Chicago Debates Wrigley, A River Runs Through it at CAF, Evanston Design, Robert Ivy, Jewels in July, Architecture 101 on Jeju Island and more. Don't leave town - it's the July Calendar!

Where'd everybody go?

It's full-up summer, and a number of institutions have gone on hiatus for July and August, but for those of us who haven't abandoned the city for our summer homes in Ocean Springs, there's still nearly three dozen great items on the July Calendar of Chicago Architectural Events.  (There's also eleven fascinating exhibitions - from Alfonso and Margaret Iannelli, to The Rendered Image, to Take Me to River and more, and we've got information on all these, as well.)

The month gets off to a late start, with this Fourth of July holiday week featuring only Radiant Cooling for Commercial Projects at the CCGT, but things start heating up after that, with Accelerating Sustainability in Chicago's 77 Community Areas at CCGT on Tueday the 9th, and then a panel discussion, A River Runs Through It: Developing and Designing Chicago's Shoreline, with Doug Farr, Benet Haller and others at the Chicago Architecture Foundation, which is also sponsoring the latest in its series of Chicago Debates: Wrigley Fast Pitch: Renovation Wreck or Refreshed Design, at Moe's Cantina  on Clark on Monday the 15th.

John Eifler will talk about Wright's Search for Innovation in Design at Fourth Presbyterian's Gratz Center on Thursday, the 11th,  the same day the CCGT offers up Previewing the GreenBuilt Home Tour, and AIA/Chicago and Design Evanston has a panel discussion with Stuart Cohen, Jack Weiss, Laura Saviano and others on Evanston Architecture, Urbanaism and Landscape Design: 1880 to 2012, tying into the just published Evanston: 150 Years, 150 Places. On Saturday, the 13th, AIA Chicago offers a daytrip to the John DeSalvo Design's Jett Residence.

Archi-treasures annual Jewels in July takes place on Wednesday, the 17th, while Thursday the 19th, USGBC Illinois offers Hartshorne Plunkard's Megan Zack, dbHMS's Sachin Anand and M&R Development's Paul Marucci discussing Parc Huron, the first LEED Gold certified high-rise apartment building in Illinois.  AIA/Chicago offers a tour of Joe Valerio's U of C Laboratory School Early Childhood Center on the 18th, and Revolution Brewery on the 19th.

Sunday the 20th, CCGT offers From Debris to Elegance: A Metamorphosis of Timber Frame Construction, and on Tuesday the 23rd, former Architectural Record editor and current AIA CEO Robert Ivy delivers the keynote, Design Excellence in Affordable Housing: The Multiplier Effect, to this year's Affordable Housing Design Leadership Institute, at a public-welcome Cultural Center event which will also feature the presentation of awards to New York's Via Verde and Chicago's La Casa.  On Thursday and Friday, the 25th and 26th, this year's Complete Streets Symposium takes place at CTA HQ.
The month finishes up on a romantic note with a free Cultural Center screening of Architecture 101, the breakout South Korean hit film about a 35-year old architect being asked by a long-lost first love to rebuild her home on Jeju Island.

And there's a lot more.  So spending the month in a Chicago seemingly stuck in a holding pattern alternating between broiling and freezing, monsoons on the side, isn't really so bad when you can check out all the great items on the July Calendar of Chicago Architectural Events.

Color Jam's Stockholder, Arquitectonica's Spear, Bey, Anthony Wood, Archi-Treasures' Jewels - its the July Calendar of Chicago Architectural Events

So now it begins.  The holiday week is over and the July Calendar of Chicago Architectural Events is ramping up to warp speed.

While some organizations take the summer month off, others are taking their place.  With their new exhibition, Skyscraper: Art and Architecture Against Gravity, the Museum of Contemporary is offering a full roster of events, beginning this Tuesday with Color Jam's artist Jessica Stockholder in conversation with MCA curator Michael Darling.   This Friday, July 13th, Joanna Szupinska offers a curator's tour of the exhibition, and on Saturday Lee Bey offers his own perspective in a Skyscraper Gallery Talk, with Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat Executive Director Anthony Wood offering his own take on Saturday the 28th.. On Wednesday the 18th, Laurinda Spear of Arquitectonica stops by for a conversation with Margarita Blanco and Marisa Fort.

Elsewhere this week, on Thursday APA Chicago holds one of its event in its Daniel Burnham Forum on Big Ideas: The Next 50: Planning, Architecture and Landscape Architecture.

On Wednesday the 18th, Archi-treasures offers up its annual Jewels in July benefit at the DIRTT Green Learning Center, while on Wednesday the 25th,  APA Chicago offers up the mayors of Chicago, Gary and Milwaukee for its annual luncheon on the topic of The Cities That Work.  Saturday, the 28th, the Chicago Art Deco Society holds a benefit to support the Chicago Art Deco Survey at the elegant ballroom of the historic Art Deco Powhatan Apartments.

The bad news is that July 19th Pecha Kucha Less is More at the Society of Architectural Historians home turf, the Charnley-Perskey House, is already sold out.  The good news is that if you haven't already bought a ticket, you won't have to suffer through my presentation.

But wait!  There's much, much more!   Check out the over three dozen events still to come on the July Calendar of Chicago Architectural Events.