“Take a stroll around Chicago with Will Quam and he’ll show you things you’d never noticed before, like all the soldiers and sailors hiding in plain sight.
“The 28-year-old Minnesota native, who now lives in Lincoln Square, is the guy behind the popular Instagram account @brickofchicago, which showcases a heretofore underappreciated aspect of the city’s otherwise celebrated architecture.
“I tried to start paying a little closer attention to the world around me and I started noticing the repetitive architectural forms in Chicago, like the courtyard apartment or the two-flat or the six-flat, the workers cottage. And I noticed it was the brick or the masonry that often gave it its individuality,” said Quam.
“He cited a stretch of Leland Avenue, near the heart of the Square, as an example: “It’s a whole block of two-flats on both sides. Some of them are greystones with Indiana limestone — some of it’s smooth, some of it’s rusticated — and a bunch of them are brick. The designs and the colors and the textures are all different, and that’s the amazing thing.”
“He started up a series of neighborhood brick tours — one part architecture walk, one part history lesson — guiding groups through Pulaksi Park/Noble Square, Rogers Park and West Loop/Fulton Market. When the tours return in spring 2020, Quam plans to add Edgewater, McKinley Park and Hyde Park to the mix” (Wetli, 11/18/19)
Read the full story at Block Club Chicago
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