Learn: Architecture and its influence. The opening theme presentation, on Thursday, June 10, belongs to celebrated journalist and writer Erik Larson, author of the bestselling The Devil in the White City: Murder, Magic, and Madness at the Fair That Changed America, about the making of the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago and the nation’s first serial killer/media celebrity. Set in 1889, Larson’s tale follows two men connected to Chicago’s quest to host the world's fair: Daniel Hudson Burnham, architect of New York City’s Flatiron Building and Washington, D.C.’s Union Station, and Henry H. Holmes, pharmacist and, by 1896, infamous serial murderer. Burnham struggles with meager budgets and incredible bad luck (tornadoes, rain, fires), and Holmes uses the rising national fascination with the fair to lure prey, eventually marrying three times and killing all three wives, and as many as two dozen other people.

Larson has written three other books: Isaac's Storm, Lethal Passage, and The Naked Consumer. He served as a staff writer for The Wall Street Journal, and his work has appeared in a number of national magazines, including Harper's, The New Yorker, Time, and Atlantic Monthly.

Celebrate: Architecture and its inspiration. On Friday, June 11, renowned architect Helmut Jahn, FAIA, will address the celebration of architecture and the dreams it inspires. Jahn has earned a reputation on the cutting edge of progressive architecture. His buildings have significantly influenced world architecture and have been recognized globally for design innovation, vitality, and integrity. As president/CEO of Murphy/Jahn, he has dramatically changed the face of Chicago. Jahn lectures and juries for various universities, professional societies, and civic and commercial groups.

Born in Germany, Jahn graduated from the Technische Hochschule in Munich. He pursued graduate studies at the Illinois Institute of Technology and then worked at C.F. Murphy Associates as project architect under Gene Summers, designing the new McCormick Place. In 1976, his first major high-rise building in Chicago, Xerox Centre, won critical acclaim. Jahn has garnered 10 AIA national Honor Awards, 46 Distinguished Building Awards from AIA local chapters, and numerous other honors. He has taught at the University of Illinois Chicago Campus and has served as the Elliot Noyes Professor of Architectural Design at Harvard University, Davenport Visiting Professor of Architectural Design at Yale University, and thesis professor at Illinois Institute of Technology.

Dream: Architecture and its potential. On Saturday, June 12, author, analyst, and award-winning commentator Virginia Postrel will discuss social trends and their economic implications, including the recent focus on aesthetics and their fundamental importance to our personal, social, and economic lives. She will address how the look and feel of things has become the new—and required—ingredient in creating economic value, how aesthetics affect businesses, and how to turn this broadening trend to competitive advantage and economic security.

Postrel has authored two previous books. The Substance of Style: How the Rise of Aesthetic Value Is Remaking Commerce, Culture, and Consciousness (selected by The New York Times as one of the “notable books” of 2003) illustrates how innovation and design have become principal factors in all aspects of economic life. The Future and Its Enemies: The Growing Conflict Over Creativity, Enterprise, and Progress redefines debate about the future by focusing on conflicting views of progress rather than on the traditional struggle between left and right. She also writes the “Economic Scene” column for The New York Times business section and a column on the built environment for D Magazine, the Dallas city magazine.

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