Chicago Theater Marquee
Matted prints are a great option if you want to choose your own frame. They come in two sizes: 8x10" and 16x20". These are standard frame sizes. You may easily find these frames at any retail shop.
One thing you need to know about frames. Those cheap, thin frames with swivel locks and kickstands will not work. They are designed for simple photo prints or diplomas. The matted print will be too thick for these frames. Find a decent frame that is at least 1" deep.
I make every print myself in my studio. No photo lab. No outsourcing. Every print is handmade.
I print on metallic photo paper. It is the perfect paper for black-and-white architectural photography. It adds a distinctive pearlescent, three-dimensional sheen to the prints.
For mats, I use 4-ply Crescent Arctic White matboard. It is off-white, traditional, and restrained. Not bright white, which is too bright and overwhelms the image. This matboard is the archival standard for conservation framing.
I mount prints on 3/16" Bainbridge foamcore. It is acid-free, clay-coated, rigid, and lightweight. It is ideal for archival print mounting.
The print is permanently sealed between the mat and the mounting board. It is intentional. A hinge mount leaves the print too loose. Also, it causes the print to bulge in the middle. A sealed mount keeps the print flat and tight. If you need a hinge mount or a matboard backing instead of foamcore, let me know.
Every print is signed and numbered (limited edition) on the mat in pencil. On the back, you will find a Certificate of Authenticity with all the details about the print and my contact information.
The actual photo print size for an 8x10” matted print is 6x6” with a 1” mat border, and for a 16x20” print, it is 12x12” with a 2” mat border. Since the photo prints are square and the matted prints are rectangular, the bottom mat border for 8x10” prints is 2” and for 16x20” prints it is 6”.
A framed print is a finished artwork. It is not just the image, it is a physical object that looks intentional, lasts decades, and feels complete.
The frame color, finish, and moulding profile. Print mounting, matting, and glazing. These are all deliberate decisions that elevate the image to the level of an artwork, which you can hold in your hands, put on the wall, and live with every day.
I am a professional framer, and I enjoy making frames for my prints. I put a lot of thought into what frame to use for my prints. And how to mat, glaze, and mount them. And after decades of frame-making, I acquired the skills to make my prints perfect, exactly the way I want them. I am proud of what I do.
I make every print myself in my studio. No photo lab. No outsourcing. Every print is personally crafted by me.
I start with printing the image on one of my large-format printers. I use glossy metallic photo paper almost exclusively. It is the perfect paper for black-and-white architectural photography. It adds a distinctive pearlescent, three-dimensional sheen to the print. In a bright spotlight, it looks like a hologram.
For glazing, I seal the print with archival 5-mil PET film, featuring a unique, high-gloss “mirror-like” finish. There is only one manufacturer of this glazing, the price has doubled in recent years, and it is issued in small batches that sell out instantly. But the result is worth the trouble. It gives the print that elusive look of a silver gelatin print from a traditional darkroom, which was treated with a vintage photo heat glossier.
I have been a photographer all my life, and I still have my traditional darkroom. I can produce small silver gelatin prints, but large 44x44” prints are obviously out of reach with this old technology. I am happy that I can replicate that look and feel for the prints on any scale with the new technology I developed.
But this is my choice. If you prefer to use museum anti-reflective glass sheets, please let me know. I can do that, but the print prices may double (since glass is expensive), and delivery will be limited to Chicagoland only (because it is glass and it breaks in shipping).
I permanently mount my prints to white aluminum Dibond sheets using archival pressure-sensitive high-tack acrylic adhesive. It is not a simple process. I use a heavy 750-pound, 60” wide large-format laminator to complete this task. And it is the most dangerous and nerve-racking stage in the whole printmaking process. A tiny misalignment or a speck of debris on the surface can ruin the almost-finished print.
Finally, the print is ready for framing. Frame-making is where a woodworker meets an artist. It is a totally different set of skills, materials, instruments, and studio space.
Over the years, I developed relationships with several suppliers, and I get my frame moulding delivered by truck in large, long boxes. I believe my studio stocks more frame moulding than your average frame shop down the street.
I cut the moulding at 45 degrees using my mitre saw mounted on a custom 10-foot-long, heavy-duty feed bench I built long ago. I then join the cut sticks with a pneumatic v-nailer to make a square frame. Now the finishing touches: I sand and paint the frame corners to make them even and smooth.
Now it is time to put the print and the frame together. I secure the print inside the frame with flexible points and install the hanging wire (or D-rings for the large prints). I sign the print, attach the Certificate of Authenticity, and the print is ready.
