Cornfield jokes aside, there are bunch of institutions in the community that people love to frequent.

Restaurants

For food on campus there is a pretty wide variety. Near Green Street people love to go to Mashawi Grill for Mediterranean, Pho Cafe and Bangkok Thai for some Thai, and Maize for some Mexican. There is Ambar for some Indian and the legendary Cravings for some Chinese.

As you move off campus more, you will find some really nice fine dining places, including Radio Maria, Bacaro and V Picasso. For special occasions most people will go to Black Dog, which serves some amazing BBQ.

Coffee

Coffee is also a huge thing in Champaign-Urbana, locations like Flying Machine, Kopi, Paradiso and Aroma being favorites. Each has its own style and typical clientele, so its easy to find a place to get some work done.

Groceries

There is one major Super Market on campus called County Market. Most of what you need you will find there.

If you are looking for Organic Groceries or something closer to Whole Foods, there is a food co-op in Urbana called Common Ground.

Music and Art

There are some great places on Campus and in town to listen to Music and check out some Art.

Canopy Club is a concert venue just south of Green Street which serves as a pit stop for many headliner acts (Louis the Child, Madeon, and more)

Krannert Center for the Performing Arts has a large variety of concerts and shows.

Cowboy Monkey in Downtown Champaign also puts on more local acts.

There are also art galleries in Downtown Champaign and Downtown Urbana that will put on showings

Makerspaces

There are a bunch of places to make things. Urbana has a makerspace in the basement of IMC in downtown Urbana, the Business School hosts one in their building. There is also the Champaign-Urbana Community Fab Lab on the south quad, the ECE Department has the Open Lab in ECEB and ACM has its own in the back room of the ACM office

3D Printing

3D printing has become pretty popular. The Illinois MakerLab (http://makerlab.illinois.edu/) is a great resource if you want to try it out. In addition to having fairly inexpensive rates, they are also willing to help and teach people their craft. In case you do not feel like walking all the way to the BIF (the business building), ACM also acquired its own 3D printer that may be available to members and the ECE Open Lab has a couple as well. Finally, if you are the type of person who wants to play around with a 3D printer without spending time to design your own item to print, there is an online marketplace (http://www.thingiverse.com/) where people can share their already-made designs for other people to download. I would highly recommend trying out a 3D printer if you get the chance; they are a lot of fun!

Laser Cutting

The Open Lab and the Champaign-Urbana Community Fab Lab both have laser cutting services.

Shopping

On campus, there aren’t a lot of retail stores yet. Urban Outfitters on Green street is the only major clothing/retail store. Cheaper clothing can be found at Ragstock - especially if you’re looking for a last minute sweater or a Halloween costume. If you are looking to get a winter coat, Champaign Surplus is probably the closest place that you will be able to find one. We also have a mall that you can get to via a free bus from campus. The mall has plenty of big name stores, so you can probably find anything you need there.

I would recommend getting off campus and exploring the area. There are plenty of weird and interesting places:record shops, comic book stores and more.