Give the Gift of Chicago: Experiences and Treats for Everyone Who Loves This City

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Last updated: November 2026

If you want to give the gift of Chicago this year, you’ve got two good options: an experience here in the city, or a box of something that tastes like it. Both work on the person who moved away and misses it, the friend who has never been and keeps saying “someday,” and the Chicagoan who already loves it and would rather have a night at ZooLights than another sweater.

You might have caught this segment on Matt in the Morning on NBC Chicago. This is the full version, with the dates, prices and transit directions that don’t fit in four minutes of TV. One note before we start: Chicago Children’s Museum, Shedd Aquarium, Lincoln Park Zoo, Brookfield Zoo, 360 CHICAGO, Chicago Botanic Garden, Navy Pier, The Great Big Game Show, Woodfield Mall, Garrett Popcorn and Frango each donated prizes for the giveaway I’m running on this site. I wasn’t paid, I didn’t get free admission, and I’d have included every one of them anyway.

Here’s the thinking behind this list. A Chicago gift should do one of two things: get someone into the city, or bring a piece of the city to them. The experience gifts below are the ones that work as a printed ticket in a card, because they have a date, a place, and a reason to show up. The food gifts are the two that Chicagoans actually send each other, not the ones the airport kiosk pushes.

I’ve grouped everything by who’s opening the gift. Skip to the section that fits, and check the dates twice. Most of these run on fixed schedules, and ZooLights and Lightscape both close on nights you’d assume they’re open.

How to Get in the Holiday Spirit in Chicago

Start with lights. Chicago has two big walk-through light events, one in the city and one in the northern suburbs, and they’re different enough that plenty of families do both. ZooLights is the one to gift if you want a sure thing on a budget; Lightscape is the one to gift if the person has already done ZooLights a dozen times.

ZooLights at Lincoln Park Zoo, in the Lincoln Park neighborhood at 2001 N. Clark St., runs Nov. 20, 2026, through Jan. 3, 2027, from 4:30 to 9 p.m. It’s closed Tuesdays except Dec. 22 and 29, and closed Thanksgiving, Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. Fixed-date tickets are $7 to $12 depending on the night. A $20 Flexible Admission ticket works any night of the season, which is the one to put in a card, because it means the weather and the sellouts are somebody else’s problem. Four Mondays are free with advance registration: Nov. 23 and 30, Dec. 7 and 14. Those free tickets are released a week ahead at 11 a.m., and everyone needs one, infants included.

Lightscape at the Chicago Botanic Garden in Glencoe runs Nov. 13, 2026, through Jan. 3, 2027, on select nights. Pricing moves with demand. Weekend and holiday-week nights cost more, and the Garden says several quieter weeknights are under $30. This year’s trail is mostly new, with three installations making their U.S. debut, and the Winter Cathedral and Fire Garden are back. There are Jingle Jam Family Nights with Santa and 21+ nights with cocktails, so check the calendar before you buy for someone else.

Pro tip: If the person you’re gifting lives in Chicago, buy the ZooLights Flexible Admission and the Lightscape ticket on a weeknight. If they’re visiting for a weekend, buy fixed dates now. Both events sell out popular nights, and a gift ticket that can’t be used is worse than no ticket.

Navy Pier handles the free part of the season. Winter Fireworks start Saturday, Nov. 21, at 8:30 p.m., right after the Magnificent Mile Lights Festival, then run every Saturday at 8 p.m. through Dec. 26 and again on New Year’s Eve. The Coast Guard’s Christmas Tree Ship, the cutter Mackinaw, docks at the Pier on Saturday, Dec. 5, with trees unloading from 8:30 a.m. and a dedication at 10. None of that costs anything, which makes it a good add-on to a gift that does.

Things to Do With the Whole Family

ZooLights is the family default for a reason, and the add-ons are where the gift gets good. The Ferris wheel gives you the whole zoo lit up from above, there’s a light tunnel on the Main Mall, a narrated light show on the South Lawn, Santa in the Pepper Family Wildlife Center, and ice carvers and Victorian carolers on select nights. Rides and attractions are $4.50 each, or $9 for the Ferris wheel and Gorilla Trek. You can buy attraction ticket packages online ahead of time, which means a gift card with ZooLights admission and ride tickets tucked in is a complete evening, no wallet required at the gate.

