Saturday reflections

Here's something a little different: reflections in the windows of a hotel on Rush Street in Chicago, solarized into something even more abstract.

Saturday reflections

Chicago in blue and white.

Abstract

Just for fun.

This started out as a photo of the pipes and vents and other structures on a nearby roof, taken from my hotel room in Chicago. I switched the colors and added some double exposures, and ended up liking the result very much.

Because reality feels highly overrated these days.

Urban poetry

I was going to save this for the end of the week, but what the hell, it's a holiday.

A very cool bike rack, just off North Rush Street.

Random things I managed to see in Chicago

Right up my alley

Two samples of the Chicago-style alleyway, one charming with painted brick, those wrought iron hanging lights and the city looming in the background, and the other more typical big-city grunge, with giant beer cans and a dumpster.

I could live here, definitely

And I'm equally sure I could never afford to.

This is East Bellevue Place, a street of charming houses just off Michigan Avenue. It was chilly and getting dark and I didn't stop to try to get decent pictures from the other side of the trees lining the street. But I would have loved to be going up those front steps and into the warm glow of that living room.

John Hancock Center

Another look at the tower disappearing into the mists.

Water Tower

North Michigan Avenue, in the gloaming.

Saturday reflections

The Burberry store on North Michigan Avenue, up the street from my hotel in Chicago.

It had been raining most of the day and I didn't get outside until evening, but the gloom just enhances these reflections. The building is so insanely shiny that it takes advantage of every photon of light aimed its way.

Saturday reflections

Brick within brick.

I took this picture in June, in Chicago, but it has an autumnal air, with the leafless vines snaking up the bricks against the growly sky.

Saturday reflections

Chicago, of course. It's full of fun juxtapositions, like this weathered ornate cupola in front of the sleek modern glass.

Little green

Obviously the Crown Fountain is the place to go if you've just had your face painted and want to make sure your hair turns green as well.

Millennium Park

I didn't see much of the city beyond this park today. After checking in to my hotel, I treated myself to afternoon tea for my birthday, then went for a walk.

It was the kind of perfectly beautiful day, warm but not humid, that's best spent in a park or on a boat, and if Millennium Park turns out to be typical of this city then I am already truly, madly, deeply in love with Chicago.

There's the famous Cloud Gate sculpture, for one thing. And the bandshell designed by Frank Gehry. And shady paths, comfortable benches, and redwing blackbirds swooping over the lawns.

And these wonderful fountains, 50-foot tall towers of LED's that display video faces of 1000 Chicagoans. Every few minutes, the lips pucker and spray water over the reflecting pool between the two towers.