At 9 a.m. on Saturday, Nov. 14, the doors of the historic Plumbers Union Hall open for an hour of early buying. That opens the West Loop's busiest shopping weekend of the fall. By 4 p.m. Sunday, a coal-fired kitchen on Morgan Street is lighting up for dinner. It opened in September and wasn't there for last year's holiday markets.
The weekend runs on two clocks. The holiday markets run on daytime hours and close at 5 or 7 p.m. The rooms that opened around them this fall start dinner at 4 p.m. Several of those rooms sit on the same blocks the markets do. That overlap makes the weekend worth planning.
Saturday Starts With a Charity Hour
The Randolph Street Market Festival's Holiday Market is back for Nov. 14–15 and again for Dec. 12–13, inside the Plumbers Union Hall. The festival's release gives the address as 1341 W. Randolph St. Its schedule page lists 1340 W. Washington. Both refer to the same hall.
The first hour is the one most shoppers skip. From 9 to 10 a.m. Saturday, Early Buy tickets cost $40, and 25% of ticket proceeds go to the Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Boys & Girls Club. General admission is $20, covers both days of the weekend, and children 12 and under always get in free.
| Market | Location | Saturday, Nov. 14 | Sunday, Nov. 15 | December repeat |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Randolph Street Holiday Market | Plumbers Union Hall, 1341 W. Randolph St. | 9–10 a.m. Early Buy; 10 a.m.–7 p.m. | 10 a.m.–5 p.m. | Dec. 12–13 |
| Chicago Artisan Market – Fulton Market | Morgan MFG, 401 N. Morgan St. | None | 11 a.m.–5 p.m. | Dec. 13 |
More than 125 vendors come in from across the country. The festival names a few of them: Eagles Eye Finds for vintage pennants and vinyl, KDR Curations for estate jewelry, Atlantic Poster for vintage rock posters, and This Old Book, a vintage bookstore. The new addition this year is an afternoon high tea service in the Market Bistro. It joins Sunflower Coffee Café, Maggie's Sweets, Kracl Artisanal Toffee and Fudgie Wudgie Fudge Company on the food side. The holiday bar pours peppermint martinis and cranberry mimosas, and a sports bar operates inside the hall. The schedule page also lists free onsite parking.
Saturday is the long day, running until 7 p.m., so the Randolph market can fill most of it by itself. Sunday is when the weekend spreads out.
Sunday Puts Two Markets on One Street Grid
On Sunday, Nov. 15, the Chicago Artisan Market sets up at Morgan MFG, 401 N. Morgan St., from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Its own calendar lists it as the Fulton Market edition. On Sunday both markets close at 5 p.m. The Randolph market opens at 10 and the Artisan Market at 11, so a shopper who starts on Randolph has an hour on their own before the second set of doors opens on Morgan.
The route between them is Morgan Street. It heads north from the Washington and Randolph blocks up toward Kinzie. This fall, that stretch and the blocks next to it got most of the neighborhood's new openings.
The Route North on Morgan
Taken in the order a shopper would reach them heading from Plumbers Union Hall toward Morgan MFG, these are the places on and near the route that opened since September:
- Set, 946 W. Randolph St. This Los Angeles activewear brand opened its West Loop flagship on Friday, Sept. 18, according to the Chicago Sun-Times. The shop carries merchandise sold only in Chicago, including patches and apparel. That makes it one of the few gift stops on the route you won't find at the brand's other stores.
- Berenjak, 113–125 N. Green St. The popular U.K. Persian restaurant opened inside Soho House on Friday, Oct. 2, and is open to the public. Eater Chicago points to black chickpea hummus, kababs, charcoal-grilled prawns and fish stew, along with cocktails that were previously poured only at its U.K. locations.
- Black Briar, 201 N. Morgan St. Chef Jimmy Papadopoulos and co-owner and operator Tim Anderson built this American restaurant around coal-fired cooking and seasonal takes on familiar dishes, as Chicago Food Magazine describes it. It opened Saturday, Sept. 26. Eater Chicago lists its hours as 4 to 10 p.m. daily.
