Affluence Aesthetics: How Ferris Bueller’s Day Off Represents Home in Suburban Illinois
by Eleanor Hutchinson
The 1986 film Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, directed by John Hughes, is an iconic object of American pop culture that takes place in the city of Chicago and its northern suburbs. The comedy follows the charming and mischievous high school senior Ferris Bueller as he takes a day off from school. On a beautiful spring day—a rarity for Chicago weather—he fakes an illness to stay home. Ferris enlists his best friend, Cameron Frye, and his girlfriend, Sloane Peterson, to join him in this adventure. To make the most of their day, Ferris borrows a prized possession from Cameron's father: a red convertible. The trio then heads into the city, where they explore many of Chicago's famous tourist destinations in the Loop, the city’s central business district. They visit the Sears Tower (now known as the Willis Tower), lunch at the upscale restaurant Chez Luis, attend a Cubs game at Wrigley Field, explore the Art Institute of Chicago, and participate in the Von Steuben Day Parade. After a full day of excitement, the three friends unwind in a backyard pool and jacuzzi before reluctantly saying their goodbyes. Ferris manages to return home just in time to successfully deceive his parents, concluding his (unrealistically) adventurous day unscathed and without repercussions.
According to sociologists Krista E. Paulsen and Jenny Stuber, places are defined as they are “interpreted, narrated, perceived, felt, understood, and imagined” (2022, 3). Hughes defines suburban Illinois as exclusive areas of wealth and privilege, affluent places. Affluent places are demarcated by residents with relative advantages in economic, social, and/or cultural capital (2022, 2). Hughes’ portrayal of Ferris Bueller’s home in Winnetka, along with those of his friends and neighbors, illustrates suburban families as having significant economic and racial advantages and reveals his position on suburbanization. The perceived social privileges of characters like Ferris, Cameron, and Sloane in Ferris Bueller’s Day Off covertly shape consumers’ understanding of critical social phenomena, such as suburbanization, affluence, and exclusion.
Figure 1. The Los Angeles residence was used as the exterior facade of Ferris Bueller’s home.
The film’s opening scene presents a direct shot of the Bueller family’s house in the suburbs of Chicago, supposedly in Winnetka, which is about an hour's drive from the Loop. This choice of location shapes our understanding of the movie and its characters; as someone who grew up near the village, I immediately formed preconceived notions about the Bueller family based on personal experiences in the neighborhood. The Bueller home, a large white colonial revival style, is set behind a half-circle driveway that accommodates three cars and presents a heavily manicured front lawn. The traditional architectural home also includes neoclassical elements like a portico with columns. Such features—symmetrical facades, classical detailing, and expansive landscaping—are hallmarks of upper-middle-class American suburban affluence, signaling not only economic capital but also cultural capital associated with stability, respectability, and taste. It’s not just the exterior of Ferris’s house that conveys the family’s wealth; the interior furnishings also provide insight into their socioeconomic status. Sociologist Mary Pattillo discusses how even subtle visual cues can indicate class status. She notes that leaving curtains open to showcase items like a piano or a decorative vase can signify wealth (Paulsen and Stuber 2022, 5). Sure enough, the Buellers have decorations prominently displayed in their windows, which are visible during scenes when Principal Rooney is attempting to break into the house. These details serve as small but telling information about the family’s financial standing.
Figure 2. The glass pavilion of the Ben Rose House, Cameron’s home, is shown displaying the iconic red convertible.
Cameron, Ferris’s best friend, lives in a large single-family home known as the Ben Rose House, situated in Highland Park, Illinois. This modern, International-style house was designed by one of Mies van der Rohe’s protégés and exemplifies the renowned architect's style. The house was last sold for $1.06 million. In his bedroom, 17-18-year-old Cameron has pricey items like the 1980s novelty plasma ball and an answering machine that appears particularly innovative compared to the wall phones visible in other scenes. Ferris describes his friend’s house by saying, “The place is like a museum—very beautiful, very cold.” Much like the original owner, Ben Rose, who was an artist and collector, Cameron’s dad showcases his vintage car collection in the home’s expansive glass pavilion. One car in particular stands out and is crucial to the storyline: a red 1961 Ferrari 250 GT California convertible. This iconic vehicle is not only expensive but also a classic symbol of wealth and luxury. These material markers—high-end electronics, important architectural design, and collectible cars—construct an environment of elite affluence. They reflect a lifestyle manifest in exclusivity, cultural refinement, and economic power, highlighting how wealth is performed and preserved through aesthetic choices and material possessions.
