The proposed redesigns of Navy Pier were released earlier this week. Some love it. Some hate it. And some wish the redesign teams would stop using Daniel Burnham's words out of context to explain their own vision. Personally, while we have no idea why the city would want a glacier jutting out of the lake 365 days a year as proposed by !melk/HOK/UrbanLab, we do like the layered and intricate walkways imagined by Davis Brody Bond/Aedas/Martha Schwartz Partners. more ›

Five people were arrested for writing graffiti on the Navy Pier Ferris Wheel yesterday after they used a gold-colored marker to write on the seats more ›

This is a collection of Chicago's baby photos. See the Adler Planetarium, Navy Pier, the Northern Trust Bank Building, Harper Library, the Mandel Brothers Store and the LaSalle Hotel, then and now. more ›

We braved the storms and mess at Navy Pier this morning to get our nautical geek on while checking out the War of 1812-era ships at this year's Tall Ship festival. Check the pics. more ›

Most Chicagoans spend the summer avoiding tourist traps like Navy Pier, save the prerequisite trip with the friend from college that's in town for the weekend, but now we may have a very good reason to make the trek up there. Just announced yesterday, a juried art fair dubbed Exposition Chicago will debut in September 2012 according the the Tribune. more ›

Winos of Chicagoland, wake up from underneath those park benches and check out our excellent picks for wine events this weekend. As the weather warms and festival season gets underway, there'll be a lot of hoopla about beer, but there are plenty of opportunities for good wine drinking too. more ›

President Obama swung through town yesterday to raise some money for his re-election campaign, blow the dust off his Kenwood home and dined at mk, where he used to take First Lady Michelle Obama on dates. The President saved the most rowdy fundraiser for last at a Navy Pier gathering of around 2,300 people. Obama played to the hometown crowds, reminding them Chicago was where he met his wife and started a family, and played on civic pride by reminding the supporters that his re-election headquarters will be here and donning a Bulls cap (Bulls stars Derrick rose and Joakim Noah were in attendance). Obama also displayed a sly with and had some fun with birther conspiracy theories. more ›

The contentious battle over whether the Chicago Children's Museum could move into the north east corner of Grant Park has reached another turning point, with museum officials considering abandoning the proposed move from the current location at Navy Pier. more ›

Vegetarians rejoice. The days of sitting idly by while your carnivorous friends banter about what makes a burger great are coming to an end. Thanks to the growing popularity of veggie alternatives, you too can chime in and shoot the patty yourself. Choose the right restaurant and you may actually find that you have the bragging rights at the table when your meatless burger turns out to be tastier than their pile o' grilled flesh. Such was the result of our recent experiment at Harry Caray's Tavern. more ›

One of the complaints about Groupon, from the perspective of a business owner who takes advantage of the deal-a-day company's ability to reach a customer base, is that in the long run it winds up only netting modest profits for the businesses, or worse, they lose money. more ›

We brainstormed a bit and have come up with a short list of potential places the state and city could shove in some "revenue builders." After the jump, all the places we might like to see (or would at least settle for) gaming grab hold in Chicago - and of course, your suggestions are welcome as well. more ›

The Sculpture Ojects & Functional Art Expo, a.k.a. SOFA, is holding court in Navy Pier's Festival Hall this weekend, so Chicagoist decided to head down to see what kind of art the Undertaxed 2% Club is spending their thousands of dollars on nowadays. SOFA, as the name implies, is heavy on the sculpture and contemporary glass, but there are 2D offerings as well. The styles on hand range wildly from the glitz of glass superstars such as Jon Kuhn, Dale Chihuly and Lino Tagliapietra to the grotesque art of Avery Palmer and Esther Shimazu, which upset the delicate sensibilities of the Real Housewives in attendance. more ›

Next week the mighty Pinot grape will be celebrated in the form of Pinot Days. Pinot Days festival planners have tapped oenophile chefs like Brian Millman of Uncommon Ground and Randy Zweiban of Province and notable sommeliers to host dining events all weeklong. One don't-miss event - a Pinot Days “Dinner Party” with Brian Duncan and Chef John Caputo at Bin 36 on Thursday, November 11 at 5pm. more ›

For this year's Fourth of July fireworks display, city officials have announced plans to stage three synchronized events along the lakefront to save money and improve public safety issues. The three events--at Navy Pier, at Foster and Lawrence in the north, and at 59th Street in the south--are set to replace the annual celebration in Grant Park on July 3. Jill Niland, along with other conservationists and nature lovers, is worried that the north and south celebrations will draw huge crowds to the Montrose and 63rd Street beaches, both of which contain "ecologically sensitive nature areas," according to the Chicago Tribune. more ›

More than 20 tall ships from all over the world are set to dock at Navy Pier for the Tall Ships Chicago 2010 festival, taking place Aug. 24-29, for the first time since 2006. With the purchase of a ticket, festival goers will be able to sail on several of the ships for the first time in the history of the event. more ›

• Besides the income tax increase, Gov. Quinn is also asking for a sales tax holiday timed to benefit back-to-school shoppers.
• How about that? There's something in the city Mayor Daley sell off.
• Progress Illinois has more on today's CPS student walk-out.

