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Englewood
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Neighborhood Promotion and Neighborhood Map Thumbnail
Explore This Neighborhood
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Englewood continued...
Two blocks from that post office, on the corner of 63rd and Halsted Streets, all candlelight and white tablecloths, is Sikia Restaurant. From the restaurant's south-facing windows can be seen another positive -- the still-new campus of Kennedy-King College
The restaurant, and the sparkling community college campus of which it is a part, are enough to make one think anything is possible in Englewood.
"A lot of people, when you say 'Englewood,' they say 'oh,' " says Danielle Clemons, a former Kennedy-King student who manages the restaurant, essentially a working lab for the school's Washburne Culinary Institute. "Those people haven't been in this area in years. It's changed."
There has been change. Much new housing lines 63rd Street between the college and the Dan Ryan Expressway to the east. A small shopping center, anchored by a Walgreens, opened across from the campus in 2007 -- same year as the school -- and serves both the community and students. It is Englewood's first retail construction in decades.
A coordinated activism by business and civic leaders under the Teamwork Englewood umbrella -- a new concept for a community that, historically, has been factionalized -- was launched in 2003. There are plans and projections for parks, housing, retail and entertainment . . .
The future for Englewood depends on forces that can't be predicted. Today's reality is Kennedy-King College -- and part of that reality is Sikia.
Opened in 2008, the mood is refined African and the dinner menu celebrates the world: pan-roasted salmon Chermoula, seasonings courtesy of North Africa; jerk chicken from the Caribbean; shrimp and grits from the South Carolina low country; West African goat stew; Senegalese peanut soup -- all prepared and served by students.
There's brunch on Sundays, jazz on Friday nights, and monthly student jam sessions.
With Sikia, the college, plus some new retail and new housing, today's Englewood offers visitors a chance to see a neighborhood in the midst of a comeback.
And for visitors who believe in ghosts, it offers a chance to mail a postcard from a very interesting post office . . .
For more information about Englewood, please contact Teamwork Englewood at 773.602.4507.
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