Chicago Moves to Landmark Bryn Mawr Historic District

Edgewater’s Bryn Mawr corridor has weathered years of pandemic closures and Red Line construction headaches. Now the city is moving to give it something lasting: landmark status.

The Commission on Chicago Landmarks is considering granting preliminary landmark status to the Bryn Mawr Historic District, which stretches along Bryn Mawr Avenue from Broadway to Sheridan Road. The district includes some of the neighborhood’s most recognizable addresses, among them the Edgewater Beach Apartments at 5555 N. Sheridan Road, the Belle Shore Apartment Hotel at 5550 N. Kenmore Ave., and the Manor House. The Edgewater Beach Apartments is already listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

The commission, which operates as an arm of the Department of Planning and Development, will take up the matter at a hearing on April 2.

Ald. Leni Manaa-Hoppenworth (48th), whose ward office sits within the district, has been pushing the effort forward. “We want Bryn Mawr to be a destination, and this is one other way for us to distinguish ourselves,” she said. She also pointed to the corridor’s persistent struggles with underinvestment. “It’s the heart of Edgewater, and it’s just seen not enough investment,” she said.

For a building to qualify for landmark status under city guidelines, it must meet at least two of the commission’s seven criteria. But the path from preliminary recommendation to official designation is not a short one. After a commission vote, the process includes a report from the Department of Planning and Development, consultation with building owners, a public hearing, and a final commission vote. From there, the designation moves to the City Council’s Committee on Zoning before reaching a full City Council vote.

The district’s inclusion on the National Register of Historic Places offers some recognition, but Chicago landmark status carries different and more direct benefits. Locally landmarked properties become eligible for funding programs like Adopt A Landmark, which provides grants for restoration work. That kind of financial support could matter significantly for a corridor still trying to regain momentum.

The Bryn Mawr business district took a serious hit during the COVID-19 pandemic, losing businesses and foot traffic along with the rest of the city. It then absorbed years of disruption tied to the rebuilding of the Red Line’s north branch. The Bryn Mawr station shut down entirely during construction, and the surrounding blocks dealt with noise, detours, and reduced commercial activity for more than four years. The renovated station finally reopened last summer, and new businesses have been arriving on the corridor in the months since.

John Holden, president of the Edgewater Historical Society, called the city’s move an important development, particularly given rising pressure on older urban buildings from redevelopment interests.

For residents and business owners who stayed through those difficult years, the landmark push represents more than a bureaucratic designation. It signals that the city sees the corridor as worth protecting and investing in, not just developing around.

Edgewater has always held a particular place in the city’s architectural and cultural history. The Edgewater Beach Apartments, with its distinctive pink exterior visible from the lakefront, stands as one of Chicago’s most recognizable surviving examples of that older residential grandeur. The buildings in and around the Bryn Mawr district carry the kind of physical history that shapes how a neighborhood understands itself.

Manaa-Hoppenworth’s office being located within the district is no small detail. She has a daily view of what the corridor is and what it still needs. Her push for landmark status reflects a straightforward bet: that formal recognition, combined with access to restoration funding, will help attract the kind of investment that makes a neighborhood corridor function for the people who live and work there.

The April 2 hearing marks only the beginning of what figures to be a long process. But for a stretch of Edgewater that has been waiting a long time for a break, it is a meaningful first step.