When you come on a private architecture walk with Off the Map Chicago, you get something you simply cannot get on a large public tour: time and space, and your very own private walking tour. One where you can take as much time as you like to consider a unique detail in a great Chicago building. Where you have time to take as many photographs as you like. And something more: me, a long-time architecture docent and architecture historian and life-long Chicago resident. I'll take you into spaces you can never see on a large public tour, and we'll do more than just tour unique architecure; we'll have a conversation about it. You can have your choice of private architecture walking tours, and if you like, I can design an architecture walk just for you. For example, a complete history of the skyscraper, from early to modern. Or, a walk up and down Michigan Avenue, with stops at some of the most unique architecture in the world. Join Off the Map for a unique private architectural walk you'll remember forever.

There were more than 100 buildings created during Frank Lloyd Wright's Prairie period. But none speak the poetry of the Prairie as eloquently and powerfully as the Robie House. Completed in 1910, Frank Lloyd Wright's masterpiece, the Robie House, still stands out as the cornerstone of modern architecture. It is a rich symphony of details, a culminating expression of Wright's five influences, all put together in rich harmony to create a shelter that is stunningly modern in the 21st century. 174 art glass windows and doors allow natural light and shadow to play in the interior spaces, while the exterior design is Frank Lloyd Wright's homage to the Age of the Machine. The Robie House is a must-visit in Chicago. And Off the Map Chicago can take you to the Robie House, and take you on a driving excursion to Oak Park and River Forest where Frank Lloyd Wright and his Prairie associates created the greatest concentration of Prairie houses anywhere.

Frank Lloyd Wright came to Chicago in 1887 when he was 20 years old to become an architect. He quickly found work in the office of Joseph Lyman Silsbee, but soon left to work under the great Louis Sullivan at Adler & Sullivan. At the age of 22, Frank Lloyd Wright found himself in charge of the drafting room on one of the biggest projects in the firm's history: the Auditorium Building. Wright wrote, "I was a good pencil in my Master's hand,' his 'leiber meister' being Sullivan. While working for Adler & Sullivan, the newly-married Wright built a shingle-style cottage in the suburb of Oak Park. He would add on to the original house several times, eventually incorporating his own studio in 1898. Sullivan terminated Frank Lloyd Wright in 1893 for moonlighting, a violation of his contract. For Wright, it was just the beginning. Building on Sullivan's concept of organic architecture and ornamentation, combining his love of Japanese art and architecture, music, geometry and nature, Wright would develop the Prairie style by 1901. Residential and commercial buildings would pour out of Frank Lloyd Wright's Oak Park Studio for a decade, including the Darwin Martin house and Larkin Administration building in Buffalo, Unity Temple in Oak Park, scores of revolutionary Prairie homes, and the landmark Robie House in 1909. Wright left Oak Park for Europe in 1909, and while he returned to Chicago a year later, his work in the Prairie style essentially ended, and the next chapter of his 72 year career would begin at the home he built near Madison Wisconsin, Taliesin, in 1911. Off the Map Chicago can take you on a unique private tour of Frank Lloyd Wright's Prairie houses, a combination walking and driving tour of Oak Park and River Forest. Off the Map Chicago can also take you up Chicago's North Shore, to show you Wright's first Prairie house, his only constructed bridge, and many other examples of unique architecture, on your very own unique private tour.

The Farnsworth House is one of the greatest houses of the twentieth century. Designed for Dr Edith Farnsworth by Mies van der Rohe, it is composed of steel, glass, wood and stone. Here, in this weekend retreat set on the banks of the Fox River in gentle farmland, the great modernist Mies van der Rohe turns to the ancient shelter materials of stone and wood, and places them in perfect harmony with the materials of the new urban city: steel and glass. It's almost ironic that such a tiny unique country home becomes the model for the steel and glass architecture that composes great modern cities, from Chicago to Tokyo to Berlin. When a visitor happens upon the Farnsworth House, Mies van der Rohe's stunning architecture creation sits passively alongside the flowing river. The Farnsworth House is truly meant to be discovered, and one of the memorable ways to do that is on a unique private tour with Off the Map Chicago. On this unique tour, with just you and your guests, you will experience every inch of the Farnsworth House's stunning architecture in complete privacy, with no other visitors. Experience Mies van der Rohe's Farnsworth House, one of the greatest examples of architecture--in Chicago and the world--on a private tour with Off the Map Chicago.

Mies van der Rohe was one of the greatest architects of the twentieth century. The son of a stone mason, Mies van der Rohe achieved early prominence in his native Germany after working in the Berlin office of Peter Behrens. It was there that a young Mies van der Rohe saw the Wasmuth Portfolio containing the early Prairie work of Chicago architecture genius Frank Lloyd Wright. Among the drawings Mies was astonished by was the rendering of the Robie House. Mies van der Rohe continued his modern design work at the newly-formed Bauhaus, of which he later became director. But as the Nazis gained power, the stunningly modern work of the Bauhaus was deemed 'degenerate,' and with many colleagues, Mies van der Rohe was forced to flee Germany. At the invitation of the Armour Institute, Mies van der Rohe came to Chicago in 1938 and became the head of what was renamed the Illinois Institute of Technology, or IIT. In Chicago, Mies became the leader of the modern movement, creating some of the earliest--and still renowned--steel and glass skyscrapers, most notably 860-880 Lake Shore Drive Apartments, a unique example of Chicago architecture. At the same time these Chicago skyscrapers were being built, Mies van der Rohe was designing and building the Farnsworth House, a stunning weekend house in farm country west of Chicago. The Farnsworth House is still considered one of the greatest examples of modern architecture in the world. Mies van der Rohe continued his architectural practice in Chicago, designing great examples of modern architecture all over the world. Mies van der Rohe died in Chicago in 1969, and is buried in Graceland Cemetery on Chicago's north side. You can visit the Farnsworth House by Mies van der Rohe on a unique private tour with Off the Map Chicago. On this unique tour, with just you and your guests, you will experience every inch of the Farnsworth House's stunning architecture in complete privacy, with no other visitors.

Did you know that Mies van der Rohe actually sued Dr Edith Farnsworth because she refused to pay him when her amazing weekend house was completed? And that, despite its international fame as one of the greatest buildings of our time, she never felt comfortable living there?