Meet me at the God Box: Mies van der Rohe: A Critical Biography with Shulze and Windhorst - More for October

It's still not too late to be adding items to the October Calendar of Chicago Architectural Events.

On Tuesday, October 23th, 5:30 - 7:30 p.m., Franz Schulze and Edward Windhorst, co-authors of the highly anticipated new and revised edition of Mies van der Rohe: A Critical Biography, will be at the Robert F. Carr chapel on IIT to discuss and sign copies of their new book. The chapel, known on campus as "The God Box" is the only ecclesiastical space designed by the architect.

It may be the last week of the month, but we still have over a dozen great items still coming up, including The Churches of Edward Dart at AIA/Chicago, Christian Kerez at IIT, Incessant Visions, a film on Erich Mendelsohn at the Spertus, with a post screening talk by Stanley Tigerman, AIA Chicago's Designight 2012, the Richard H. Driehaus Foundation Preservation Awards, Tom Leader at UIC, and, for Halloween, Edgar Allen Poe readings at Glessner House.

Check out the October Calendar of Chicago Architectural Events.

Erich Mendelsohn's Incessant Visions, plus, Canberra today, Magic and Poetry of Havana, Wednesday

Never too late to be adding to the October Calendar of Chicago Architectural Events.

On Wednesday, October 24th, at 6:30 p.m., the Spertus Institute will be hosting screening, Incessant Visions, on the life and work of Architect Erich Mendelsohn.

In March 1933, German Jewish architect Erich Mendelsohn, head of Germany’s largest architectural firm, fled Berlin, foreseeing grave consequences from Hitler’s rise to power. In Amsterdam he bumped into an acquaintance who asked what he was doing there. The reply: “I’m relocating my office.” It wouldn’t be the last time Mendelsohn would start over in a foreign land.

In Incessant Visions, Israeli director Duki Dror unfolds the amazing story of Mendelsohn’s life through letters exchanged with his wife Luise, an accomplished cellist. The film explores Mendelsohn’s rise as an architectural visionary, his friendships with Albert Einstein and Frank Lloyd Wright, and the jagged trajectory of his career as he worked in England, Israel, and the United States.

 Following the screening will be a discussion led by Stanley Tigerman.  More information here

Today, Monday, October 15th, David Headon, Advisor to the Centennial of Canberra and Australian Capital Territory projects, will discuss The Planning of Canberra, at 5:00 p.m. in Kresge Hall at Northwestern in Evanston.  The 1911 plan was the result of a competition won by Marion Mahony and Walter Burley Griffin.

Then this Wednesday the 17th, 12:15 p.m. at the Great Cities Institute, Julio César Pérez Hernández, author of Inside Havana, will discuss The Magic and Poetry of Havana: A Glance at the Past, Present and Future of a Caribbean Metropolis.

Also this week, we've got The Core at The Eden Project at AIA/Chicago, Felipe Assadi discussing Contemporary Chilean Architecture at Crown Hall, IIT, Carol Ross Barney talking about Design for Sustainable Transportation at CAF, Anna Tobin D’Ambrosio on Cranes, Dragons and Geishas: Metalwork of the Aesthetic Movement, at the Driehaus Museum (twice), Bill Tyre on Glessner House at 125, at the Cultural Center for Landmarks Illinois and, again at CAF, Our Buildings as Ambassadors: U.S. Dept. of State's New Design Excellence Initiative.

There are 15 great programs just this week, and nearly three dozen still to come this month.  Check them all out on the October Calendar of Chicago Architectural Events.

Farnsworth Alfresco with Schulze, Windhorst and Jacobs; Williams and Tsien on (and at) their new Logan Center for the Arts, John Van Bergen month - more for October

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Chicago has so many great architectural tours, we don't even try to list them in our October Calendar of Chicago Architectural Events, but there's an exceptional tour this Saturday for which, at this writing, there's still tickets available.  Farnsworth House and Docomomo Chicago Midwest is offering up Farnsworth House Alfresco this Saturday, October 6th.

And, yes, there is a picnic lunch included, but the real draw is the participation of the Franz Schulze and Edward Windhorst, co-authors of the highly anticipated New and Revised Edition of Mies van der Rohe, A Critical Biography, due out next month; plus Tom Jacobs of Krueck+Sexton, the project architect for recent restoration work on the historic home.  The $100 ticket price also includes bus transportation to and from CAF downtown, with a drive yourself ticketing also available. The actual event runs from 12:00 to 3:00 p.m, with bus pickup at CAF at 10:30 a.m., returning at 4:30 p.m.

Read our own piece recounting the history of Mies's masterwork, and the battle to save it, Glass House Struck by Gavel.

As a run-up to this years Open House Chicago, we've also added a Friday, October 12th lecture, Beware the Stairs Are Always Moving: a conversation with architects Tod Williams and Billie Tsien, 6:00 p.m. in the Performance Hall of the new Williams/Tsien designed Reva and David Logan Center for the Arts on the University of Chicago campus.  It's part of Logan Launch Fest, a three day festival celebrating the building's official opening, over 40 free events, from music, to film, to poetry, theater and more, showcasing the dizzying array of performance spaces incorporated in the building.