Now, let’s talk about the frames I use for my prints. In my opinion, black-and-white photography does not require elaborate framing. A simple but sophisticated matte black frame is all that is needed. It is like the famous Audrey Hepburn’s "little black dress" designed by Hubert de Givenchy for the movie “Breakfast at Tiffany's”. It became iconic and has been described as "perhaps the most famous little black dress of all time." Accordingly, a “little black frame” is all that is needed for my prints.
For 16x16” prints, I use a simple 3/4” matte black frame, but it is 1 1/8” tall, which adds a touch of sophistication. It looks proportional to the relatively small size of the 16x16” print.
For 24x24” and 32x32” prints, I use the same style but a different profile frame. It is a wider 1 1/4" frame, which works for larger print sizes. And it is not as tall, only 7/8", which keeps the prints more grounded on the wall and less overpowering.
For large 44x44” prints, the frame design requires a totally different approach. Compared to smaller prints, the large print is a statement, it is a centerpiece of the room. It is a celebration, and the "little black dress" concept doesn’t work here. It needs a bit of exuberance. At the same time, it has to be constrained and confident. Like a Rolls-Royce brand identity.
To meet this challenge, I came up with a design of two different frames stacked together to form a unified frame for large prints.
The main frame is one of the most expensive frames I used, a custom frame made in Italy. It is 2” tall and 2” wide. It is a block, but it has a bevel on the inside. The beauty is in color, or to be precise, in color gradation. It is dark charcoal on the outer sides, which gradually transforms into a patina of silver leaf on the inner bevel through dark copper leaf on the front side. The beauty is that the gradation is not even, it looks painted by hand. It looks authentic, rustic, and antique.
The secondary frame is 1 1/8" wide, and it has a similar rustic, scratched, antique look, but it is pewter, which is almost the same color tonality as a photographic print it frames. It is more restrained than the primary frame and works well as a separator. Also, it has this chiseled, rough edge, another detail that adds authenticity to the whole frame.
I owe you a clarification about print sizes. The framed print sizes listed on my website (16x16”, 24x24”, 32x32”, and 44x44”) refer to the sizes of prints mounted on the board before framing. But with the frame included, the outside dimensions will be obviously larger. Also, because of the white space (1” or 2”) around the image to separate it from the frame, the actual print size is smaller. Here is the table with all dimensions:
| Framed Print | Outside Dimensions | White Space | Actual Print |
| 16x16” | 17x17” | 2" | 12x12" |
| 24x24” | 26x26" | 2" | 20x20" |
| 32x32" | 34x34" | 2" | 28x28" |
| 44x44" | 50x50" | 1" | 42x42" |
And here is the sample picture to explain the dimensions table:
These are the standard frame options I offer on my website. If you need a custom frame or print sizes, please reach out to me, and I would be happy to help.
A photo print is an option if you want to frame it yourself or have a frame shop you know and trust that will frame it for you.
A photo print is just a loose print that I will send to you in a shipping tube.
I make prints myself in my studio. I use glossy metallic photo paper almost exclusively. It is the perfect paper for black-and-white architectural photography. It adds a distinctive pearlescent, three-dimensional sheen to the print.
The prints are part of a limited edition. They are signed and numbered just below the print. The Certificate of Authenticity is enclosed with the print.
I offer on my website three different sizes for photo prints: 24x24”, 32x32”, and 44x44”. If you need a custom size print, please let me know.
Split print is a great option if you want to go big, really big, up to 10 feet or maybe even bigger. It is a great option for office lobbies and for any place with large, tall walls.
There is a little “behind-the-scenes” story about split prints. I used to offer 60x60” on my website, but it was a mixed bag. First of all, that was the maximum print size I could make because all the materials (backing board, glass, etc.) do not come in sizes bigger than 60x60”. That was the ceiling I could not break. Second, the shipping of these prints was a nightmare. They are big and had to be shipped freight in a crate (not cheap), and every second print I shipped came back damaged, with big holes poked by careless forklift drivers at the sorting facilities.
There had to be a solution to these problems. And I found it in split prints.
Split print is a square print divided into nine (3 by 3) or more smaller squares. 60x60” print becomes a set of nine 20x20” prints, and 120x120” print is a set of nine 40x40” prints. No frame is required for this print presentation, as these are acrylic prints.
Acrylic print is a print on metallic photo paper face-mounted on a 1/4” thick sheet of acrylic (with polished edges) and sandwiched for strength with a sheet of aluminum Dibond. It is a modern, contemporary way to present a photographic print.
Because these are relatively small prints, compared to the final result, they can be shipped on a palette, which eliminates the shipping damage I had before. Plus, they are not heavy, and one person can easily put them on a wall using cleat hangers.
The best practice is to leave about a 1/4" or 1/2" gap between the acrylic print tiles. Since the edges of the acrylic prints are polished and the acrylic is quite thick at 1/4", it creates an interesting optical effect like looking through water.
