The heart of our mission at VoyageChicago is to find the amazing souls that breathe life into our city. In the recent weeks we’ve had the privilege to connect with some of the Chicago’s finest artists, creatives, entrepreneurs and rabble rousers and we can’t begin to express how impressed we are with our city’s incredibly deep talent pool. Check out rising stars from the North West side below.
Cynthia Kanner
My path to 2018 is a history I really like looking back upon…my professional journey began in Washington, D.C., where I was born actually, when I was hired by The World Affairs Council of Washington, D.C. I was fortunate to secure an internship my senior year at Duke University. Read more>>
Courtney Williams
I’ve always been drawing. I remember always having had little sketchbooks on me as a kid. I didn’t explore painting very much until high school when I was introduced in various art classes. From then on, I started using primarily watercolor and ink, and it’s sort of taken off from then. Read more>>
JP Dadivas and Kat Filipinas
I was around 12 years old and I would just go around recording anything from family parties to just everyday life. This passion would later be reinforced by film classes taken in high school and later realized in college. After gaining experience telling narratives through short films. Read more>>
Jennifer Cupani
Newcastle Dance Supply was created to utilize my background to help provide young dancers and professionals with what they need to supplement their training and work with high quality and beautiful dancewear, shoes and other accouterments. Read more>>
Kate Burton
Mostly straight people who love the mission of my business, but the few queer people that came in told me that they had never felt comfortable going to a tailor before because they felt that they would be judged. It was at that point, and every time someone comes in saying that they finally feel comfortable in their clothing, that I know I found my calling and that this shop will be around for a very long time. Read more>>
Leigh Kelsey
I have loved doodling since I was a child. In 2005, one of my roommates was a crafter and she started selling her goods. It was inspiring to see and I decided to launch my own business Rhymes with Twee (an easy way for people to remember how to pronounce my name). I purchased a Japanese children’s screen printing toy called the Riso Print Gocco and used it to print my first greeting cards and a line of fill-in-the-blank calling cards which I called “card me cards”. These were designed to be filled in and handed out to new people as an easy way to make new friends. I sold these at the 2005 Renegade Craft Fair; back when it was in Wicker Park. Read More>>
Jesse Hora
I think what sets us apart is that we actually have discernible, hard skills that inform everything we do. We are artists at heart. We grew up drawing, painting, crafting, printing, winning Santa Clause drawing competitions and building towers out of toothpicks & marshmallows. Using our hands and making art is the reason we chose design in the first place. Read more>>
