I've sold real estate in Chicago for more than a decade. I've been inside hundreds of homes and condo buildings, and the ones I remember are the old ones with detail nobody would pay to build today: plaster work, tile, stained glass, a lobby someone clearly fought over. I love that someone once added detail to a building purely to make it beautiful, and to show what they could do.
I have never gone to Open House Chicago. This year I'm going.
What Open House Chicago is
Open House Chicago is a free weekend festival run by the Chicago Architecture Center, now in its 16th year. On Oct. 17–18, more than 200 buildings across 30 neighborhoods open to the public, many of them normally private. Several are new this year.
There's no admission and no registration. You pick your sites and show up during their hours. The catch is that hours vary, and some sites are open only one day. The Magic Lounge is Saturday only, and Electrical Audio is Sunday only. Check hours before you plan a route.
The list includes churches, theaters, private clubs, a recording studio, a cemetery, skyscrapers, and a condo building with a pool most Chicagoans have never heard of.
Where I'm going
I've grouped my list by neighborhood, because driving back and forth across the city is the fastest way to waste the weekend.
Park Castle Condominiums, West Ridge. This is the one I most want to see. Architect James Denson designed it in 1925 to look like a castle, with turrets, towers and crenelated walls. Live swans once swam in a moat-like pond out front. The pond is gone, but the bridges are still there. Inside is an indoor pool from the Jazz Age that the CAC calls one of the city's best-kept secrets. I spend a lot of time in vintage condo buildings, and the details that survive a hundred years are what make them. A 1920s pool is an extreme example. The entrance is the gate at the end of Greenleaf, just before Indian Boundary Park.
TimeLine Theatre, Uptown. TimeLine's new home opened this year. It's a $46 million project that reused and expanded an older building, and it now holds a flexible 250-seat theater, galleries, rehearsal space and a café. Uptown was one of the city's big entertainment districts, and I want to see how the new work sits against the old building. It's also a neighborhood I love to work in.
St. Pauls United Church of Christ and Birch Road Clubhouse, Lincoln Park. I've done more business in Lincoln Park than anywhere else in the city and have never been inside either one. St. Pauls was built in 1898 and mostly destroyed in a fire on Christmas Day in 1955. The sanctuary was rebuilt in a modernist take on Gothic Revival, so you can see two eras in one building. It's new to OHC this year. Birch Road Clubhouse returns after a break.
Chicago Magic Lounge, Andersonville. You walk in through a fake laundromat. The OHC visit is an architecture and history tour, not a magic show, and it's ages 16 and up. Saturday only, 10 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.
The Auditorium, downtown. If I could only see one building all weekend, it might be this one. I've seen shows here. Adler and Sullivan finished it in 1889, and it's on this year's list. Buildings with this much ornament are the reason I love old Chicago. Hours are short on Saturday (10 a.m. to noon), so Sunday (10 a.m. to 5 p.m.) is the easier day.
The Chicago Board of Trade, downtown. This is Holabird and Root's 1930 Art Deco tower at the end of LaSalle Street. Many people in my family have worked here, so I'm excited to finally see inside. Open both days, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.
Walt Disney House and Birthplace, Hermosa. Disney was born here in 1901. It isn't a monument, just a house on a residential block. I sat outside it for the first time this summer, after a client bought a house nearby, and now I want to see the inside.
The music stops
Music has been the center of my life since I was a kid, so this part of the list was easy.
Stony Island Arts Bank, South Shore. This one is personal. I saw Frankie Knuckles play many times when I was young, and it was my introduction to club culture. Quite the start! I was supposed to see him again when he died in 2014. His record collection, about 5,000 records, lives here now, and some of my friends have helped catalog it. The building is worth the trip on its own: the 1923 Stony Island Trust & Savings Bank, a neoclassical bank that sat vacant for nearly 30 years until artist Theaster Gates bought it from the city for $1 and his Rebuild Foundation turned it into a gallery, archive and library.
Electrical Audio, Avondale. This is the recording studio founded by the late, great Steve Albini. The building started as a dairy barn and later housed manufacturing and screen printing before Albini converted it in the 1990s. It's architecture built entirely around sound: the materials, the isolation, the shape of the rooms. Visits are short guided tours in groups of 20 to 30, with no wandering on your own. Sunday only, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.
Willie Dixon's Blues Heaven Foundation / Chess Records, Near South Side. This is 2120 S. Michigan, where Chess recorded Muddy Waters, Howlin' Wolf, Chuck Berry and Etta James. The Rolling Stones recorded here too, and named a song after the address. Visitors can explore the first floor, listen to music recorded in the studio, and see memorabilia and a short film about the building's history. Open both days, noon to 4 p.m.
Muddy Waters MOJO Museum, Kenwood. Muddy Waters and his wife Geneva lived in this 1891 two-flat from 1954 to 1973. Muddy and his band rehearsed in the basement, and musicians including Howlin' Wolf and Otis Spann stayed here when they first arrived in Chicago. New this year. Visitors can see parts of the ground floor and basement. Open both days, noon to 5 p.m.
Smashed Plastic Record Pressing, Hermosa. This is a working record-pressing plant and also new this year. It pairs well with the Walt Disney birthplace, since both are in Hermosa.
Garfield Park and North Lawndale
This part of the West Side has 14 sites this year, more than most North Side neighborhoods. They include Central Park Theater, Rapp and Rapp's 1917 movie palace, which is Saturday only, 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Our Lady of Sorrows Basilica and the Sears Sunken Garden are here too, and the Sunken Garden is new to the festival. It's easy to fill a whole day here, and it gets less attention than the downtown sites.
What's new this year
Other additions include the Woman's Athletic Club, the Blackhawks Ice Center, and the Griffin Museum of Science and Industry. A new "Built on Belief" program connects three Woodlawn sites: Narrow Bridge Arts Club, First Presbyterian Church of Chicago, and Oak Woods Cemetery. Each has exhibitions about the faith communities that shaped the neighborhood.
Planning it
Pick one or two neighborhoods per day and plan around the one site you don't want to miss. Create a MyOHC account on openhousechicago.org to save sites and itineraries. If you're going to the popular downtown buildings, a CAC membership includes a Priority Pass that skips the line at every site. After Oct. 1, the Chicago Reader's October issue will have a festival guide with a site list and a bingo card.
I'll update this post after the weekend with where I actually went and what was worth the line.
FAQ
When is Open House Chicago 2026?
Saturday, Oct. 17 and Sunday, Oct. 18. Each site sets its own hours, and some are open only one day.
Is Open House Chicago free?
Yes. There's no admission fee and no registration.
How do you skip the lines at Open House Chicago?
Chicago Architecture Center members get a Priority Pass that skips the general line at all participating sites. Otherwise, go early to the popular downtown buildings.
Can you go inside residential buildings during Open House Chicago?
Some. This year Park Castle Condominiums in West Ridge is open, and visitors can see its indoor pool.
How many sites can you realistically see in a weekend?
Fewer than you'd think. Lines, guided-tour groups and travel all add up. Stick to one or two neighborhoods a day.
Is it worth going if you've lived in Chicago for years?
I've sold real estate here for twelve years and have never been inside most of these buildings. So yes.
