Guess the Restaurant #203

Here's one I don't think I would have known a year ago. This clue is from the building's exterior and is visible from car or bus on a major street in Chicago.

Maybe it will be more recognizable now.

Skylark

Yep, the spot with the tots. The building has been a tavern for a century (with some gaps), originally as a tied house associated with Chicago's Birk Bros. You can still see traces of Birk's "Superb" logo in the entryway.





Skylark
2149 S Halsted St
Chicago
312-948-5275

OK, this is probably not the place to go off on this tangent, but I'm going to do it anyway. I wish more restaurants and bars had bird houses, like water bowls for dogs on the sidewalk. I first started thinking about this when I came across this tiki bar bird house on the facade of a private residence in my neighborhood. I had no idea there was such a thing as restaurant- and bar-themed aviary abodes!



(I guess it's actually more of a bird feeder than a house since it doesn't offer much shelter, but still...)

The one I spotted remains my favorite, but a simple Google search yields at least two other tiki bar bird feeders.

Then, there are bird restaurants like this one that feature "live entertainment, happy hour, satellite TV and more." (FWIW, if you Google "bird restaurant" today, Blackbird is the first result. Way to go, SEO!)



(Click on the picture to buy a Wagon Wheel Restaurant for yourself or fellow bird lover.)

Anyway, I think the simple wooden bird house suits the Skylark very well. I'll look for it now whenever I'm on the Halsted bus, bike lane or stopping for a drink.

happy_stomach wrote:OK, this is probably not the place to go off on this tangent, but I'm going to do it anyway. I wish more restaurants and bars had bird houses, like water bowls for dogs on the sidewalk.

I wish more bars had birds. Think how pleasant it would be to have a drink at a bar with no televisions, no music, only people talking, glasses clinking and birds chirping. An old Loop bar, Ladner Brothers, was known for their potent rum-and-peach-based Cohasset Punch as well as for having birdcages hanging behind the bar. Here's an old postcard from my collection.

A Line O' Type or Two in the Chicago Daily Tribune of 21 August 1934 wrote:There until prohibition became effective the Cohasset reigned. Going into the place one heard canaries in a row of cages singing sweetly. As Cohasset followed Cohasset, the canary notes became sweeter and sweeter, almost no limit to their sweetness.

I regret never visiting Ladner's though I had my chances (it reopened after Prohibition and closed in 1986). I'm not sure if they still had the birds in their later years.

Going even farther off topic, and over to dog bowls, here's one you ought to appreciate.



Bonjour Bakery used to offer their canine friends a choice of the usual Milk-Bones or simple bone-shaped sugar cookies.

Ladner Brothers (closed)
207 W Madison St
Chicago
DEarborn 2-0139

Bonjour Bakery
1550 E 55th St
Chicago
773-241-5300

Rene G wrote:

happy_stomach wrote:OK, this is probably not the place to go off on this tangent, but I'm going to do it anyway. I wish more restaurants and bars had bird houses, like water bowls for dogs on the sidewalk.

I wish more bars had birds. Think how pleasant it would be to have a drink at a bar with no televisions, no music, only people talking, glasses clinking and birds chirping.

I'm guessing not an homage to Ladner Brothers, but at least one bar in Chicago today has birds, though of the peeling decal kind. I think chirping from real birds would inspire hush and wonder; I don't know that this bar's owners would feel the same.

h-s:

The birds on light blue at the Violet Hour were a pleasant surprise on a cold winter's night. (This did morph into another GTR, right? )

-Mary

The GP wrote:The birds on light blue at the Violet Hour were a pleasant surprise on a cold winter's night.

The birds have grown on me (which probably means TVH facade will change soon). For some reason, TVH birds initially made me think of that story from Pliny, about the Greek painter Zeuxis, who painted grapes so realistically that real birds flew in and pecked at the image. I'm still waiting for someone to illustrate a story from Pliny on TVH, because I'm a dork like that.

I was disappointed that the bird decals were peeling somewhat, but I think I now like that aspect. I like the aesthetic of peeling playbills, e.g. à la Double Door across the street, so the peeling birds are kind of a funny twist on that.

happy_stomach wrote:I'm guessing not an homage to Ladner Brothers, but at least one bar in Chicago today has birds, though of the peeling decal kind. I think chirping from real birds would inspire hush and wonder; I don't know that this bar's owners would feel the same.

I see what you did there

Khaopaat wrote:

happy_stomach wrote:I'm guessing not an homage to Ladner Brothers, but at least one bar in Chicago today has birds, though of the peeling decal kind. I think chirping from real birds would inspire hush and wonder; I don't know that this bar's owners would feel the same.

I see what you did there

Actually, I don't care much for rum-based drinks.

I was thinking this:

Bernard DeVoto in "The Hour," first published in 1948 wrote:This is the violet hour, the hour of hush and wonder, when the affections glow again and valor is reborn, when the shadows deepen magically along the edge of the forest and we believe that, if we watch carefully, at any moment we may see the unicorn.

I never thought about it, but it is funny that the base spirit for the Hush & Wonder is Matusalem since DeVoto abhorred rum.