Elizabeth Blasius

Thank you @atrubek.bsky.social for asking me to write a new intro to FLWs 'Modern Architecture' for Belt Publishing! This cover is perfect because as soon as I finished rereading the book, I knew I wanted to draw upon my experience as a volunteer docent at the Robie House in my early 20s.

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chicagotribune.comRobert Loerzel: The Uptown Theatre drew thousands during Open House Chicago. How do we get it restored?

Thank you @robertloerzel.bsky.social for quoting me in this op-ed in @chicagotribune.com about the Uptown Theatre! I was honored to volunteer at the Uptown during Open House Chicago. There is a lot of momentum and optimism to build on in this moment. Let's keep the conversation going!

Chicago Tribune@chicagotribune.com

Commentary: The line stretched for almost a mile on Broadway on Sunday in Chicago’s Uptown neighborhood. Thousands of people waited in the line for hours as the line inched forward.

Elizabeth Blasius reposted

Max Chavez

@maxchavez.bsky.social

Copies were sold out for a bit but we’re restocked! If you’ve been having a tough time getting a copy, now’s your chance. 👀 www.routledge.com/Art-Deco-Wor...

routledge.comArt Deco World: The International Legacy of the Architecture and Design MovementArt Deco is one of architecture's most beloved styles. Famously celebrated for its rich colour, distinct geometry, texture and sumptuous use of materials, it has captivated the public's imagination wi...

Elizabeth Blasius reposted

starch mogul

@posts-cards.bsky.social

wrote a pretty fucking long thing about the intersection of 71st and south shore drive—real estate speculation, government intervention, white flight, and fitful reinvigoration www.postcard-past.com/71st-street-...

@ladytophamcatt.bsky.social

My incredible friends @ruralindexing.bsky.social have a book coming out!

Rural Indexing Project@ruralindexing.bsky.social

We made a book! RURAL INDEXING: A COLLECTION OF AMERICAN BUILDINGS, SIGNS, AND SYMBOLS arrives from Rizzoli in March 2027. Our favorite themes and subjects from the thousands of places we've visited since 2010—450+ photos, many never published before. Preorder: linktr.ee/ruralindexingproject

Elizabeth Blasius reposted

Lady Topham Catt

I am once again asking for one of our intrepid Chicago designers to get "SHUT THE FUCK UP, RAHM" merch on the market ASAP

NBC News@nbcnews.com

Former White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel calls on Democratic lawmakers to set aside plans to impeach President Trump if they win a majority in the House, pushing them instead to pass an ethics reform package.

nbcnews.toRahm Emanuel says Democrats should focus on ethics reforms rather than impeaching TrumpDemocrats have publicly weighed whether they should pursue impeaching Trump for a third time.

Elizabeth Blasius reposted

@langealexandra.bsky.social

So very happy for people who hadn't seen it before (and for those who had). I was one of the guides at the doors to the auditorium.

Heather in Chicago@heatherk.bsky.social

They gave up stopping people from taking photos

Elizabeth Blasius reposted

Zach Mortice

@zachmortice.bsky.social

Rapp & Rapp’s Uptown Theater, 1925. I watched thousands of people stand in line for two days to see this for @chiarchitecture.bsky.social’s Open House Chicago. Don’t ever let anyone tell you no one cares about architecture.

Elizabeth Blasius reposted

Alexandra Lange

Thrilled to announce my new book THE SALVAGED CITY will be out April 2027 + is available for preorder now geni.us/salvagedcity

Elizabeth Blasius reposted

Anjulie Rao

@anjulierao.bsky.social

dwell.comInside the Unconventional College That Blends Classical Building Trades With Liberal Arts EducationStudents at Charleston’s American College of the Building Arts are finding hope for a stable future in mastering crafts like blacksmithing and architectural carpentry.

I visited the American College of Building Arts, a liberal arts school in Charleston that trains students in classical building trades. This is a story about young people: growing up in a world that is literally falling apart, they are building something that lasts. www.dwell.com/article/acad...

Elizabeth Blasius reposted

Stony Island at 67th Place (looking west) 1971 and now

Elizabeth Blasius reposted

dmercer.bsky.social

@dmercer.bsky.social

I started putting these collages together in 2018, the year I was being treated for breast cancer. I now have over 200 of them and I'm still here!

Elizabeth Blasius reposted

Imagine a Woodlawn with such a packed and bustling commercial district that a firehouse had to be built on a side street

McKie's Disc Jockey Show Lounge@mckiesdjlounge.bsky.social

Imagine a Woodlawn with such a packed and bustling commercial district that a movie theater had to build on a side street mid-block

mascontext.comPreserving the Origins of Universal Design at the ILZRO HouseIn 1972 industrial designer and educator Marc Harrison, with the help of his students from the Rhode Island School of Design, created and built the ILZRO…

My monthly column in MAS Context returns on the ILZRO House, a 1973 experimental steel home in the woods of Rhode Island that holds within its design a watershed moment in universal design. Thanks, as always for reading!

