Looptopia 2008

Well I have heard that there was MUUUCH improvement compared to last year, I didn’t go that time. The weather was HORRIBLE and I don’t see why they don’t move it farther back in the year. What can be expected for an outdoor event in the end of April?! They ran out of bracelets to stay past midnight, which sucked. You even found the people who worked the booths bargaining with you to pay them for some bracelets they had taken and hid. Now I’m venting about the bad things, but the event was enjoyable with a lot of entertainment and actually brought life to the Loop! It could get big, but needs a bit more organization, especially when the website is down the NIGHT OF!

Shoulda been called «Craptopia.»
*Note — I know the above name change is pretty lame, but Looptopia was so bad it doesn’t even deserve the time wasted to come up with something better, like «Floptopia,» for example. Actually, that one was pretty good.

I work downtown so I headed over to Looptopia right after work. The first thing we did was get wristbands and guide maps. The lady at the booth told us that there were only 8,000 wristbands to go around. Almost 3 million residents of the city, not including the burbs, and only 8,000 wristbands. That is probably why some of you didn’t get them :(Sorry.
Some of the stuff was pretty cool. The fire dancers were great. There was a girl who hula-​ed a ring of fire. I saw one of the dancers afterward with char and cuts all over her face and arms. All in the name of public entertainment. Awesome.
The art show on the river walk was pretty cool but had way too many artists and it was far too crowded. Should this event be held again… please… fewer artists, more space to stand back and appreciate the ones that are there.
Other stuff going on in the street… well… it was different. There was the ghost performers (those folks all in white). The girl in the dress dropping petals was pretty cool-​slash-​creepy. If you didn’t catch it she had a clear bag full of naked, crawling, crying baby toys at her feet. There was a girl constructing a mess of metal wire and string in the window at Macy’s. I’m not sure what she was making. Then there were clowns in another window, painted red, stacking books to the ceiling. Kind of cool.
The violinist at Blick was really amazing. Probably one of my favorite parts of the night. Plus the space is so cool. Above the store. Just a big open area. Very lofty and such. I’m not sure if they regularly use the area for shows — if they do I would love to go back.
It all fell apart at the Palmer House for me. There were two things there I wanted to see there: Russian on the Side and Broadway in Chicago Cabaret. It was too crowded. The attendees were already largely drunk and didn’t really pay attention to the performers so you couldn’t so much hear the performances. There were no attempts at getting people to be polite to the performers and people there who actually wanted to see these things, only meager efforts to clear paths that the «fire marshall» ordered. There were not enough bar tenders. I stood by the bar for 15 minutes and didn’t get so much as looked at. My boyfriend’s feet kept getting trampled. It was a noisy, unpleasant mess of an event that should have been held at a reasonable venue for something like this. Millennium Park, Daley Plaza, not the lobby of a ritzy hotel.
All in all I think it went off better than last year, for me, anyway. But by the time midnight rolled around I found myself irate and anxious to get the heck out of the loop.
If Looptopia 2009 occurs they need: more outdoor events, signage throughout the loop to let people know where things are happening, better descriptions of events, a website that is worth having, food vendors, at least some closed streets, better events later in the night.
Edit: For any minds that are curious as to why I took a wrist band and left at midnight… I expected to stay all night. My night was cut short because event managers were doing a poor job of managing the crowds and I got irritated.

Well, all of the hope I had for the city getting it right this year was pissed on, and I’m not talking about the rain.
The night started off well enough. Caught some fire dancers. Had some drinks. Checked out some acrobats. Lots of cool circus tricks. Nice.
The Looptopia masterminds decided that this year, in order to keep order, they would have more late night events and better spread them over the loop. The events would require a bracelet to get into, that was free, so long as you presented an ID stating that you were of age, and therefore not affected by curfew.
Not a terrible idea. Not a good one (How about stamps? They don’t run out. Oh no, I’m spoiling the surprise).
That’s right. They ran out. At ten. At ten o’clock, no one could get bracelets. I would have tried to buy them off of someone, but NO ONE had them. Really, I think I saw two all night, in crowds and crowds of people.
Yet another testy scene, courtesy of Looptopia, at the info booth at Daley Plaza. On one side you’ve got bitter, irritated Looptopia employees who are out of bracelets, on the other, bitter, irritated Chicagoans who trekked it down to the loop only to be told to go back home.
Ugh. Strike two, Chicago.

This is billed as an up all night festival… a magical metropolis with endless events fit for the most modern cities –Madrid, Paris. but obviously not Chicago.
We arrived at midnight, which should of left us with six hours of theatre, art, dancing, and comedy… but of course, THEY RAN OUT OF WRISTBANDS!!!
This year it was necessary to have a wristband to enter any looptopia event after midnight. And of course, there were a limited amount of wristbands…
WHAT…THA…FUCK. We went all the way downtown, excited about this event, and were not allowed in any building. Even millennium park was closed. And security on every block just made us feel unwelcome.
That was horrible. If this is a taste of how you’ll handle the olympics… Chicago, you fail.