A Shoe In

The Dressing Room Shoes (4657 N. Lincoln Ave.; 773-878-7400, thedressingroomchicago.com), the recently opened specialty outpost from the same owners of three-year-old Lincoln Square shop The Dressing Room, is located just down the street from its sister store and carries both affordable and swanky kicks. On the casual side, find mom-friendly Crocs and adorable lace-up rain boots from Dav ($80.50), as well as...

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Gabler, Interrupted
Into the Woods
meets Groundhog Day in The Further Adventures of Hedda Gabler, a campy twist on the story of Henrik Ibsen’s doomed heroine from playwright Jeff Whitty (Avenue Q). When Hedda decides to take things into her own...

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Need a Kick?

Sometimes adidas (845 N. Michigan Ave., 4th fl.; 312-867-1640) actually makes shoes for athletes. Whereas the adidas Originals store on Rush Street stocks the brand’s fashion and retro heritage shoes, the new Water Tower store is the first athletic-shoe shop for the brand in the Midwest, carrying sports gear and shoes for tennis, running, basketball, soccer, and golf. The real draw is...

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Even if you’ve seen it butchered by a high-school cast—especially if you’ve seen it butchered by a high-school cast—don’t miss The Hypocrites’ take on the Thornton Wilder classic Our Town. The troupe remounts its too-short, sold-out staging, an imaginatively revisionist twist on what must be...

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Tracing Jeaneology

The Lincoln Park shop DNA 2050 (2122 N. Halsted St.; 773-525-8004) stocks a mix of established and emerging brands for men and women in casual and dressy styles. Find pajama-soft tops from Sportmax Code, separates from Just Cavalli, dresses from Bread and Butter, among others. For women, we loved the William Rast pea coat ($409), a silk chiffon halter dress ($399) from Julie Haus, and a yellow cashmere sweater from Knitwit ($145). For men, there is a mix of preppy, work-appropriate attire such as...

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Poor old Hamlet may not have been the picture of stability, but then again, neither was crime-fiction writer Dashiell Hammett’s hardboiled hero Sam Spade. Put them together, and you’ve got one tongue-twister of a nod toward the dark and the stormy: Dashiell Hamlet, a new play cowritten by the 84-year-old stage and screen vet...

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Suit up

Those who tromp around the financial district may have noticed the recent addition of tailors working in a storefront of Richard Bennett Custom Tailors (175 W. Jackson Blvd.; 312-913-1100). The “tailor in a fishbowl” concept is the centerpiece of the shop’s new space, meant to demystify the custom-tailoring process and show customers craftsmen at work. A city fixture since 1929, the tailor shop...

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Thirty years ago, Jim Jones urged the residents of his “utopian” settlement in Jonestown, Guyana, to drink poison-spiked punch. In the three decades since, the event has lingered uncomfortably in the public memory: How did such a thing happen? Why?...

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Fashion Forward, Eh?
Canada has given us hockey, Michael J. Fox, and now Aritzia (Water Tower Place, 3rd fl.; 312-867-9230, aritzia.com), a trendy shop carrying boutique brands that range from comfy tees ($18) to a double-breasted gray overcoat ($350). The 4,300-square-foot shop is the Vancouver-based brand’s fourth store in the U.S. Brands include BCBG Generation, Citizens of Humanity, Ella Moss, Habitual, Nudie, Talula, Twelfth Street by Cynthia Vincent, and...

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Red Alert
Squashing a gigantic inflatable ball into tight spaces sounds a little like one of those Olympic events that didn’t score much NBC airtime (half-lightweight judo gets no respect). But artist Kurt Perschke’s RedBall Project—a public art installation in which a 15-foot vinyl ball makes its way across the city, stopping at...

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