Getting inspired and sunburnt at the Obama Presidential Center in Chicago 🥵🇺🇸

Four presidents, Michelle “The Closer” Obama, Oprah, Stevie Wonder, and another lesson in dignity

Howdy, fashion fans! Happy Juneteenth and welcome back to AND ANOTHER THING.

I’m writing this morning with a throbbing headache. Literally.

Yesterday’s weather report said it was going to rain in Chicago, where I was Karlie Kloss‘s date for the grand opening of the Obama Presidential Center. So I packed two umbrellas and zero sunscreen. It turned into a glorious, cloudless day—and my face got baked. My forehead is the color of a lobster roll.

I haven’t had a sunburn since college! What am I supposed to do here? Drink aloe? Mash an avocado onto my face? I need help.

Apart from the skin damage, yesterday was absolutely incredible.

You already know the set list. Jennifer Hudson sang the national anthem and “The Impossible Dream.” Christina Aguilera performed “What a Wonderful World.” John Legend, Common, and the Chicago Children’s Choir brought the crowd to its feet with “Glory.” Eddie Vedder performed alongside students from Guitars Over Guns. The Boss, Bruce Springsteen, whose pro-democracy bent has only intensified in recent concerts, delivered “Land of Hope and Dreams.” The whole thing ended with Stevie Wonder bringing down the house and everyone to their feet.

Of course, this is to be expected—music, dance, and having fun are tenets of the Obama legacy.

But even more impressive were the people onstage with the First Family: four presidents and their wives all in one place. Obama, Biden, Clinton, Bush—Democrats and Republicans. Different generations. Different philosophies. Different records. Yet all united by a shared belief that democracy is worth preserving.

In 2026, that’s something.

Michelle Obama, known as “the Closer“ on the campaign trail, spoke as if the heavens had opened. She hadn’t shown her husband her remarks beforehand, and by the end, after extolling the virtues of the type of man he was—“Eight years in the crucible, and not once did you melt from the heat”—he was visibly emotional.

And so was I.

Maybe I forgot speeches are supposed to lift us, make us smile, spark our imagination.

“You told me all those years ago you couldn’t promise me the world, but you could promise an interesting life,” she said. “And of course, you outdid yourself and managed to give me both. I know it hasn’t always been easy, but there hasn’t been a single second that this experience, standing by your side, hasn’t left me in awe.”

I teared up again. Or maybe it was sunstroke?

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A passage from Obama’s 2015 Selma speech is carved into the side of the building, a reminder that progress is always a relay race.

A little context on this big building: Obama’s isn’t a presidential library as we have known them in the past. (Fun fact: My mother has been to every presidential library and is proud of it.)

The first president to build a library bearing his name was Franklin D. Roosevelt. Before FDR, presidential papers were generally considered private property—some were kept for family, some were sold, some were scattered to the winds.

Roosevelt built his library on the grounds of Springwood, his family home in Hyde Park, New York, where he was born and where he is buried alongside Eleanor Roosevelt, effectively inventing a presidential library system.

Since then, libraries have generally been repositories for documents, archives, and historical artifacts, and they’re often located in presidents’ hometowns—Clinton’s is in Little Rock, the aforementioned Bush’s is in Dallas, Richard Nixon‘s is in Yorba Linda, Jimmy Carter‘s is in Atlanta. (Biden’s is still a work in progress, but is expected to land in Delaware.)

My favorite part of these museums is the recreation of each president’s Oval Office. The tradition started at Harry Truman‘s library in Independence, Missouri. Lyndon B. Johnson hadn’t originally planned to include an Oval Office replica in his own library, but when he heard how popular Truman’s had become with visitors, he quickly changed his mind and added one.

Obama wanted something different.

Less mausoleum, more town square. Less nostalgia and looking back, more forging ahead and dreaming up a better future.

Designed by the New York architecture firm Tod Williams Billie Tsien Architects, which also designed Philadelphia’s Barnes Foundation and David Geffen Hall at Lincoln Center, it was conceived as a living civic institution—a place where people gather, learn, organize, and participate.

At the opening, Obama spoke movingly about his connection to Chicago’s South Side. This is where he first drove into town as a 23-year-old community organizer. His daughters were born nearby and took some of their first steps in this park. He launched his first political campaign at a Ramada Inn just down the road.