- Victory & Vice, 318 N. Carpenter St. This sports bar opened Wednesday, Sept. 9, with 30 screens, a custom 17-by-10-foot viewing wall and a 1,000-square-foot patio. Eater Chicago singles out the bulgogi cheesesteak and the house pizza puff.
- Morgan MFG, 401 N. Morgan St. This is where the Artisan Market sets up.
Black Briar's address matters most for the timing. It sits on Morgan, between the two markets, and starts service at 4 p.m. That is an hour before both markets close on Sunday and three hours before the Randolph market wraps up on Saturday. On either day, a shopper can walk from the last vendor table to a dinner reservation without leaving Morgan Street.
Two Blocks Off the Route, Lunch and Free Art
The Sunday gap between the markets opening and the 4 p.m. dinner start belongs to two newcomers just east of Morgan.
Pizzeria Gabbo, at 834 W. Fulton Market, Suite 200, comes from Lettuce Entertain You executive partner Marc Jacobs and chef partner Andrew Ashmore. Lettuce announced an opening date of Thursday, Oct. 22. The menu is built around two styles: Chicago thin-and-crispy and New York crispy. Antipasti, pasta, gelato and Italian-inspired drinks round it out. Its posted schedule fits the market weekend well. Lunch runs daily from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m., and dinner runs 4 to 11 p.m. on Friday and Saturday and 4 to 10 p.m. Sunday through Thursday. Kitchens that close between lunch and dinner leave a gap in the middle of the afternoon. On paper, Gabbo's schedule runs straight through it.
Around the corner, Gertie's new Hub at 400 N. Peoria Ave. is running "82 Nights Only*," an art installation that changes every week. It opened Sept. 16 and runs through Dec. 13, and Gertie says its Hub exhibitions are free to the public, according to Block Club Chicago. Because the installation rotates weekly, the work on view on Nov. 15 won't be the work on view on the December market weekend. Its final day, Dec. 13, is also the date of the second Artisan Market at Morgan MFG.
Farther west on Kinzie, Switchyards opened a 24/7 work club at 1046 W. Kinzie St. on Monday, Oct. 26, as Block Club Chicago reported. It isn't a market-day stop. It does show that this fall's openings are spreading north toward Kinzie as well as along Randolph.
The Weekend, Laid Out
| Time | Saturday, Nov. 14 | Sunday, Nov. 15 |
|---|---|---|
| 9 a.m. | Early Buy at Plumbers Union Hall, $40 | None |
| 10 a.m. | Randolph market general admission opens | Randolph market opens |
| 11 a.m. | Pizzeria Gabbo lunch service begins | Artisan Market opens at Morgan MFG; Gabbo lunch begins |
| 4 p.m. | Black Briar and Gabbo dinner service begin | Black Briar and Gabbo dinner service begin |
| 5 p.m. | Randolph market still open | Both markets close |
| 7 p.m. | Randolph market closes | None |
December Runs the Same Map
The second market weekend follows the same pattern. The Randolph Street Holiday Market returns Dec. 12–13 and the Artisan Market returns to Morgan MFG on Dec. 13. By then the route may have more stops. Gibsons Tavern at 925 W. Fulton St. was slated by Block Club Chicago for this November. AMARA, a Balkan-inspired mezze restaurant going into the former Gino & Marty's space at 844 W. Randolph St., was described by Block Club Chicago as coming this fall. Jack Frost's holiday pop-up lists its Fulton Market home at 170 N. Green St. on its own site.
If you're wondering how this fall's run of openings on Morgan, Randolph and Fulton Market affects what a home near that corridor is worth, Ivona Kutermankiewicz and the IKGroup team at Jameson Sotheby's International Realty can go through the numbers with you. Request a private consultation and home valuation, and we'll prepare a confidential read on your property.