Figure 3. The backyard and jacuzzi of an unnamed neighbor.
Figure 4. The backyard and exterior facade of Sloane’s house.
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Not only do the opening scenes of Ferris Bueller’s Day Off take place in the suburbs, but the concluding scenes also return to the teen’s neighborhood. Before realizing the late hour, Ferris and company, in typical rascal behavior, sneak into an unknown backyard to enjoy the pool and jacuzzi. This amenity alone signals wealth and affluence in the neighborhood. Soon after, we catch a glimpse of Sloane’s house as Ferris drops her off. Unsurprisingly, it’s huge, and like every other house in the area, the backyard is almost as large as the house itself. Such spacious landscapes are typical of expensive properties due to zoning regulations, such as exclusionary zoning, that limit the amount of land that can be developed. These regulations can enforce large-lot and single-family zoning, as well as impose construction specifications and aesthetic regulations such as requirements for large lawns or specific architectural features. By employing zoning rules, neighborhoods can maintain economic exclusivity, which in turn prohibits access to diverse populations (Paulsen and Stuber 2022, 3). Even a short glimpse of Sloane’s house informs viewers that Ferris and Cameron’s affluent families are not anomalies, but part of a larger neighborhood trend.
Figure 5. Ferris Bueller jumps over two women tanning during the climactic running scene at the end of the film.
As Ferris races home to beat his sister and avoid getting caught for lying, he dashes through the homes and gardens of his neighbors. He jumps over picket fences and sculpted hedges, running across large, landscaped lawns in every backyard, just like Sloane’s. As he passes families gathered outside—dads barbecuing, women sunbathing, and children playing—he navigates picnic tables, trampolines, and jungle gyms. This reveals a larger view of the surrounding neighborhood, highlighting material consumption, as well as its homogeneity. All the neighbors are white, and each backyard looks strikingly similar. Repeated material and symbolic indicators of social class that have become ingrained into cultural and social normativity, such as owning multiple cars (like the Buellers) and maintaining expansive and “untouched” backyards, are one of the most effective and penetrating ways that affluence is expressed in the suburbs (Paulsen and Stuber 2022, 3). The neighborhood tour of identical backyards serves as more than a comedic climax; it comments on the way suburbia spatializes class.
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In this sense, Ferris Bueller’s Day Off does not merely depict suburban life—it actively participates in shaping its cultural meaning. Suburbanization accelerated the spatialization of affluence, particularly through the adoption of symbolic and aesthetic means of exclusion. Suburbs provide space to display wealth through large homes and estates, with a faculty that dense cities cannot (Paulsen and Stuber 2022, 3). Ferris Bueller’s Day Off uses this suburban backdrop not merely as a setting, but as a visual language of affluence, embedding wealth and social advancement into the fabric of its narrative through architecture, objects, and space.
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In their sociological research, authors Edgett, Hankins, and Pierce use the term “place frames” to understand shared narratives and beliefs about what elements constitute a place. They explain that “sometimes this persuasion [of representing affluence] is explicit, but just as often it is a matter of modeling preferred geographical arrangements through one’s daily round, property acquisitions, or economic consumption” (2023, 137). Not only do we see this “persuasion” through the repetition of place frames in daily life, but in media and popular culture we consume. By representing place in a particular way, Hughes frames the suburbs as homogeneous spaces of affluence—essentially, the places of upper-middle-class white families. The way Hughes articulates his impression of the northern Chicago suburbs through the manicured lawns, large estates, and expensive consumer goods furthers suburban place-contiguity (Edgett 2023, 137). This experience mediates the way a neighborhood’s narrative is constructed and understood, thus influencing how we understand a place like Winnetka—how it’s utilized, who it’s for, and who remains invisible within it (Paulsen and Stuber 2022, 5).
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Bibliography
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Edgett, Kayla; Katherine Hankins; and Joseph Pierce. “Whitenesses in the City: A History of Place-Making in Little Five Points, Atlanta, USA.” Journal of Race, Ethnicity and the City 4, no. 2 (2023): 135-152.
Ferris Bueller’s Day Off. Directed by John Hughes. Los Angeles: Paramount Pictures, 1986.
Paulsen, Krista E., and Jenny Stuber. “On Place and Privilege: Varieties of Affluence in Cities and Neighborhoods.” Sociology Compass 16, no. 6 (2022).