The Newberry Mansion
The Newberry Mansion, a High Victorian Gothic style building designed by Prussian-born architect Frederick H. Waescher, was built with funds from the estate of wealthy Chicago businessman and philanthropist Walter Loomis Newberry.
It began as a school for young ladies with their sights set on Vassar, then became a self-proclaimed first-class family hotel with a farm-to-table board, a century before eating local was fashionable. Next it served as Chicago’s first music conservatory to put up out-of-state students in dormitories. And it spent decades as a transient hotel in the neighborhood’s seedy, bohemian days during the mid-to-late 20th century before being turned into condos in 1980. From elegant receptions and intellectual pursuits to carousing and crime to family life, these walls have seen it all.
This site is dedicated to exploring the history of the Newberry Mansion and the streets around it.