We should also mentioned a new exhibition at the Highland Park, which has declared October John van Bergen Month.  Events include an exhibition of photographs and artifacts of the work of the famed Prairie School architect at the Highland Park Historical Society, with a panel discussion on Prairie Architecture at the Highland Park Public Library on October 14th, and a house walk October 21st.

Among the over a dozen items this week, new IIT Dean of Architecture Wiel Arets lectures at Crown Hall Wednesday at 6:00 p.m., Related Companies discuss the resuscitation of the stalled Waterview Tower as 111 West Wacker, Thursday lunchtime for Friends of Downtown at the Cultural Center, the same day Commission of Chicago Landmarks fails to discuss the subject of Bertrand Goldberg's Prentice Hospital still again, Seaside Award-winning architect Scott Merrill lectures at the Driehaus Museum, and Chris Ware talks about and signs copies of his new book, Building Stories, at Unity Temple.  And if you can't make it to Farnsworth on Saturday, you can head over to the Art Institute, where Clare Lyster will be leading an "Archi-Salon" on the topic architecture’s external influences, such as transportation networks, within the exhibition space of the spectacular new show, Building:  Inside Studio Gang Architects.

Check out all seventy-plus great items on the October Calendar of Chicago Architectural Events.

October in Chicago is Crazy Busy: Roggeveen's Go West, Arets, Vinoly, Tigerman, Stern, Gehry, Jahn(x2), Open House Chicago, MAS Context Analog - much, much more

Now up: At well over 60 items already, we're setting a blistering pace for the October 2012 Calendar of Chicago Architectural Events.

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You want architects?  At UIC, there's Daan Roggeveen of the Go West Project on the 8th, and Tom Leader on the 29th.  At IIT, there's new dean Wiel Arets this coming Wednesday, the 3rd, Kevin Daly on the 10th, Felipe Assadi and Ignacio Volante of Chile's Universidad Finis Terrae on the 16th, and Christian Kerez on the 24th.  On Monday, the 8th, Rafael Viñoly is at U of C's new Logan Center for Arts - his huge New Hospital Pavilion opens next year.  On the 17th, Carol Ross Barney talks about Design for Sustainable Transportation at CAF lunchtime, where Mary T. Schaffer talks about Target's rehab of Louis Sullivan's Carson Pirie Scott store on the 31st.

You want benefits?  How about Helmut Jahn x2?  On the 3rd, he's being honored at Facets Multimedia's Screen Gems Benefit, while on the 26th, he receives the AIA Chicago Lifetime Achievement Award to Designight 2012 with Victoria Lautman.  And on the 13th, at the Art Institute's Modern Ball, Stanley Tigerman is honored for his lifetime achievements and participates in a dialogue with Frank Gehry and Robert A.M. Stern, moderated by Geoffrey Baer.

For ambition and shear density, nothing matches the 2012 edition of Open House Chicago, Saturday and Sunday the 13th and 14th, offering often rare access to over 150 buildings both downtown and in twelve other Chicago neighborhoods, from Hyde Park to Edgewater.  (Expect to reach me only through Twitter on those days)

We got Chicago Ideas Week 2012, including events with Martin Felsen, Devon Patterson,  Navy Pier,  Gunny Harboe and Tim Samuelson on saving the Rookery, and Steve Wiesenthal and Anthony Shou of Kirkegaard Associates on their new Reva and David Logan Center for the Arts at U of C.

We got 111 West Wacker (formerly the stalled Waterview) at the Cultural Center for Friends of Downtown, Ulrich Dangel of Nicholas Grimshaw talking about The Eden Project at AIA Chicago, which is also offering a demo tour of Arup's Experience SoundLab and a talk by Matthew Seymour on The Churches of Edward Dart.  On the 27th, Landmarks Illinois offers up this year's edition of the Richard H. Driehaus Foundation Preservation Awards.

Then there's SOM's Eric Keune and the State Department's Casey Jones and Lydia Muniz talking about the new U.S embassy in Beijing and State's New Design Excellence Initiative at CAF,  Scott Merrill at the Driehaus, Chris Ware and his new book Building Stories at Unity Temple, an Archi Salon led by Clare Lyster inside the galleries of the Art Institute's Building:  Inside Studio Gang Architects, Richard Pare discusses Soviet Modernist Architecture at the Graham, and William Tyre talks about Glessner House at 125 for Landmarks Illinois at the CCL, while a Halloween tradition continues as Glessner House again offers up Edgar Allan Poe readings, and Haunted Tours of Historic Prairie Avenue.

I've never seen so many conferences in a single month, and we're still adding.MAS Context is presenting Analog - Second edition, an all day event with speakers from Jimenez Lai to MCA's Dieter Roelstraete and more at Marsha target="_blank"ll Brown's NewProjects "urbanism studio" on South State. The Architects Newspaper is hosting a day-two symposium, Facades+Innovation, at IIT, with a free keynote by Fernando Romero.  SEAOI offers up symposiums on Structures, learning from the Indiana State Fair Collapse Incident,and Concrete Mix Design

OK, I'm exhausted just talking about it all.  To paraphrase Dr. Johnson, she who is tired of Architecture in Chicago in October is tired of life.  Start filling out your own dance cards by checking out the cornucopic October Calendar of Chicago Architectural Events.