A sledding accident at age 11 resulted in a traumatic brain injury that required Harrison to relearn how to walk and speak. That experience radicalized him--but also brought him in to the world of industrial design, where he focused on creating things for every user, and every body.

Personal note: While I was writing this column, my wife was in the beginning stages of recovering from a traumatic injury that has required her to relearn how to walk. When I wrote the first line "Disability touches us all," I was experiencing it through the lens of a caretaker.

The ILZRO House is the work of industrial designer and educator Marc Harrison (1936-1998) who is known for designing the Cuisinart DLC-X. You probably have an iteration of this food processor in your own kitchen. Like the ILZRO House, Harrison designed the DLC-X for people of all ages and abilities!

Elizabeth Blasius reposted

Katherine the Sixth

@luigithirty.bsky.social

Replying to @rogersparkman.bsky.social

that’s not AI it’s just a really shitty hot dog

Elizabeth Blasius reposted

openhousechicago.orgUptown TheatreThe Uptown Theatre is the crown jewel of theater developers Balaban and Katz and renowned movie house architects Rapp and Rapp. Built in 1925, the Uptown is the largest freestanding theater in North A...

The line to get in the Uptown will look like this once again (context for readers who don't know - the Uptown is a massive movie palace, closed in 1982 and not toured by too many since then)

Robert Loerzel@robertloerzel.bsky.social

Just announced: The Uptown Theatre has been added to the Chicago Architecture Center's Open House Chicago. "Visitors will enter though the main lobby and take a short guided tour of the auditorium. No photography will be permitted." 10 a.m.-3 p.m. Oct. 17 and 18.

Elizabeth Blasius reposted

Leor Galil

@imleor.bsky.social

And you can prep for it with my 2024 Ragamala oral history

chicagoreader.comAn oral history of Ragamala - Chicago ReaderHow Chicago’s marathon of Indian classical music became a focus of artistry and community, in the words of the people who’ve made it happen

Philip Montoro@pmontoro.bsky.social

The World Music Festival begins tonight with Ragamala, a free 14-hour marathon of Indian classical music at the Cultural Center. Have you ever seen anybody play a morsing? Or a surbahar? I had to look those up! Bring snacks or even a sleeping bag. It's a great time! www.chicago.gov/city/en/dept...

chicago.govchicago.gov

Elizabeth Blasius reposted

mascontext.comThere’s A Place Called Kokomo (Opalescent Glass)In her monthly column, Elizabeth Blasius visits Kokomo, Indiana, for a tour of Kokomo Opalescent Glass, the United States’ oldest art glass manufacturer,…

More about Kokomo Opalescent Glass in a great piece here from '24 by my friend @blaservations.bsky.social mascontext.com/observations...

McKie's Disc Jockey Show Lounge@mckiesdjlounge.bsky.social

Bad news out of Indiana, thanks @ericallixrogers.com for the tip. They produced the glass used in the leaded window that once hung in the Schlitz tied house on Ewing (& probably their others)

archpaper.comarchpaper.com

21 Sept

Thanks to @archpaper.com for asking me my thoughts on the Thompson Center renderings released last week! www.archpaper.com/2026/09/goog...

villa-albertine.orgShaping Contemporary Realities: Architecture and Beyond Symposium - Villa AlbertineJoin us September 24–26 for a three-day public symposium in Chicago, organized by MAS Context and Villa Albertine Chicago, with leading support from Saint-Gobain, a global leader in light and sustaina...

21 Sept

I'm looking forward to moderating a panel at Shaping Contemporary Realities: Architecture and Beyond this coming Friday, September 25th at Experimental Station! This symposium is FREE and full of awesome panelists and moderators. Register below: villa-albertine.org/va/events/sy...

New Thompson Center renderings were released today. I won't be reposting them but I have some thoughts to share. The renderings are easily found through your favorite search engine. 🧵:

Can you see the difference? I'll be damned if I let a multinational technology corporation tell this discipline what preservation is--or isn't.

When the JRTC opens to the public (whatever that means) I will be excited to write a full review. In the meantime--I know where the DuBuffet is.

New Thompson Center renderings were released today. I won't be reposting them but I have some thoughts to share. The renderings are easily found through your favorite search engine. 🧵:

When Google & friends lead with preservation-oriented language “Historic/a landmark/a careful and thoughtful restoration plan/preserve the building’s architectural integrity/A masterpiece of preservation” (all things said about this project) they are allowing capitalism to dictate that defination.

