Our New Neighborhood, Food & Bar Tours
We are excited to bring you three new private Chicago neighborhood tours. Chicago is, after all, a city of neighborhoods. Each of these tours explores the history, architecture, and food created by the people who live in these distinct, though ever-changing, areas. Think outside of downtown. Think outside of deep-dish and Italian beef. Heck, think […]
Learn How We Guide Chicago Walking Tours in Winter
Leading Chicago walking tours in winter presents a unique set of challenges. Chicago, you may have heard, tends to be grey and cold in the winter. Now, don’t get me wrong, there’s still plenty of great reasons to visit Chicago in winter. Leading a winter tour is much easier when the weather is nice, though. […]
A Letter from Dad About Fun Tours in Chicago
This blog post is written from the point of view of Alex as “Dad,” as immortalized in a photo from Halloween years ago. Hello sport, This is your father writing. Remember me? Man who bred and raised you. I’d hope you do! (haha!) Wanted to send along the photo up above. Do you still have that […]
Guided Field Trips in Chicago from an Educator’s Perspective
As a tour guide with Chicago Detours, I very often find myself leading field trips in Chicago that focus on the city’s history, architecture, and culture. Most of my professional life, in fact, is working as an educator of some sort. I also teach courses about cinema, the mass media, and pop culture at Harold Washington […]
Designing a University of Chicago Tour
Special for the University of Chicago, we’ve just developed a new tour of the University of Chicago campus and surrounding neighborhoods. The University of Chicago hired us to offer this tour for “Family Weekend,” when parents, siblings and grandparents of undergraduate students come to Hyde Park to learn more about the student experience. While the […]
Designing an 1893 World’s Fair Tour Unlike Any Other
Our new 1893 World’s Fair Tour with Bars launches on March 16th. This walking tour is a three-hour-long adventure featuring charming pre-1900s buildings, drinks, some light snacks, and games. Guests learn the history of popcorn while snacking on the Chicago-made Cretors brand. We ride in one of the last passenger elevators with a human operator. The tour looks […]
Meditating on Modernist Architecture with Mies
Ludwig Mies van der Rohe is the master of modernist architecture. This is, of course, an architectural style that many could easily do without. Mies’ black box steel-frame buildings have no intricate details or Greek columns; their interiors have no marble staircases or glimmering mosaics. So what’s the big deal, right? Well, Mies essentially ushered […]
The History of Chicago’s Community Gardens
This week marks the last scare of frost for the Chicago farmers. Soon you will see community gardens blooming city-wide as urbanites work to keep Chicago true to its motto Urbs in Horto, or City in a Garden. Gardens, especially community gardens, hold a place in Chicago’s history. Today, community gardens blanket Chicago’s neighborhoods, often […]
The Chicago Picasso: Beginnings of Public Art in Chicago
It hard to walk past Daley Plaza and not catch a glimpse of Chicago Picasso. The colossal three dimension sculpture towers 50 feet into the sky above plaza. Some say it is a woman, a horse, or even a baboon. To locals of Chicago however, this sculpture is just the Picasso. (By the way, you […]
Group Urban Excursions (aka Private Tours)
2022 Update: We no longer offer public tours and have kept this post as a historical record of our role in innovating in travel and tourism. Lately we’ve been bombarded by interest in our private tours of Chicago, and it probably comes along with the surge in interest in unique experiences these days. (FYI, we […]