Creative Placemaking, 5 Big Ideas, North Grant Park Revised, plus Lifson on Prentice, Uhlir on Netsch, Aquilino, Doug Reed - lots more for February

Yeah, I know - I thought we'd be done by now, too, but I was wrong.  We've just added several great new items to the February Calendar of Chicago Architectural Events.

This Thursday, the 23rd, in the Millennium Room on the 5th floor of the Chicago Cultural Center, the Great Cities Institute is sponsoring Creative Placemaking: How, Why, Outcomes, presenting the results of a national scan of successful creative placemaking efforts. On Tuesday the 28th at the Chicago Hilton and Towers, the Local Initiatives Support Corporation Chicago will present Building the 21st Century City: 18th annual Chicago Neighborhood Development Awards, with Rahm Emanuel scheduled as keynote speaker, and an afternoon forum 5 Big Ideas for the 21st Century City.  And on Wednesday the 29th, at the Daley Bicentennial Fieldhouse, the Grant Park Advisory Council will both be electing officers (who knew?) and presenting the latest revisions from Michael van Valkenburgh for the North Grant Park Renovation Project.

From Edward Lifson discussing Those Mysterious Curves of Bertrand Goldberg's endangered Prentice Hospital at Häfele on the 23rd, to moderating a session of CAF's Chicago Debates - Beating the Odds: Designing a Casino for Chicago on the 28th, to Roman Catholic Art and Architecture and VOA's Roosevelt Tower, Marie Aquilino at the Graham, and Doug Reed at Crown Hall, all this Wednesday the 22nd,  

Rebecca Graff on Urban Archeology at Charnley-Persky, and a lecture and booksigning for Barbara Lanctot's A Walk Through Graceland Cemetery at Glessner House, all on Thursday the 23rd, Merritt Bucholz at IIT on the 27th, and the Structural Engineers Association of Illinois all-day seminar on Wind Loading and Wind Engineering on Tuesday, the 28th, and a Wednesday, the 29th crammed with Connecting Digital and Physical Space at DePaul, Randolph Tower at CAF, Ed Uhlir on The Legacy of Walter Netsch at the Cliff Dwellers, and a Pocket Guide to Hell at Gallery 400 . .  .

There are still over two dozen great items to check out on the February Calendar of Chicago Architectural Events.

Lifson on Prentice Curves, Explore Engineering at CAF, Marie Aquilino, Carolyn Armenta Davis, People's History and Preservation, plus last days for Bertrand Goldberg:Reflections - more for February

We told you there was a lot more coming to the February 2012 Calendar of Chicago Architectural Events, and it turns out we weren't kidding.  We've just added another dozen+ items.

On Thursday, the 23rd, Edward Lifson will be talking about Those Mysterious Curves: Why Prentice Women's Hospital Should be Reborn at the Häfele America Chicago Showroom, while a mile or so north, Rebecca Graff will be presenting Archaeology at the Charnley-Persky House: Changing Tastes on Chicago's Gold Coast, 1890-1930 at, appropriately enough, the Charnley-Persky House.

On February 29th, the Chaddick Institute at DePaul will have a symposium bridging the real and the virtual, Connecting Digital and Physical Space: Social Media and Technology's Impact on How & Where We Work, Live & Shop.  And on Sunday the 19th at CAF, Chicagoland Engineers Week will be sponsoring Explore Engineering - How do they do that? Find out. Figure Out. Try Out, "a day-long festival of fun, hands-on activities designed to help families discover what engineers do, try out activities, have fun building, constructing, and solving engineering challenges," targeting families with kids 5-13 and students 14 to 18.

And for Wednesday, the 22nd, we've added a lecture at the Graham Foundation by Marie Aquilino, editor of the book Beyond Shelter, Architecture and Human Dignity, who will describe the ways in which some of the world's most innovative architecture and engineering firms, nonprofits and research centers are changing how we engage in disaster recovery solutions.

This week, on Monday the 6th, we've got Yolande Daniels of Studio SUMO lecturing at the Art Institute, and on Tuesday the 7th, Jamie Simone talks about Planning in Progress: The Bloomingdale Trail Project at the Great Cities Institute in the afternoon, and in the evening there's the Structural Engineers Association of Illinois monthly dinner meeting at the Cliff Dwellers, on the topic The Structural Engineer and Construction Disputes, while Emmanuel Pratt is at the Chicago Cultural Center for Archeworks, and Carolyn Armenta Davis discusses Creativity Released: Designs from Black Architects in Paris, Dakar, and Beyond at Alliance Française de Chicago.

This Friday, the 10th, there's what promises to be a different kind of look at historical preservation with a  round table discussion at the Jane Adams Hull-House Museum, This is Not My Beautiful House: Historic Preservation and the People's History, with Vince Michael, Roberta Feldman, Estevan Rael-Galvaz, Mary Means and Lee Bey.

We're already in the second week of the month, but there's still 50 great upcoming events to check out on the February Calendar of Chicago Architectural Events.

And a final reminder that you have only through this Wednesday, February 8th, to catch the great exhibition, Bertrand Goldberg:Reflections at the Arts Club of Chicago.