Buena Park Historic District

Buena Park is a 326-acre neighborhood on Chicago's lakefront, about five and one-half miles north of downtown. Its roughly 400 buildings are mostly brick and mostly residential. Three- and four-story apartment buildings predominate, built chiefly between 1900 and 1920, with several larger apartment buildings and hotels added in the 1920s. Detached single-family houses, mainly dating from 1890 to 1915, form nearly continuous rows along Hutchinson Street, Hazel Street and a block of Junior Terrace. The area was listed for the quality and variety of its architecture, which shows the move from picturesque Queen Anne and Shingle Style designs to the more symmetrical Prairie School and Classical Revival styles. Many buildings use brick in white, buff, tan, red, orange, gray and gold. Curving streets, a diagonal Broadway, and clear edges at Graceland Cemetery, Lake Michigan, Montrose Avenue and Irving Park Road give the district a distinct identity, though tall modern apartment towers intrude in places.