On Sunday, Dec. 6, the Chris White Trio plays its jazz tribute to A Charlie Brown Christmas at the zoo, with a matinee that includes Santa, Snoopy, a hot chocolate and cookie bar, and ZooLights entry. That’s the single best “whole family, one ticket” gift on this list if you have kids between about 4 and 10. New Year’s Eve at ZooLights runs hourly countdowns, so a family with a 7 p.m. bedtime still gets to count down.

Winter WonderFest at Navy Pier turns Festival Hall into an indoor carnival from Nov. 27 through Jan. 3, 2027, with rides and ice skating, and it’s the answer for the day the lake wind makes outdoor lights miserable. Santa photos at the Pier start Nov. 23. The Centennial Wheel runs daily through the season except Thanksgiving and Christmas Day, and the gondolas are heated.

Gifts for Little Kids

For kids under about 8, the gift is Chicago Children’s Museum, and the timing matters. The museum sits at the entrance to Navy Pier at 700 E. Grand Ave. in Streeterville. Its Castle exhibit is dressed for winter from Nov. 11 through Jan. 10, 2027: blue and silver, snowy owls to find, snowball and sword play, and a pretend winter bakery.

Two program weeks make a visit worth scheduling around. Thanksgiving Week of Play runs Nov. 23 through 29 with the Fantastical Fall Forest, a ribbon forest where kids make a leaf to add to the trees, from 10 a.m. to noon and 1 to 3 p.m. Winter Weeks of Play run Dec. 21 through Jan. 3. On Dec. 21 to 24, Dec. 31 and Jan. 1 there’s a Winter Celebration Dance Party at 11:15 a.m. On Dec. 26 to 30 and Jan. 2 to 3, kids craft a sparkly ice crown in the castle, 10 to noon and 1 to 3. Regular hours are 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Monday, Wednesday and Thursday and 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Friday through Sunday, with the museum closed Tuesdays, so confirm the day you’re gifting on the museum’s calendar before you put a date on the card. The museum sells gift tickets online.

Shedd Aquarium, at 1200 S. DuSable Lake Shore Drive on the Museum Campus, is the other little-kid gift, and I’d give it as a gift membership rather than a day ticket. A membership means free admission all year, advance ticket reservations, 40% off 4-D shows and 10% off in the store, and it’s the gift that turns a one-time trip into a Tuesday-after-preschool habit. Shedd memberships can be bought online, by phone at 312-692-3284, or by mail, and a membership runs through the end of the month you buy it, one year out.

Romantic Chicago Gifts

The best date gift on this list is a 360 CHICAGO ticket timed for dusk. The observation deck is on the 94th floor at 875 N. Michigan Ave., the former John Hancock building, in Streeterville. It’s open 9 a.m. to 11 p.m. daily with last entry an hour before close, and general admission includes CloudBar, so you can get a drink and stay as long as you want. Adult tickets start at $30, youth at $20, and kids under 3 are free, with the price varying by day and time. Go in the last hour of daylight and you get the city in three versions: afternoon, sunset, and lit up.

For a grown-up night with lights, Adults Night Out at ZooLights is Thursday, Dec. 10, 6:30 p.m., tickets from $20. It’s 21 and over, with a DJ, s’mores, animal chats, caricatures, and unlimited rides on the carousel and Ferris wheel. Lightscape’s 21+ nights do the same thing with cocktails and mocktails for sale along the trail. And if you’re thinking about a proposal, Lincoln Park Zoo does holiday proposal packages. Email groupsales@lpzoo.org and don’t tell anyone I sent you.

Gifts for a First-Time Visitor

A first-timer needs the view and needs the lakefront, so give them both. 360 CHICAGO covers the view. A Navy Pier Pier Passport covers the lakefront: the $65 membership comes with two Centennial Wheel tickets, parking discounts, Navy Pier swag and rotating discounts at Pier businesses, and it’s good for a full year from the day it’s bought. For someone who has never been, it also does something subtler. It gives them a reason to come back.