Preservation cannot allow a multinational technology corporation to broaden the definition of preservation when: -this project rejected preservation outright technically and in spirit -we have already allowed preservation to run rampant as a tool with which to make and preserve capital

New Thompson Center renderings were released today. I won't be reposting them but I have some thoughts to share. The renderings are easily found through your favorite search engine. 🧵:

The definition of what preservation is has been broadened recently by communities, stewards and organizations who want the discipline to tell more inclusive histories. This broadening empowers preservation to help serve more people with the resources and recognition of the discipline.

This broadening returns preservation back to the grassroots efforts from which it originated. We are giving communities the power to tell us as practitioners where our deficiencies are.

New Thompson Center renderings were released today. I won't be reposting them but I have some thoughts to share. The renderings are easily found through your favorite search engine. 🧵:

But shouldn't this new spatial arrangement give us pause? what does this say about the influence and power of multinational corporations over government? Our civic realm?

As a culture we should be doing everything we can to discourage building waste by adaptively reusing everything we can, whenever we can. But there is a clear distinction at the JRTC between adaptive reuse and preservation. Don't be fooled. "bear with me for a second let me put y'all on game..."

New Thompson Center renderings were released today. I won't be reposting them but I have some thoughts to share. The renderings are easily found through your favorite search engine. 🧵:

Writing the National Register nomination for the James R. Thompson Center (rejected by Google once the building was out of public hands) was a foundational project for Preservation Futures.

Renderings are a distraction until the public gets an opportunity to see the building for itself. But how much of the Thompson Center will be accessible to the public? The civic sector was adamant that offloading the JRTC would be for the public good i.e adding to the tax rolls, workers downtown...

chicagolandmarkreports.orgEvery Chicago Landmark Designation Report in one placeEvery Chicago Landmark and Landmark District with its designation report. 472 reports online, searchable by name, address, architect and full text.

I can access Landmarks Designation Reports and even the CHRS maps with ease because I use them so frequently in my research, but its nice that Preservation Chicago has put these resources in one place!

dmercer.bsky.social@dmercer.bsky.social

Something new! www.chicagolandmarkreports.org

So now that the data is democratized and the public can see the deficiencies in both the Landmarks program and the CHRS, organizations and agencies with the power to ensure that preservation in Chicago works better for its people are going to use that power to make improvements...right? Right?

Elizabeth Blasius reposted

14 Sept

Fashionland Shawneetown, IL

Elizabeth Blasius reposted

dmercer.bsky.social

@dmercer.bsky.social

9 Sept

The siding is falling off this relic at 5425 S. Ashland in Chicago and is providing a tantalizing glimpse of some signage. It reminds me of the sign that was revealed and saved on the north side a few years ago. I want to rip the rest of that siding off.

Elizabeth Blasius reposted

mascontext.comFrom Design to Destruction: Archiving the World Trade CenterIn her monthly column, Elizabeth Blasius visits the Archives of Michigan, the home of the Yamasaki, Inc., Architectural Firm Records, to consider what…

Last year I visited the Archives of Michigan, home of the Yamasaki, Inc., Architectural Firm Records to look at how the archives expressed the World Trade Center's construction and destruction. Spoiler alert: this story includes the dramatic rescue of historic materials from a dumpster!

Elizabeth Blasius reposted

🚨 Special Urban Report 🚨 AmeriCandy Lisbon, Portugal

Elizabeth Blasius reposted

28 Aug

Pizza Time Catlin, IL

Elizabeth Blasius reposted

8 Sept

Big Bend Saw Service Dolores, CO

This topic and approach was one I've thought about for years. Yamasaki was a name that even my auto mechanic father/secretary mother knew, as the WTC commission allowed him to build an office in Troy, Michigan. The destruction of the WTC solidified my interest in the symbology of architecture.

Elizabeth Blasius reposted

Max Chavez

@maxchavez.bsky.social

elledecor.com10 Stunning Art Deco Landmarks Around the World You’ve Probably Never SeenFrom Pueblo Deco to Streamline Moderne, the style took many surprising forms.

ART DECO WORLD is almost here! Here’s a sneak preview of the inside—have you pre-ordered your copy yet?

Elizabeth Blasius reposted

Max Chavez

@maxchavez.bsky.social

21 Aug

My new book Art Deco World was featured today in Elle Decor. Ranking this as one of the coolest/wildest moments of my life 🤯 www.elledecor.com/life-culture...

Elizabeth Blasius reposted

Alexander Luckmann

@aluckmann.bsky.social

mascontext.comThe Highs and Lows of “Inland Architect”Published on and off from 1883 until 1999, Inland Architect chronicled the rise of Chicago and the Midwest as centers for architecture and provided a home…

“The magazine proved that regional long-form architectural journalism, a typology that daily newspapers, regurgitated press releases, & artificial intelligence cannot ever provide with meaning, had value…” Brilliant on Inland Architect by @blaservations.bsky.social mascontext.com/observations...

Thank you!