Damen Tavern
Where Bar DeVille sat in Ukrainian Village for nine years, its successor, the Damen Tavern, opened in October 2017 by the owners of Lincoln Park Irish bars Halligan and Hook and Ladder. Damen Tavern has featured a series of painted-on-black-brick murals, including promotions for booze like Reyka vodka. Late summer brought a Chicago-devoted apparition, which resembles a word cloud, but on inspection, shares the entirety of 285 words of Carl Sandburg’s brief but emblematic 1914 poem, “Chicago,” including “They tell me you are wicked and I believe them, for I have seen your painted women under the gas lamps luring the farm boys,” bold alongside a modern saloon. These words are singled out for all-caps treatment in the mural: STORMY HUSKY BRAWLING CITY OF BIG SHOULDERS MY CITY PROUD ALIVE STRONG VIVID BAREHEADED SHOVELING PLANNING BUILDING BREAKING REBUILDING DESTINY HEART PEOPLE LAUGHING PROUD. (Ray Pride)
Damen Tavern, 701 N. Damen, 312.796.3191, damentavern.com
Best of Chicago 2018
