CHIBOYS @ ORD
DeShawn Murry owns and founded ChiBoys, a Chicago-inspired clothing line that celebrates the city’s rich history, vibrant culture, and iconic architecture. Murry has always been passionate about representing his city in style. From a young age, he moved to Los Angeles to work as a model and was immersed in the fashion industry. With a strong appreciation for his Chicago roots and fashion sense, he wanted to create a way to represent Chicago fashionably. With this, ChiBoys was born.
In 2009, Murry initially distributed his line through select boutiques, but he later opted for a more exclusive approach to maintain control over the narrative of ChiBoys. “Almost every design has a story,” he explained. He wanted to make sure these stories were told. “One of the best ways to tell your story is to tell it yourself,” he said.
Murry’s love for Chicago’s architecture, particularly the iconic Hancock building, sparked the vision for his first graphic tee. When asked what his favorite city is, Murry — who’s done a lot of traveling — still answers, “There’s no other city like Chicago because our skyline is second to none, and there’s nowhere I’d rather be in the summer.”
Festivals in Chicago are one of the biggest attractions of the summer. With controlling the narrative in mind, he knew this was a way to reach thousands of locals face-to-face. After years of long set up and teardowns of the merchandise tents every weekend, lifting heavy cases, and dealing with bad weather, he knew there had to be a better way. This led to a brilliant new solution: Chicago’s first mobile T-shirt truck.
Through relentless persistence and collaboration with City Hall, Murry pioneered Chicago’s first mobile T-shirt truck, granting ChiBoys broader accessibility across neighborhoods. After he secured the license in 2016, Murry went on a mission and found the perfect truck for summer festivals in Chicago. The truck has become a Chicago staple.
In 2019, Murry opened his first brick-and-mortar store in the popular Wicker Park neighborhood -— an ideal home for the brand. In 2022, ChiBoys opened a shop at the Chicago Riverwalk Community Market Place to support the city’s vision of celebrating cultural diversity and enhancing the existing concession programs. In 2023, ChiBoys ventured into culinary operations and opened a café on the Riverwalk.
When Murry was approached to open a store at O’Hare International Airport, he knew it was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. “To say ‘opening a store at O’Hare is an honor’ would be an understatement,” said Murry. “From the fruition of ChiBoys, I dreamt of it being on a platform for the world to see, and with this opportunity, travelers from all over the world finally get to see why Chicagoans are so prideful. Our history, architecture, culture, and culinary scene are second to none. Our diverse neighborhoods are what make us a world-class city. We look forward to being a new and exciting addition to ORD.”
Drawing inspiration from the city’s lineage, structure, and pulse, ChiBoys offers a range of fashion pieces that reflect Chicago’s soul and pay homage to the roots that resonate with many proud Chicagoans. The shop at ORD is now open in Terminal 3.
