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November 2007
Fall Fashion Fete
October 11, 2007 - Chicago magazine and the Park Hyatt Chicago hosted a cocktail reception for more than 50 guests in the Drawing Room on Thursday, October 11th. Stacey Jones, fashion director of Chicago magazine, and Stacey Wallace-Albert, contributing editor of Chicago magazine, celebrated with attendees in honor of Chicago Fashion Focus Week 2007. The stylish crowd enjoyed the fashionable company, while sampling Moët and Chandon Champagne and haute cuisine courtesy of NoMI. Read more
Housing Bulletin—Riding the Foreclosure Bus
By Dennis Rodkin

Housing Bulletin: Riding the Foreclosure Bus
It’s only a matter of time until some enterprising Chicagoan emulates the Stockton, California, real-estate agent who dreamed up this idea: a bus tour that takes potential buyers all over town to view the foreclosed houses for sale. It’s a long tour.

And if the real-estate forecasts play out as prognosticated by some—that is, if hundreds of thousands of over-extended U.S. homeowners have to bail out of their houses in the next 18 months as their once-cheap Adjustable Rate Mortgages (ARM) reset at dramatically higher prices—that Stockton bus tour might become a national franchise.

Nationwide, foreclosures are spreading like a bad rash. On November 1st, the California-based Realty Trac reported that...

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Week 26: Harvest Moon

We were in need of a good adventure, something to get us out of the house and break up these 40 weeks. So on Sunday, we drove 223 miles for a hamburger. I had heard about a general store in Moonshine, Illinois, that served what many called the best burger in America, and Sarah, typically gung ho, piled into the car with me.

We made it 42 miles before she demanded Taco Bell and a bathroom, both of which she got. The rest of the drive was uneventful—apart from a bad omen near Rantoul, when a birthday clown driving a white Dakota passed us doing 95. As he sped past, he glanced over, his face painted into a chilling smile, and you just knew...

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Clandestine Destination
By Rebecca Little

Fall Out Fashion
Clandestine Industries (952 W. Newport Ave.; 773-857-3525, clandestineindustries.com) may not be a household name yet, but its chief designer certainly is: Wilmette-born Pete Wentz, the bassist for a little band called Fall Out Boy. The line just opened its first stand-alone store in the space formerly occupied by the Lakeview Manufacturing Co., a boutique that sold the clothing-and-accessories line. Stephen Westman, who ran the former store as an offshoot of his bar, Lakeview Broadcasting Company, now owns and operates Clandestine Industries. “When I opened the Lakeview Broadcasting Company, I partnered with Clandestine and used their clothing for our uniform,” Westman says. “The opening of the Lakeview Manufacturing Co. was merely a response to the overwhelming interest people had in our...

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Celebrity Sightings

I've had not one, but two good celebrity sightings in the past week. In Chicago, I saw Gary Sinise filming an episode of CSI: New York outside the Tribune Tower. I admit it, I didn't have to work very hard for that one, since Chicago magazine offices are inside the building. Sinise didn't want his picture snapped directly, but one of the directors agreed that he could "walk by me" and I could "happen to snap a picture." Um, OK...

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Scene and Overheard

Who knew Last Girl Standing was kind of like confession? Here, the most notable quotes from the last week:

"There I was, standing in a room with 700 women and three gay guys."
–The Boyfriend, in reference to me dragging him to Thursday's opening party for the new ultra-feminine Nanette Lepore store in Bucktown

"Oh, my god. Do you want to die? I think I lost my virginity to an R. Kelly CD. I think we put the music up really loud."
–Kim Kardashian, in an interview I conducted...

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Art Imitates Death
By Ann Wiens
Audrey Niffenegger, author of The Time Traveler's Wife, discusses art, writing, and her upcoming exhibition on Isabella Blow, the fashion icon who died last spring. Read more
There Goes the ‘Hood

Kudos to Nanette Lepore. There was a lot of talk about which New York boutique would be the first to pierce Damen Avenue's indie veil. It was supposed to be Marc by Marc Jacobs, but, Lord, they're slow (they were supposed to open in August, then it was October, now who knows when?) Others are on the horizon, including BCBG.

But when it came down to getting the lease, stocking the store, and flinging open the doors, Lepore did it first. Her store, which opened...

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