If you are in the Chicagoland area, I will get you in touch with an installation guy I trust and have used for years, and he will help you install the split print in your home or office.
Each fine art print is produced specifically for you.
From the moment your order is confirmed, your print enters a deliberate production process: printing, inspection, drying, mounting, framing, final quality control, and secure packaging for shipping. Nothing is rushed. Every step is completed in-house to ensure consistency, precision, and permanence.
For matted prints and 16x16” framed prints, the production takes 1-2 days. For large framed prints, it takes 3-4 days.
If you are in the Chicagoland area, the shipping takes only one day. Large prints, I will deliver personally. I will contact you to schedule a delivery date and time that is convenient for you.
If you are outside of Chicago, the shipping takes 2-3 days, standard UPS Ground transit time. Large prints will be shipped in a crate built out of lumber and plywood. To open it, you might need a screwdriver, there will be many screws to remove.
You will receive an email with shipping tracking information once your order is ready for shipping.
Because most of the work is handmade in the studio, minor variations are part of the object's character. The result is not a mass-produced item, but a permanent piece crafted with attention.
Split prints are the only option I outsource to the photo lab. But I guarantee the quality of the prints because they are made under my supervision. Delivery time for split prints is about two weeks, but it can vary depending on the scope of the project.
If you have a specific deadline, please contact me before placing your order, and I will do my best to accommodate your timeline without compromising quality.
Each work is produced to order and crafted individually in my studio. Because of this, my payment and refund policies reflect the seriousness and permanence of the object.
Payments
Full payment is required at the time of purchase to secure your edition and initiate production.
I accept major credit cards and other secure payment methods at checkout. Production begins once payment is received.
There is an option at the checkout for “Payment in Person”. Please use it if you want to reserve your print but need to customize it and are unsure of the exact price. I will email you the invoice, which you can safely pay on my website later.
Refunds and Returns
All prints are made to order. As such, sales are considered final.
I do not offer refunds for change of mind, incorrect size selection, or personal preference. I encourage collectors to review dimensions, framing options, and placement carefully before purchasing.
If your work arrives damaged in transit, please contact me within 48 hours of delivery with photographs of the packaging and the piece. I will repair or replace the work as appropriate.
In the rare event of a production defect, I will make it right.
Cancellations
Orders may be cancelled within 24 hours of purchase, provided production has not yet begun. After production starts, cancellations are not possible.
I stand behind the quality, craftsmanship, and permanence of every piece. If you have questions before purchasing, I am always available to assist.
ADDRESS: 175 North State Street, Chicago, IL
ARCHITECTS: Rapp & Rapp
YEAR BUILT: 1921
October 26, 1921. Take a time travel to this date.
The corner of State and Randolph. The smell of the city hits you first. Then the sound of “L” trains clanking overhead. The whole Loop is buzzing with the frantic pulse of commerce and ambition. State Street is a sensory assault, but today none of it matters. Every eye on the block is turned toward one thing.
Seven stories of cream-colored terra cotta rising from the sidewalk like a declaration. Above the glowing horizontal marquee, a massive vertical sign spells “CHICAGO” in a waterfall of incandescent bulbs. Not a building. A stake driven into the cultural heart of the Midwest.
This is a city making a statement. Chicago had finally traded its stockyard grit for imperial glamour, and it wanted you to see.
How did that come about? Let’s roll back another 14 years.
One day in 1907, young Barney Balaban took his mom, Gussie Mendeburskey, to a movie theater for the first time in her life. She was not impressed with the moving picture, but she saw a business opportunity.
She said: The customers pay before they even see what they're paying for! There has to be money in that business.
Think about that. A Jewish immigrant from Odesa, sitting in a cramped room with a flickering reel on a white wall, and what she sees is not a novelty. She sees a future. She sees an empire. She sees a palace that doesn't exist yet.
The rest is history. But history deserves the details.
Two years later, Barney rented the same place his mother had first visited. He and his brother-in-law, Sam Katz, went into the movie theater business. Together, they built a chain of cinemas across the Midwest. By the early 1920s, Balaban and Katz operated 125 theaters. They became millionaires.
They were not just businessmen. They were revolutionaries who understood something most people missed: cinema was a low-brow medium trapped in low-brow spaces. The movies themselves were magic. The experience of watching them was misery. Hard benches. Hot stale air. The smell of sweat and cheap beer. No respectable family would go.
So Balaban and Katz flipped the equation. They bet four million dollars, the equivalent of seventy million today, on a single radical idea: build a palace for the people, “put on the Ritz”, make moviegoing a class act.
