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This elaborate terra cotta house stands at 5652 North Virginia, where Hollywood runs into the North Shore Channel. Oversized windows and elaborate ornamentation differentiate it from other nearby houses in the Peterson Park neighborhood (part of the West Ridge community area). It is prominently visible from the North Shore Channel Trail and adjacent parks, with its central tower commanding attention.

Unfortunately, I can learn little about the house. The Chicago Historic Resources Survey, which rates the house orange (potentially significant), doesn't fully identify the architect, and almost certainly reflects the wrong date of construction. The architect is listed simply as "Klafter." There seem to have been two architects working in Chicago around the same time by that last name, David Saul Klafter and Joseph H. Klafter. I have found relatively little about either, including whether they were related. The database also indicates that the house was built in 1938, which seems unlikely for a number of reasons. Tax records reflect a much more plausible date of construction, 1928.

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detail

Built 1940

windows filled with steel

windows filled with steel