The Magnificent Mile is where Chicago comes to shop. It's got the views. It's got the location. And it's most certainly got the shops. At the last count some 460 stores lined North Michigan Avenue, which runs the mile from the Chicago River in the south, to the Gold Coast in the north. Not only does it have retail by the bagful, it has some of the biggest and best hotels in Chicago. Naturally enough, this is also where tourists gravitate. And serving them, and the shoppers, office workers, and assorted visitors, are a plethora of restaurants – geared for every taste, and all budgets. The Magnificent Mile really is the buzz of Chicago, concentrated tenfold.

It all started in the 1920s, when Mayor Burnham transformed this area of old factories and warehouses into a new avenue of ever-taller skyscrapers, and ever-grander shopping arcades. Post-war property developers promoted its luxury shopping, bringing in the 'in-crowd', and sky-rocketing property prices and storey counts. Five of the highest buildings in the world are found along this short mile in Chicago – including the 100-storey, 335-metre John Hancock Center, with its iconic twin-antenna tower, and the Trump Tower Chicago, which just pipped it to the post in height in 2009.

There probably isn't a retail chain, luxury brand or hot-dog topping combo that can't be had along the Magnificent Mile. Bloomingdale's, Macy's and Nordstrom all have flagship outlets here. It is regularly named as one of the top shopping destinations in America, on a par with New York's Fifth Avenue. Top-flight restaurants such as Tru, Spiaggia, Lawry's and The Grand Lux carve out luxury menus for the most affluent. But with 260 restaurants, there's bound to be a cuisine to suit those a shade less financially endowed.

It's not all shops and eateries. The Magnificent Mile also has some fine examples of Chicago's ground-breaking 1920s skyscrapers, like the Wrigley Building or the Chicago Tribune Tower. And tucked into a corner, overshadowed by the glittering modern towers, is a little fragment of old Chicago – the Water Tower and Pumping Station. These remnants of the city's water network, crucial to supplying its fire-fighters, were among the handful of buildings to survive the flames of the Great Fire of 1871. Proving that the Magnificent Mile doesn't just do retail – it does irony too.