Blog

By Brent Hoffmann, Class of 2005

“I talked with a young Italian woman who was admiring the Chicago model in the lobby,” says Harvey Goldman, a VEV (Visitor Experience Volunteer). “She’d recently graduated as an architect

from a school in Bologna, Italy. It was her first time in Chicago, and she wanted to see our famous architecture. I said, ‘see that building with the wavy balconies near the river?’ She was thrilled to hear that Aqua was designed by a woman, Jeanne Gang, who heads up her own studio here in Chicago, where women play major roles in our built environment.”

Harvey’s been a VEV since 2013. He began volunteering in the CAF store, assisting the staff at the ticket booth by preparing listening devices, doing ticket counts, and issuing tour stickers. Now he

is an exhibit host in the lobby, interpreting the Chicago model to visitors and those waiting to join tours. (VEV’s exhibit hosts, who number more than 60, work shifts of 3-1/2 hours. To remain active, they’re required to serve at least 30 hours per year.) “Like the docents, we sign up for our assignments online.”

Inspired by FLW
“My older brother got me interested in architecture,” continues Harvey. “He showed me the buildings of Frank Lloyd Wright, including the Guggenheim Museum near Central Park. ” Harvey also was inspired by his wife, Sabra, who became a docent in 2010. They helped identify and enroll Gold Coast buildings for Open House Chicago. And Sabra won the Myra Gary Award in 2014 for Excellence in Tour Development.

In addition to service as an exhibit host, Harvey is on the volunteer steering committee as a team leader of exhibit hosts, and is on the nominating committee. He was a tour guide at the Cultural Center for the First Chicago Architecture Biennial. Like CAF docents, VEVs conduct training and enrichment programs. Harvey and the volunteers recently toured the Columbian Model and Exhibit Works on West Adams Street, where the Chicago model was made.

New York
As a child in Brooklyn, Harvey recalls seeing the closing of the last Dutch milk farm, with its horse-drawn milk wagons, next to the house in which he lived. He graduated with a BA from Queens College, New York. He then earned his MS in education with a major in psychology at City College of New York.

Before retiring and moving to Chicago in 2003, Harvey was Managing Director of the Jewish Communal Network Commission of the UJA-Federation of New York. “I distributed funding worldwide, and created the UJAF’s first accreditation process for domestic agencies receiving grants in the system,” he explains.

3D in Dubai
The Goldmans, who live at Newberry Plaza (Harvey is on the condo board), are avid travelers. In the last 10 years, they’ve visited 13 countries: Peru, Chile, Argentina, Uruguay, Japan, New Zealand, Australia, Egypt, China, Germany, Austria, Italy, and the Czech Republic. In January they will begin a month-long sea cruise that boards in the United Arab Emirates, then sails to south India, Sri Lanka, Thailand, and Singapore. “In Dubai, we want to see the world’s first 3D-printed building,” says Harvey. It was created by a 3D printer 20-ft. high, 40-ft. wide and 120-ft. long, according to Gulf News of May 23, 2016. Billed as the Office of the Future, the one-story building was printed, layer-by-layer, using a mix of concrete and other building materials.

Harvey and Sabra’s cruise will end in Tokyo, where they will visit their daughter and son-in-law.

“Wherever we’ve gone,” concludes Harvey, “we meet people who’ve been to Chicago and have seen the lobby model. They’re surprised, too, at how clean and walkable the city is, and at the friendliness of the people.”