An Impressive 20-Foot Skylight Transforms a Jumbled Chicago Home

Defining interior spaces often becomes a matter of perspective. When Eric and Nicolette Nijensohn began searching for a family home in Chicago in 2011, they expected to end up in a multistory space on a narrow urban site—imagine a series of stacked levels like in the film The Royal Tenenbaums. But when they stumbled upon the perfect spot in the Buena Park neighborhood—a sleepy stretch of historic homes within walking distance of Wrigley Field—they found themselves dealing with different conditions altogether.