With the battle over the Children's Museum's controversial move to Grant Park next yet over, a new lease extension is expected to be agreed to that will keep the museum at its current Navy Pier location until at least 2013. Fox 32 reports that the agreement will give the museum a November 2011 deadline to extend its lease to 2013, 2014, or 2025. Children's Museum spokesman Natalie Kreiger said, "There are several phases that have to take place before we can break ground. I don't have a specific date, but it'll be in the next few years. While we're at Navy Pier, we'll continue to develop new exhibits that rotate out just as we always have. We'll continue to maintain the museum in a way that ensures it's attractive to visitors and fun for them until we move." more ›

It was revealed this past week that the city Plan Commission has approved balloon rides to continue this summer at Navy Pier from New York-based company, AeroSpace-NYC and the Metropolitan Pier and Exposition Authority. The balloon rides initially started as a test run, operating out of Gateway Park at the western end of Navy Pier for two months last summer. This year, the rides will also take place in Gateway Park and will start in early May and run until late September. Due to complaints last summer that the balloon rides blocked views of the lake, a logo that appeared on last year's balloon has been removed for this year. [Chicago Tribune] more ›

File this under No Surprise to Anyone: Metropolitan Pier and Exposition Authority, otherwise known as McPier, is deep in debt. Crain's is reporting that according to the new chairman of McPier, more ›

The story goes that when Talking Heads were planning the concert that would be captured on film as Stop Making Sense, frontman David Byrne asked a stage designer friend for pointers. She told him that on stage, everything needs to be bigger. He took her advice literally. Thus was born the Big Suit. more ›

Those tethered hot-air balloon rides at Navy Pier have been approved by the Chicago Plan Commission in spite of protests from Erma Tranter, executive director of Friends of the Parks. The ride could be open by next week and will stay open through October. [CBN] more ›

Round and round and round it goes, where it stops, nobody knows... more ›

Navy Pier wants to give people the chance to see Chicago from a new angle: a hot air balloon. Perhaps a little friendly competition with the Sears Willis Tower Ledges? The balloon would be tied to the ground and the attraction would be run by New York-based AeroBalloon. According to the Sun-Times: more ›

Ah, the shopping mall: food courts, chain stores, erstwhile home to zombie uprisings and Tiffany concerts (specifically "The Beautiful You: Celebrating The Good Life Shopping Mall Tour '87"). The first enclosed shopping center, Southdale Mall in Edina, Minnesota (shown above), opened in 1956. Since then they've spread to practically every corner of the globe. In fact the world's largest malls are now in Asia, dwarfing their North American ancestors. Aside from McDonald's perhaps no other American innovation has been so equally reviled and embraced. more ›

Mayor Daley loves cameras. Be it red light cameras, street sweeping cameras, or surveillance cameras, he can't seem to get enough of them. So he must be thrilled after last night's "unveiling" of 200 new security cameras placed around Navy Pier. The new $4.2 million monitoring system comes from IBM and, in a way, makes sense as Navy Pier is one of the city's top tourist attractions; Crain's says 8.3 million people visited in 2008. Or maybe Mayor Daley just wants to keep an eye on all those commies over at WBEZ (we kid!). The system, which was installed in February, has already proved useful. more ›

If you've noticed an abundance of men and women in uniform around town, it's because it is the first ever Marine Week here in Chicago. It kicked off Monday morning and continues through Sunday night. The Marines will be showcasing their talents around town all week. You can see the full list of events here, but here is a list of events that are free and open to the public. more ›

Comedy troupe The Whitest Kids U' Know, NYC's purveyor of the crass and offensive, will make a one-night-only appearance at the Lakeshore Theater this Thursday. Known for their delightful vulgarity, the Kids will tackle everything from celebrity worship to potty humor, and will no doubt throw some beastiality somewhere in the mix. Prepare to giggle nervously. more ›

As we speculated a month ago, it's now been confirmed that this summer's Chicago-filmed Batman blockbuster, The Dark Knight, is returning to IMAX screens. But it's coming sooner than you think. The film hits the big-big screen starting this Friday, January 23rd. But there's an extra special something for those of you who score tickets to the 9 p.m. show on (re)opening night: a special IMAX screening of Batman Begins follows. Swing by the Navy Pier IMAX Theatre site for more details and the chance to buy tickets for the film as well as the special doubleheader. Tickets for all shows are $15 for adults and $13 for children. more ›

Every day in August, we said to ourselves, "Gotta go see The Dark Knight in IMAX." Guess what we never got around to? Seeing The Dark Knight in IMAX. So when we stumbled across this press release from Warner Brothers, we counted our lucky stars that we'd be able to catch it in all its IMAX'ed glory (despite the cynic in us mumbling "They just want to cross the billion-dollar threshold"). more ›

We know what you're thinking: "Uh, there's already a giant Ferris wheel at Navy Pier, what is this, Best of Chicagoist 1995?" Yes, there is one there now, but forget that dinky piece of shit, McPier wants to go BIGGER. As in twice the current size, putting the finished product at over 300 feet tall. more ›