The Tiny Lounge

My friend was taking me to some favorite and quirky places in Chicago, including “The Tiny Lounge.”

Located at 1814 W. Addison, it was indeed tiny—holding a maximum of 50 people, it was long but very narrow. Here is a description from an online site called chibarproject.com: “Walk through the door and you will see a long wooden bar to your right and three black leather crescent booths to your left, similar to those found at nearby Ivan’s Lounge. Tiny’s is one of the few places with a free coat rack as you walk in, and local artwork adorns the walls. Beyond the bar and through the black velvet drapes is the tiny, wood-paneled back room with its comfortable crimson couch and ottoman-like chairs. White votive candles proliferate. Because most people don’t know it’s even there, I recommend grabbing the couch in the back room and staring into the flickering candle until the world disappears.”

When we visited, I had my Holga camera with me—a little plastic gem with a rangefinder viewer and a plastic lens. It was loaded with B&W film, and after processing, I selected this image and scanned it with my Nikon Coolscan unit, but in the RGB color space. I exaggerated the color crossovers that I got, pushed them a little, and tweaked the text in the signage to highlight it more until I achieved this result.

Alas, The Tiny Lounge was demolished in 2006 as part of the Addison Brown Line station expansion project to make way for a stairway leading down from the El platform to Patterson and Lincoln and for an elevator for handicapped accessibility. Before that happened, we went back and presented owner Colleen Flaherty with an 8” x 10” print of the image, which she seemed delighted to receive.

Raise a glass to the original Tiny Lounge, at either of its successors, The Tiny Tavern at Navy Pier or The Tiny Tapp & Cafe at The Chicago Riverwalk.

This image was awarded Third Place in The Visual Arts Alliance 40th Juried Open Exhibition in July 2024.