Wicker Park and Bucktown

Creative types still cluster in Bucktown and Wicker Park, a hip, somewhat grungy enclave of side-by-side neighborhoods. These days, you'll find young families, twentysomething working types, and university students thrown into the mix along with the immigrant communities that have lived here for generations. Within this Petri dish of gentrification, there are also cutting-edge galleries, coffeehouses, nightclubs, and a bizarre bazaar of shops. A sign of the changing times: chains like American Apparel and Urban Outfitters have opened outposts in this neighborhood, once considered a haven from corporate retail. Still, this definitely ain't where you'll find anything akin to your momma's suburban strip malls.