1 Holiday Lights, City Lights Tour (Chicago Architecture Center, 111 East Wacker Drive) Experience the magic of a holiday lights tour like no other aboard the Chicago Architecture Center’s double-decker bus. You’ll learn all about the great architects, designers and leaders who shaped the city and also get into the holiday spirit. (One-and-a-half hours, $35)
2 Ando and Le Corbusier: Masters of Architecture (Wrightwood 659) Last Chance: In their inaugural show, Wrightwood 659, a new Lincoln Park venue for exhibitions on architecture and socially engaged art, designed by Pritzker Prize-winning architect Tadao Ando, will showcase more than a hundred drawings and photographs by Swiss-French pioneer of modern architecture and design, Le Corbusier, as well as models made by students of Ando himself. (Through December 15)
3 Renegade Craft Fair (Bridgeport Art Center, 1200 West 35th) Your annual meet-up with artists, designers, makers and entrepreneurs from around the country strikes twice before year-end: Once in the early fall and once right in time for Christmas shopping. The homegrown fair turned global craft showcase phenomenon gives you the perfect excuse to shop small and support your community without it becoming financially overwhelming. (December 1-2, 11am-5pm)
4 Keep Moving: Designing Chicago’s Bicycle Culture (Design Museum of Chicago) Did you know that just before the turn of the century, Chicago-based manufacturers produced the majority of American-made bicycles? Learn all about it at an exhibition that looks at bicycle design and manufacturing in Chicago and explores the city’s contribution to the early popularity of bicycles in America at-large. (Through March 3)
5 Vends + Vibes (University of Chicago Arts + Public Life, 301 East Garfield) The South Side lights up as local artists, makers and creative entrepreneurs gather for a weekend handmade marketplace event to jumpstart your holiday shopping—from clothing, jewelry and accessories, to candles, soaps and body oils, to gourmet treats. (December 8-9)
Greek-born Vasia Rigou is a Chicago-based art critic and pop culture journalist, largely on the subjects of contemporary art, design, and fashion. She moved to Chicago in 2013 to study Arts Journalism at the School of the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (SAIC,) where she was awarded the New Artist Society Merit Scholarship. She grew up to appreciate art after years of carefully planned, culture-filled travel itineraries and museum-hopping around Europe with her family. During this time, she received a bachelor’s in English Literature, in her native Athens; a master’s in Media, in Nottingham, UK; and studied foreign languages—English, German, and Spanish at the University of Salamanca, Spain. Her writing—reviewing museum exhibitions, gallery shows, art fairs, fashion shows, and music festivals among others—has been published nationally and internationally both in print and online. In 2017, she founded and now serves as editor-in-chief of Rainbowed.—an independently published website focused on the visual and performing arts, digital media, and popular culture. When she’s not writing about art or looking at art—wine in hand, she keeps up with Chicago’s creative entrepreneurial and startup community, makes lists for pretty much everything, drinks immense amounts of coffee and takes cross-country road trips every chance she gets.
