🧱 Every Brick Has a Story — Quam & Baer Book Launch! 📖✨

🧱 Every Brick Has a Story — Quam & Baer Book Launch! 📖✨

🧱 Fire And Clay: Book Launch — Will Quam & Geoffrey Baer

Chicago's bricks have stories to tell — and now there's a whole book about them! 📖✨ Join architecture historian and photographer Will Quam and ten-time Emmy-winning WTTW host Geoffrey Baer as they celebrate the launch of Fire and Clay: How Brick Reveals the Hidden History of Chicago — the first book of its kind tracing how brick evolved from a simple fireproof material into a defining element of Chicago's architectural identity. Followed by a book signing! 🏛️

***

📍 LOGISTICS
📅 Tuesday, May 5, 2026
⏰ Doors open 5:30 PM | Lecture starts 6:00 PM | Event ends 8:00 PM
📍 Richard H. Driehaus Museum — Murphy Auditorium, 50 E. Erie St, Chicago
💰 General Admission: $20
🎟️ BUY TICKETS: https://driehausmuseum.org/programs/detail/fire-clay-book-launch

📚 Copies of Fire and Clay available for purchase at the event

🔗 Plan your visit: https://driehausmuseum.org/visit/plan-your-visit

***

🎙️ ABOUT THE SPEAKERS
🧱 Will Quam is an architecture historian and photographer who has shared Chicago's architecture and history since 2016 through his beloved project Brick of Chicago, leading award-winning walking tours for thousands across the city. His work has been featured by PBS Chicago, the Chicago Tribune, Block Club Chicago, and more. Find him at @brickofchicago on Instagram.

📺 Geoffrey Baer is a ten-time Emmy-winning writer, producer, and host who has been a fixture at WTTW for 30 years. Best known for his popular Chicago architecture and history specials — including Chicago by 'L', The Chicago River Tour, and Chicago on Vacation — he has also hosted the PBS primetime series 10 that Changed America and has been a Chicago Architecture Center docent since 1987.

***

🏛️ ABOUT THE DRIEHAUS MUSEUM & MURPHY AUDITORIUM
The Richard H. Driehaus Museum sits near the Magnificent Mile on the Near North Side and is dedicated to art, architecture, and design of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. It spans two historic Chicago landmark buildings — the Samuel M. Nickerson Mansion and the John B. Murphy Memorial Auditorium — presenting collections and exhibitions in a fully immersive setting. 💎

🏠 The Nickerson Mansion was designed by architect Edward J. Burling and completed in 1883 at a cost of $450,000 — reportedly the most expensive and elaborate private residence in Chicago at the time. Its interiors are replete with marble, onyx, carved exotic and domestic woods, glazed tiles, and stained glass, with original Nickerson-era furnishings alongside American and European decorative arts including works by Louis Comfort Tiffany. The mansion was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1976 and designated a Chicago landmark in 1977. In 2003, philanthropist Richard H. Driehaus acquired and restored it, opening the museum to the public in June 2008. ✨

Saved from demolition in 1919 by a group of concerned Chicagoans and later lovingly restored by philanthropist Richard H. Driehaus between 2003 and 2008, the museum reflects Driehaus's lifelong passion for historic preservation and classical design. It remains one of the most elegant and underappreciated cultural gems in Chicago. ✨

🏛️ The Murphy Auditorium was built between 1923 and 1926 by the American College of Surgeons and designed by renowned Chicago architects Benjamin Marshall and Charles E. Fox of Marshall and Fox.

Erected as a monument to Dr. John B. Murphy (1857–1916) — a founding member of the American College of Surgeons, pioneer of the appendectomy, and the surgeon who performed a life-saving operation on President Theodore Roosevelt in 1912 — the building is an architectural landmark in its own right. 🏥

Its iconic limestone exterior is Marshall's interpretation of the double-columned façade of the Chapelle Notre-Dame-de-Consolation (1900) in Paris. The entrance features a magnificent pair of cast bronze doors by Tiffany Studios, with six panels depicting historic figures in medicine: Aesculapius, Pasteur, Osler, Lister, McDowell, and Gorgas. Inside, a towering multicolored stained-glass window crowns the auditorium. 🎨

The Driehaus Museum acquired the Murphy Auditorium in 2022 and opened the expanded campus on June 21, 2024 — making tonight's event one of many exciting programs this remarkable space will host for years to come. 🎉

***

🍸 OPTIONAL DRINKS OR DINNER AFTER
Keep the night going and join us afterward at a nearby spot!
🍽️ Options shared closer to the date
💵 Please bring cash — some venues may not split checks

***

🚇 GETTING THERE 🚇 CTA: Google Maps or CTA Trip Planner: https://www.transitchicago.com/planatrip/ 🚗 Metered street parking on Erie & nearby streets 🅿️ Garages nearby — use SpotHero or ParkingWhiz for best rates
📱 Lost or running late? Call/text 312.835.4259

***

⚠️ NO-SHOW POLICY

• 😬 3 no-shows without updating your RSVP = 3-month event ban
• ⏰ Update your RSVP before the event start time; after that, message the host directly
• 👋 Check in with the host upon arrival
• 🚫 Continual no-shows = removal from the group