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Chicago magazine delivers an authoritative guide to life in one of America's greatest cities. From insight into the best dining and shopping to interviews with fascinating figures shaping the future of Chicago, every issue is your source for living city smart.

Chicago Magazine

Life After COVID

Behind the Mask

Senator’s War Story • This is a really incredible telling of a horrific period of time [“The Day Tammy Duckworth’s Black Hawk Went Down,” April]. Proud to call Senator Duckworth my rep and awed by her strength then … and now, to tell her story in such vivid and visceral detail.

Best Plant Photos

Talking Points • This month’s essential Zoom happy hour chatter

Razed From Within • Illinois Republicans have lost their mojo, and it’s going to take a major recalibration to rebuild.

The Exelon Split • The company is severing ComEd and its other utilities from its power generation — the Brad and Angelina of Chicago corporate breakups. But how will this affect your bill?

Mobile Mansion • The grand manse at 400 Washington Road in Lake Forest is more than 120 years old — but it hasn’t always had that address.

Code Cures • Our wish list for the vaccine-wrangling whiz kid

Hunter-Gatherer • A staple for North Shore antique collectors relocates, eclectic POV intact.

Flash of Style • Ireland’s favorite purveyor of trends proves that State Street remains undefeated for one-stop shopping.

Ask a Budtender • Featuring Datrianna Meeks

Tinsley Mortimer • Socialite, reality TV star, boxing buff

Shake and Baked • Can working out on a vibrating plate make me as fit as a Russian cosmonaut?

Party Starters • Bartender Tim Williams’s high-end cocktail mixers go with whatever spirit you have on hand.

Spring Green

Bread Winners • Ready to give your sourdough starter a rest? Try the delicious loaves from these enterprising newcomers instead.

The Hot List • 10 places everyone’s talking about (in order of heat)

LaVelle and Me • On friendship, sneakers, and being a Black man with a plan in a city that too often eats its own

THE 10 BEST DAY-TRIP HIKES • FORGET THE TENT OR HOTEL ROOM. THESE DESTINATIONS OFFER A BUNDANT NATURAL BEAUTY, FROM CANYONS AND WATERFALLS TO PRAIRIES AND DUNES, WITHIN THREE HOURS OF THE CITY.

THE GREAT CHICAGO THRU-HIKE • IT MAY NOT BE AS LONG (OR AS MOUNTAINOUS) AS THE APPALACHIAN AND PACIFIC CREST TRAILS, BUT THE 200-MILE OUTERBELT ROUTE, ESTABLISHED IN 2018, IS THE CITY’S OWN BUCKET-LIST MEGAHIKE. HERE’S APLAN FOR TACKLING IT IN 19 DAYS.

WHAT COVID SURVIVORS KNOW • As these testimonies reveal, those who have had the most severe cases face profound and often lasting effects that experts are still struggling to understand.

Objects of Fascination • If you visit the Chicago History Museum, you will see only a fraction of its unparalleled collection. Among the hundreds of thousands of treasures carefully stashed away are these eight unique artifacts, each a window into a chapter of the city’s past.

Chicago’s Arts Scene Has a Race Problem • Canas even-year-old antiracism nonprofit solve it? The city’s biggest cultural institutions a re betting heavily that it can.

The Sound of Spectacle • On their new album, Damon Locks and Black Monument Ensemble channel a chaotic time of pandemic and protest through an energetic sonic collage.

George Wendt • The actor, 72, on causing a stir at a Sox game, cleaning out Royko’s office, and dancing in heels