Fancy Trimmings

I like older buildings. There's always some fancy trimming, to give it some personality, that you don't see on the new sleek glass and steel structures. And sometimes they have names, too. Someone was so confident that the business was going to be there forever that he/she had the name permanently applied to the building.

This building is in the West Town neighborhood. I couldn't find anything about this particular business using my old standby Google. I did find some sort of archive-type document that made several references to Chicago and also stated that "Mr. M. Houlberg, who is a painter by profession, was elected president" of the Dania Society (which seems to be a Danish fellowship organization) in December, 1900. Perhaps the two were the same.

It is also interesting (possibly ironic, though the correct usage of that word has confused me since the Alanis Morissette song) that the current business in this building is a salon of sorts. So M. Houlberg was right: the building is still in the painting and decorating business.