The aftermath of the protests after the killing of George Floyd was not predictable. One could´ve assumed that highly emotional and political protests would bring along some uncontrollable dynamics of large moving crowds, and some collateral damage is probably calculated into events like this. While tensions flared up dramatically in Minneapolis, it was a different case in Chicago. Most protests were peaceful and crowds moved along streets in different parts of the city, not paying attention to the infrastructure of businesses on the way. Occasional outbursts of rising tempers left a shattered window here and there.

After the actual protests subsided on the first day, a new momentum picked up when businesses were deliberately vandalized and looted. These seemed to have been organized coups by groups of people who broke away from the anonymous protection of the protest groups, or as in other cases, openly drove up to certain shops with U-Haul vans and trailers in order to get great amounts of loot away effectively.

In the following days business owners were quick to board up their shops as a protective and precautionary measure in anticipation of looters to come after more protests had been announced. It was the hour of carpenters. They boarded up shopwindows and showcases in a variety of standards, depending on the amount of money people were willing to spend. Some individual shop owners could be seen working on their own, while the big chains brought in professional firms with heavy tools.

All of a sudden facades of buildings and storefronts in downtown Chicago got a different look. One also started moving differently along streets as the distraction of consumption was gone. Here are some photos from a walk around town.

Boarding up in action

In some cases small hinged doors were installed

No more coffee in this cafe

No, we´re not! The "open" sign is still signalling the policy related to the

Corona crisis - obsolete in this case

This is one of the places where looters shoved a burning shopping

cart into a shop. The soot stains can still be seen above.

Make yourself known while you´re at it

After a few days some businesses carefully started re-opening 

The good old nail-it-up-technique

Chicago Galleries