They didn't just hire ushers. They employed a standing army of 125 uniformed men who underwent daily white-glove inspections. They pioneered the use of air conditioning, turning their theaters into cool sanctuaries during Chicago's brutal summers. They made the movies respectable. They made it an event. They gave a factory worker the right to feel like a king for the price of a nickel.
The Chicago Theatre was the jewel in their collection. The largest, most costly, and grandest of the super deluxe movie palaces of its time.
The architects were another pair of brothers: Cornelius and George Rapp. They specialized in what they called "architectural drama." Their style was not the atmospheric ceilings of fake clouds and painted stars favored by other movie palaces. It was something more ambitious: French Neo-Baroque. Total immersion. They wanted you to walk off State Street and into the Second French Empire.
The structure is seven stories tall and fills half a city block. The six-story triumphal arch on the facade is a direct echo of the Arc de Triomphe in Paris. But this was not mere imitation. The central arch-headed window borrows from Borromini's false-perspective window reveals at the Palazzo Barberini in Rome, creating an illusion of depth that makes the facade feel larger and more monumental than it actually is. The arch served a strategic purpose. It was a visual prologue, a portal that told you the gritty sidewalk was behind you now. You were stepping into a high-class.
Inside the arch, a circular stained-glass window blazes with color. The design is the coat of arms for the Balaban and Katz Company: two horses holding ribbons of 35mm film in their mouths, outlined by a border of film reels. Many local legends attribute this glass to Tiffany, but the exact fabricator remains unknown. A bit of mystery the city likes to keep alive.
Now look at the marquee. Behind the word "CHICAGO" sits a Y-shaped figure. It has a special name. It is the Chicago Municipal Device, symbolizing Wolf Point, the place where the Chicago River forks into its north and south branches. You can find it on many old Chicago buildings. Most people walk past it every day and never notice. It is a secret handshake for those who know the city.
The facade itself is a mountain of cream-colored terra cotta, fabricated by the Northwestern Terra Cotta Company. Seven stories of it. The material was chosen not for economy but for permanence, for the way it catches light. On a clear afternoon, it glows warm against the steel canyon of the Loop. At night, the incandescent bulbs take over. The 76-foot vertical sign spells “CHICAGO,” sparkling in light visible for blocks in every direction. That sign became the unofficial emblem of the city. Not the Water Tower. Not the Wrigley Building. The marquee on State Street.
On October 26, 1921, the Wonder Theatre of the World opened its doors. The scene was bedlam. Carl Sandburg reported that mounted police were needed just for crowd control. The crowds poured through the triumphal arch and into a building that Balaban and Katz had designed to make every one of them feel like royalty.
That was the paradox they understood. You give people grandeur, and they rise to meet it. You give them squalor, and they stay small. The building was not a theater. It was an argument about human dignity disguised as entertainment.
But every great story has a second-act collapse. For the Chicago Theatre, it arrived in the 1950s. By the 1970s, the decline was complete. The theater showed B-movies to half-empty houses. The screen was riddled with bullet holes. The rodent population frequently exceeded the number of paying customers. The locals called them the squeaky years.
On September 19, 1985, the doors closed. The wrecking ball seemed inevitable. A hundred years of immigrant ambition, architectural genius, and civic pride reduced to a demolition permit.
The rescue came in 1986. Architect Daniel Coffey led the restoration. He saved the adjacent Page Brothers Building, the Loop's only surviving post-fire cast-iron facade, to serve as the theater's financial engine. He replaced its decaying wooden framework with reinforced concrete while leaving the historic facade untouched.
The theater reopened in September 1986 with a gala by Frank Sinatra. Sinatra started a tradition that night of signing the backstage wall, a ritual followed by everyone from Dean Martin to Dolly Parton.
In 1996, the iconic vertical sign was replaced with a detail-for-detail replica. The original 1921 sign, built by the Thomas Cusack Company, was made of steel and porcelain enamel and weighed seven tons. The replica is aluminum and weighs half as much as the original. That relieved the structural stress inflicted on the building's bones. You look up at it today, and you see the same sign. You don't. You see an engineering feat of preservation disguised as nostalgia.
Walk down State Street from Randolph. Look up at those glowing letters. The glamorous light bulbs spelling out a single word: “CHICAGO”.
Behind that sign, behind the triumphal arch and the stained glass and the terra cotta and a century of bedlam and decay and resurrection, there is a simple story. A woman from Odesa walked into a small shanty theater in 1907. She watched the flickering picture. She watched the people pay before they knew what they were paying for. And she told her son, "This is an opportunity."
Gussie Mendeburskey raised her children to go into the world and build. They built a palace. They gave it to the people. A century later, it still stands.
That is what immigrants do. They arrive with nothing, and they build things that outlast them. The building is the proof. The marquee is the signature. The light still burns.
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