If the visit lines up with the season, add a fixed-date ZooLights ticket. It’s the one Chicago holiday thing that out-of-towners have usually heard of, it’s a $7 to $12 ticket, and the zoo itself is free every day of the year, which still surprises people.

Gifts to Send Someone Who Misses Chicago

There are two correct answers here, and every Chicagoan knows them: Garrett popcorn and Frango mints. Everything else is a T-shirt.

Garrett Popcorn Shops has been making popcorn in Chicago since 1949. The thing to send is Garrett Mix, the caramel-and-cheddar combination that customers invented by asking for a third bag to dump the other two into. Garrett ships nationwide from its Chicago kitchen, and the popcorn is made the day it ships. The Classic tin is the standard gift size. If you’re in the city, the downtown shops will fill a tin while you wait, and there are shops at O’Hare and Midway for the last-minute version.

Frango mints are the Marshall Field’s chocolate, and they’re still sold where they’ve always been sold: Macy’s on State Street, 111 N. State St. in the Loop, and on macys.com. The one-pound box holds 45 pieces, and the classic is the milk mint. The brand itself came home in 2017, when Garrett’s parent company bought it from Macy’s, so the two gifts on this list are now Chicago-owned cousins. Send the green box to anyone who ever stood in line for the Walnut Room at Christmas. They’ll know.

For the ex-Chicagoan who still comes back a few times a year, the memberships above work too. A Shedd membership or a Pier Passport says “we expect to see you,” which is the actual message.

Getting There Without a Car

Nearly everything on this list is easier by transit than by parking garage, and you should say so in the card.

• Lincoln Park Zoo (ZooLights): the #151 Sheridan bus stops at the zoo’s east side, and the #22 Clark and #36 Broadway buses stop near the west entrance. From the Brown or Purple Line, Armitage is about a 15-minute walk east.
• Navy Pier (Children’s Museum, Winter WonderFest, Pier Passport): CTA buses #29, #65, #66 and the #124 Navy Pier Express all stop at the Pier, and the #124 runs from Union Station and Ogilvie, which makes it the Metra rider’s route. There’s no L stop at the Pier.
• Shedd Aquarium: the #146 bus from State Street in the Loop stops on the Museum Campus. From the Roosevelt Red, Orange or Green Line station, it’s about a 20-minute walk east.
• 360 CHICAGO: Red Line to Chicago, then walk east on Chicago Avenue to Michigan Avenue, about 10 minutes.
• Chicago Botanic Garden (Lightscape): Metra’s Union Pacific North Line from Ogilvie to Braeside, then a 0.8-mile walk on the North Branch Trail. You’re walking in the dark on Lightscape nights, so check the return schedule before you go. Nonmembers pay for parking if they drive.
• Macy’s on State Street (Frango): the Washington/Wabash L station on the Brown, Orange, Pink, Purple and Green lines is a block east, and the Red Line’s Lake and Monroe stops are underneath State Street itself.

Frequently Asked Questions

Can you buy ZooLights tickets as a gift without picking a date?

Yes. The $20 Flexible Admission ticket works on any night of the 2026-27 season, Nov. 20 through Jan. 3. Fixed-date tickets are cheaper, $7 to $12, but they’re locked to one night.

Is ZooLights really free on Mondays?

On four of them: Nov. 23 and 30, Dec. 7 and 14. You still need a ticket for every person, including babies, and the free tickets go up one week ahead at 11 a.m. Rides, food and the Ferris wheel still cost extra.

Does Garrett Popcorn ship outside Chicago?

Yes, nationwide, from its Chicago kitchen, and the popcorn is made on the day it ships. Order early in December. Holiday lead times get long.

Which of these works for someone with sensory sensitivities?

ZooLights holds a Sensory-Friendly Night on Tuesday, Nov. 24, with moving lights slowed or held static and music turned down. Tickets are $7. Lightscape also lists a sensory-friendly night on its calendar; check the Garden’s schedule for the date.

If you give one thing off this list, make it a ticket with a date on it. The box of Frango gets eaten by New Year’s; the night at the zoo gets talked about in July. And if the person you’re gifting is coming into town for it, send them my guide to Little Chicago Guide and tell them to start with the transit section. The L is part of the gift.

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