyville’s one-time biker bar (and, later, Brody’s on Clark) has been reborn as a nightspot that plays to the party animals. We spotted folks congregating at the watering hole on Saturday night. And you know what they say—“When in Wrigleyville”—so we ambled down the block to check out Red Ivy.

Comments (1) | Read more »

Handbags for All

The Man's Bag

The Chicago handbag designer Christopher Augmon launched his eponymous handbag line this fall, and his sophisticated designs are now available online at augmon.com. Augmon’s rich leathers lend themselves to his simple and sophisticated shapes; check out the red patent leather London clutch ($460) and his exotic Boa-embossed purse ($985). African, Asian, and Indian influences are subtly...

Comments (2) | Read more »

The Scene at the Tribune Tower Lobby

It's day three of post-election/pre-inauguration, and people are still flocking to the Tribune Tower like we're selling iPhones. We're not. The folks in the lobby are selling commemorative Chicago Tribune papers announcing Barack Obama's win, and there are lines nearly every time of the day. I leave for lunch and have to cut through the line. Leave after work and have to cut through the line. Dr. Beat Soltermann (yes, that is a real name) is a Swiss radio reporter who was in town covering the election, and he couldn't...

Comments (1) | Read more »