Embracing the Chicago winter
- 3 days ago
- 4 min read
Updated: 2 days ago
One of the things I'd been meaning to do ever since the winter of 2025 is go to frozen Lake Michigan. Winters in Chicago are interesting. You can barely feel your face as cold winds rush through the gridded, waffle-like streets of the Loop, and most sane people choose to stay in, enjoy the view of the snow from the comfort of their homes.
A year ago, I too was cozied up in my warm apartment to get out. The only time I made an outdoor excursion was in late February for a Beers & Cameras meet-up, when much of the ice on the Chicago river had already started to melt.
Although I carried my small point-and-shoot camera everywhere I went as per usual, I was craving the feeling of something more planned. Something more intentional.
I decided to go check out the frozen lake on a cold Saturday morning. This was the weekend with the worst case of the wind chills in Chicago: it was colder than the Arctic Circle for a brief moment. Luckily for me, two of my friends, Heer and Sunil decided to join me on this outing to the lake.
This was no joke, and I checked in on my photography buddies on the Beers and Cameras Discord group for advice just to make sure I don't freeze off from hypothermia: "double everything up, hats, gloves, socks". I took heed, and layered up with two pairs of pants, a turtleneck sweater, a hoodie on top of that and a jacket to follow.
As an added precaution, I got myself some hand and toe warmers from the drug store. Just open the plastic cover and shake the little bag to get the exothermic reaction inside started, and the bag would stay warm for hours.
For gear, I decided to keep it simple, one camera and one camera only - the Canon EOS 70D. The tactile controls with big buttons meant that I could change settings with gloves on. Secondly, this is still the largest format digital camera I own. If I am in for a penny (planning out a photowalk in advance), I am in for a pound (taking it on the best camera I can). Since batteries don't work too well in the cold, I charged all the spare batteries the night before and decided to toss them in a jacket pocket with a hand warmer bag — a tip I learned from YouTube.
Seeing ice form over the beach sand is an interesting experience: the dichotomy of sand, which I closely associate with heat and summer against the ice formed from the winter.
Everything was frozen: the water, the sand, the concrete on the man-made shoreline, even the lake had a thick layer of slick ice formed on top of it. Thanks to the warmers, I still had sensation in my fingers and could still fidget with the dials on my camera. Still, there were moments I felt my feet slipping, any moment I could fall over and plop myself into the frozen lake along with my camera equipment with me. I guessed the mass it would take to break through the thick ice on the lake and whether I'd cross that threshold, took a deep breath, and quietly thanked my friends for being around in case I'd fall.
Some areas of the lake had ice pancakes, which form when turbulent waves collide big chunks of ice, slowly chiseling down the sharp edges to rounded circles. It was a cloudy, gloomy day and black and white called to me.
I had some fun with the cropping and tried out an XPan crop (64:25 aspect ratio inspired by the Hasselblad XPan/Fuji TX1)
I am a fan of the horizontal-ness of this photo, and the folks walking to the structure on the left add some interest.
The next day, I would visit the Adler Planetarium Parking with another friend to get a different view of the city skyline, only to find the whole city wrapped up in a snowstorm.
Behind the tree is a snow-covered Lake Michigan. Barely visible in the background is the St. Regis building, standing tall at about 370 m. On a warm summer day, I'd be listening to the docent on an Architectural Boat Tour of Chicago explaining how the Jeanne Gang designed building was the tallest building designed by a woman when it was constructed, or how it deals with high speed winds through its mass dampers and "blow-through" floors that are hollow just to let wind through. In this weather, though, I couldn't reminisce the warmth, my brain too was occupied with the thoughts of carefully plodding through the snow and making sure I am not slipping and falling face first on asphalt.
Sanity returned, and we decided to go back indoors and check the "Design at 329" open house instead.
As I wrap up this piece, I am enjoying the warmest Chicago has been in a few months, with temperatures in the 60ºs F (15º C), it's practically summer and the ice everywhere is starting to defrost. The townsfolk have returned from their hibernation and are out and about.