DeStewart

Saloon For Sale (Thawville, IL)

Architecture

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Medinah CC Clubhouse

Architecture

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909 West Elm Street

Architecture

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“Million-dollar homes in the U.S. are selling at double their historical average while middle-class property demand stumbles, showing that the housing recovery is mirroring America’s wealth divide.” So notes a recent Bloomberg News article. Exhibit A of this housing and income shift can be found in my neighborhood, where last week a structurally sound 1960s colonial was leveled to make way for a million-dollar custom home.

Buildings of a bygone era

Architecture

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Small towns in Indiana have an abundance of timeworn, peculiarly beautiful garages. Here are two examples, photographed during a fuel stop in Boswell. The first garage appears to have been an auto-repair place, whereas the second one was a tire shop.

Garage 1

 

Garage 2

Fractured ticket booth

Architecture, Film

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I started creating fractured images while taking a digital design class at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Here’s a fracture I composed this week using a photograph of the ticket booth at the Wheaton Grand Theatre.

Rock ‘n’ Rubble High School

Architecture, Neighborhoods

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Though my high school experience was a mixed bag, I’m struck by a nostalgic sense of loss every time I pass by the demolition site seen below. Day by day, Wheaton Central High School — an institution that educated the likes of Edwin Hubble, Red Grange, Bob Woodward, John Belushi, and, much further down the list, me — is being pounded by a wrecking ball, a process slowed by the presence of asbestos that needs to be hosed down and carefully removed.

And what will take the place of the school? A gourmet grocery store, naturally.

603 Ohio Street

Architecture

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I admit it. I’m drawn to decaying structures. A building in disrepair stirs my emotions. Tells me story. Compels me to ask questions.

Farmhouse cutout

Animals, Architecture, Family

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It’s been a desk-bound week of writing and editing for me, but I took a break to create — and now share — a cutout illustration of the farmhouse at Marmac. A vacant chicken coop sits in the foreground.

 

Buy a house for a buck

Architecture, Neighborhoods

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Surrounded by posh abodes worth north of $500,000, the 117-year-old home at 8 Park Drive in the Chicago suburb of Glenview can be yours for a mere dollar. The catch? The buyer has to uproot the massive structure and move it to a new site.

The owner of the home, the Glenview New Church, wants to redevelop the property. If a buyer doesn’t come forward soon, the home likely will be torn down. The Queen Anne-style dwelling lacks a landmark designation even though it possesses significant historical value. It was designed and owned by Hugh Burnham, Glenview’s first village president and the nephew of the famed city planner of Chicago, Daniel Burnham.

According to Trulia, the annual property taxes on the uninhabited home are a steep $12,713, which may explain why the pastor of the New Church described the residence as a “money pit” in an interview with TribLocal.