After 1915, new neighborhoods appeared across the prairie, and the Chicago-style bungalow came to both dominant and symbolize these areas.

The Chicago Bungalow is more than a housing style indigenous to the city it epitomizes Chicago’s work ethic and is representative of the material rewards of the American Dream chased by hundreds of thousands of immigrants who found themselves in the Midwest in the 20th century. A one and a half story single-family freestanding home, it included such modern conveniences as electricity, indoor plumbing, and central heat. Chicagoans built some 80,000 bungalows while another 20,000 were built in suburban Cook County. Nearly every ethnic and racial group in the area has made its way at one time or another to the Bungalow Belt, and one could even consider it the great equalizer of Chicago. In this book, the Chicago Architecture Foundation interprets both the design and the meaning of these homes, in keeping with CAF’s mission to raise awareness of Chicago’s rich architectural legacy.