Shopping with Your Kids - Chicago with Kids - page 234

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refer you to Frommer's Chicago ), the overall area is a little like N ew York's Fifth Avenue
and Beverly Hills's Rodeo Drive rolled into one. Whether your passion is Bulgari jewelry,
Prada suits, or S alvatore Ferragamo footwear, you'll find it on this str etch of concr ete.
This is the city's liveliest corridor: The sidewalks are packed in the summer and on week-
ends with hordes of shoppers strolling up and down the avenue and pausing to enjoy the
many str eet per formers who enliv en this strip . H olidays on M ichigan A venue ar e a
magical time, as the city knocks itself out with lights and music and a spectacular Christ-
mas tree in the John Hancock Center plaza.
And don't think you're seeing everything by walking down the street: Michigan Ave-
nue is home to several indoor, high-rise malls, where plenty more boutiques and restau-
rants are tucked away. The face of M ichigan Avenue has been dramatically transformed
since the first mall—Water Tower Place—went up on the north end of the street. Several
more malls and large-scale, hotel-r etail pr ojects hav e follo wed. As the r ush for squar e
footage escalated (beginning in the late 1980s), many city r esidents lamented the meta-
morphosis of the str eet from a rather intimate and graceful pr omenade of 1920s build-
ings to a glitzy cany on of r etail theater. Eager to get in on the action, national and
international retailers—from middle-brow discounters to highbrow couture purveyors—
have continued to look for fr ont-row locations to squeeze into.
For the ultimate M ag Mile shopping adventure, start at one end of N orth Michigan
Avenue and work your way to the other. This section lists some of the best-kno wn kid-
related shops on the avenue and on nearby side streets.
North Michigan Avenue & the Magnificent Malls
North Michigan Avenue is lined with shops and includes four of the afor ementioned
vertical malls—each a major shopping destination in its o wn right. These indoor malls
offer shopping on multiple levels.
WATER TOWER PLACE Chicago's first—and still busiest—v ertical mall is Water
Tower Place, a block-size, marble-sheathed building at 835 N. M ichigan Ave. ( & 312/
440-3165; www .shopWaterTower.com), betw een East P earson and East Chestnut
streets. The mall's seven floors contain about 100 stores and house a dozen different cafes
and restaurants. Notably for families, the mall is no w home to American Girl Place,
which occupies two floors of Water Tower Place, and has a gr ound floor entrance (y ou
can enter thr ough the mall's main lobb y, but to get the full effect, use the doors of the
store's main entrance on Chestnut St.).
Water Tower was the first big indoor mall to open do wntown (in 1975), and its glass
elevators and shiny gold trim gav e the place a glamor ous air. These days, after some
recent renovations, the spiffed-up mall r emains popular. Water Tower is a magnet for
suburban teenagers (just like y our mall back home!) and can get quite cr owded during
the summer tourist season. Most of its stores are part of national chains (Gap, Victoria's
Secret, and the like); ho wever, a fe w notable shops make it wor th a stop, including hip
young designs from the British store French Connection (fifth floor; & 312/932-9460 )
and wearable women's clothing at Eileen Fisher (second floor; & 312/943-9190 ). The
department store anchoring the mall is Macy's (floors one to eight; & 312/335-7700;
p. 243). The second anchor is American Girl Place (floors one and two; & 877/247-
5223; p . 251). O ne of the mall 's best featur es is the inno vative foodlife food cour t,
which contains mor e than a doz en stations, fr om burgers and pizza to M exican and
Moroccan, plus the Mity Nice Grill ( & 312/335-4745 ), a faux-1940s diner. Two movie
complexes contain eight screens. Of note to kids are Accent Chicago ( & 312/944-1354 ),

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