His point was that this center isn’t all about him. (His presidential papers will ultimately be maintained through the National Archives.) He encouraged visitors not to spend too much time watching old videos of his speeches; instead, he pointed them toward the stories of the Founding Fathers, Abraham Lincoln, the suffragettes, generations of Americans who expanded the country’s promise. Can you imagine Donald Trump opening a museum and telling people to spend less time looking at him?

I put on my tan suit in the men’s room at Chicago O’Hare International Airport.

On the flight to Chicago, I kept wondering how much of the current political climate would be referenced from the stage.

Would anyone directly address the latest insult, conspiracy theory, or manufactured outrage?

Nah. When they go low, the Obamas go high. That has always been their superpower.

But, it’s not mine!

I’m happy to spell this out: the contrast between the Obama event yesterday and the political discourse that bubbled up from the bowels of Washington, D.C., for the America250 (or whatever it was called) on Sunday was impossible to miss. One was a celebration of civic participation, public service, and national unity. The other often feels like a competition to see who can say the most offensive thing into a microphone.

Yeah, that comment UFC heavyweight fighter Josh Hokit made about Michelle Obama.

I genuinely thought I’d misheard it. Surely there was context missing. Surely nobody talks like that. At the White House. About a former First Lady. Surely we’d evolved beyond playground insults masquerading as political commentary.

But nope.

Every chance of that event coming off patriotic or cool (and confession: I love a fighter jet flyover) was instantly lost. In that moment, they exposed who and what they’re all about. They showed all their cards.

I wondered if the people who were at that event and heard that comment were ashamed? Is anyone anymore? Bring back shame!

You know that’s right.

Whatever you think about Barack Obama’s presidency—and no president, no person, is perfect—the message of yesterday was that leadership should aspire upward. Toward empathy. Toward dignity. Toward service. Toward something bigger than ourselves.

The alternative feels exhausting. Aren’t we all tired?

I won’t even get into the irony of Obama’s good day coinciding with Trump’s no-good, very-bad day with a busted Iran deal because there are so many other, more qualified people explaining why that is. (I’m looking at you for that, Jessica Yellin.)

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Besides, I want to get back to the good stuff. Like the guest list.

Oprah! She was the first person Karlie spotted when we arrived. Naturally, Oprah was with Gayle King. Naturally, everyone wanted a selfie. Naturally, we wanted one too. We just had to wait patiently for the mayor of Detroit, Mary Sheffield, to get hers first. (That’s them, above.)

Our seats were behind a row of comedians: Conan O’Brien, David Letterman, and Stephen Colbert, who was sitting a few seats down from Jon Batiste, his former bandleader. (As I felt my forehead frying in the sun, I looked at Conan and feared for him the same fate.)

When the opening turned into a Stevie Wonder dance party, we found ourselves in a section with La La Anthony and Tina Knowles, who was wearing the biggest pair of YSL sunglasses I’d ever seen. Jackie O by way of Houston.

Many of us men were in tan suits, which may or may not have been intentional. Surely, you remember the Great Tan Suit Scandal of 2014? Sadly, although there is an extensive fashion exhibit, that original suit is not at this museum. Valerie Jarrett says it has long since been given away.

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The final speaker was the man everyone had come to see: Barack Obama.

The sharpest section of his speech focused on technology and social media. He argued that, with our phones, we’ve created a false sense of intimacy. We think we know each other because we’ve consumed each other’s content. We think we know everything, but it’s hard to tell what’s even real. We’re often more isolated, more suspicious, and more divided than ever.

“It’s tempting to give in to cynicism and even despair, to stop trying,” he said. “People are looking for fairness and common sense and mutual respect.”

Standing there yesterday, surrounded by thousands of people who had gathered from around the world not for a campaign rally but for a civic institution, I found myself thinking about an old Obama slogan.

Hope.

I know. That’s corny!

But I’m now old enough to have watched the political pendulum swing several times. And after yesterday, standing in the Chicago sunshine with a sunburned face and unexpectedly watery eyes, I found myself fantasizing about when it swings back again.

Soon, I hope.

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Thanks for reading all the way to the bottom!

You know the drill:

Stay safe and chic,

Derek C. Blasberg