Change is one thing everyone can count on. It can challenge us, foster growth, and even spark cultural, social, and environmental transformations.
That makes it a fitting theme for the 10th annual Chicago Architecture Biennial. Entitled SHIFT: Architecture in Times of Radical Change, this year’s event explores how architecture reflects societal shifts during periods of profound change.
The citywide event, the continent’s largest architecture and design exhibition, will feature more than 70 projects from architects, artists, and designers from around the world. All events and exhibits are free and open to the public through the Biennial (Sept. 19, 2025 – Feb. 28, 2026).
This year’s edition is anchored at four main locations: the Chicago Cultural Center, the Graham Foundation, the Stony Island Arts Bank, and the Griffin Museum of Science and Industry, with supplemental programming throughout the city. If you aren’t sure where to get started, here are just a few of the many fascinating exhibits and events to jumpstart your journey.
Inhabit, Outhabit and The Ordinary Extra at the Chicago Cultural Center
Sept. 19, 2025 – Feb. 28, 2026
In the heart of downtown, the historic Chicago Cultural Center serves as a starting point for the Biennial. This is where you’ll find the Inhabit, Outhabitexhibit, featuring more than 30 collective housing projects from refugee camps to experimental urban developments. Together, they investigate different forms of sustainable housing and how people can share space with each other.
You may find joy in a windowsill or intrigue in other mundane objects at the second exhibit housed in the Chicago Cultural Center. The Ordinary Extra installation aims to demonstrate how layering, texture, and a little imagination can reveal beauty in our everyday architecture.
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Melting Solids at Stony Island Arts Bank
Sept. 19 – Nov. 30, 2025
We often think of architecture as fixed, rigid, and enduring. However, this exhibit at Stony Island Arts Bank invites viewers to think differently. Bringing together the work of five architects and artists, this installation showcases architecture that is impermanent, adaptive, and rooted in cultural memory. The Stony Island Arts Bank is a former condemned bank building that has been restored and transformed into a community museum and archive.
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Museum of Oil –The American Rooms, 2019, courtesy of Chicago Architecture Biennial /
Kendall McCaughtry
Fragmented Manifestos at the Graham Foundation
Sept. 19, 2025 – Feb. 28, 2026
Combining moments from architectural history that emerged from periods of immense change, Fragmented Manifestos highlights a constellation of work that reflects the technological, political, and cultural transformations of their respective eras. The exhibit is held inside the Graham Foundation’s historic Madlener House, a Prairie-style mansion in the city’s Gold Coast neighborhood.
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TRACES outside the Griffin Museum of Science and Industry
Sept. 19, 2025 – Feb. 28, 2026
Built on the site of the 1893 World Fair, Chicago’s Jackson Park is home to the Griffin Museum of Science and Industry. TRACES is a temporary installation of 10,000 dry-stacked bricks that will outline the former locations of the fair’s great buildings, inviting reflection on the theatricality and scale of the historic event’s architecture. Bricks from the exhibit will be repurposed after the Biennial, leaving only the memory of the experience.
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Yasmin Spiro: Cornerstone at Hyde Park Art Center
April 19 – Nov. 2, 2025
Drawing inspiration from her native country of Jamaica, artist Yasmin Spiro’s exhibition at the Hyde Park Art Center explores how vernacular architecture and construction techniques can impact our relationship to the built and natural landscapes around us. The Hyde Park Art Center is an acclaimed hub for contemporary art on the city’s culturally rich South Side.
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A New View of 20th and 21st Century Architecture and Design at the Art Institute of Chicago
Jan. 1 – Dec. 31, 2025
Chicago is world-renowned for its architecture, and this exhibition at the Art Institute of Chicago showcases the city’s long history of design innovation. The galleries will feature creative and visionary plans from an array of architects and designers that reimagine cities, housing, furniture, and more. The exhibit celebrates both important historical pieces and more contemporary works.
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Living in the Shade: Open Space and Public Housing at the National Public Housing Museum
July 23 – Nov. 9, 2025
How do shared spaces like large lawns, tenant gardens, shaded seating areas, and public art impact life in public housing communities? This is the central idea explored in the latest exhibit at the National Public Housing Museum, which features large-scale architectural models, site plans, renderings, photographs, and testimonials from people living in these communities. This new museum is located within one of the last remaining buildings of the historic Jane Addams Homes.
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Iñigo Manglano-Ovalle: A Want for Nothing at the DePaul Art Museum
Sept. 11 – Feb. 8, 2026
Blurring the line between beauty and functionality, artist Iñigo Manglano-Ovalle’s work interrogates the “usefulness” of art in society through pieces that resemble everyday objects but serve no practical purpose or pieces that may seem impractical but reveal a surprising use, encouraging viewers to feel comfortable with ambiguity. The DePaul Art Museum is located on the university campus in the heart of Lincoln Park.
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Explore more exhibits and events during the 2025/2026 Chicago Architecture Biennial.
