If there’s one thing most Chicagoans have in common, it’s a gripe with the CTA. But for Emily Siegler and Ben Taylor, the much-maligned public transportation system is a love they share—so much so that it became the resounding theme in their River West apartment.

“I love the CTA,” declares Taylor, a 33-year-old bassist by night and Playboy.com employee by day. Siegler, a 30-year-old industrial designer, agrees with him, recalling the multiple times she’s found herself in arguments at parties defending the system’s merits.

Their spare selection of adornments, mostly tossed and found, includes a Western bus stop sign, a CTA map poster from the Illinois Railway Museum and a mural of the Blue Line in their bedroom. The south-facing window opens up to a classic Chicago landscape: a billboard across the street, a view of the Sears Tower in the background and the Metra tracks shooting diagonally across the adjacent Chicago Avenue. That vital energy of the locomotive rumble and the extraterrestrial green glow beaming from the train reflect off of the loft-style apartment’s exposed brick, “Flintstones”-orange and “Cookie Monster”–blue painted walls and beneath the open, high-rafter ceilings.

“If I can be patient and get anywhere for two bucks, that’s great,” Siegler says. “It’s really hard to get people to appreciate, [but] I’m trying.”

1 Their antique-wielding landlord dresses up the laundry room with a collection of vintage washboards and detergent boxes.

2 Enamored with the Illinois tourism bus shelter posters, Siegler salvaged a memorable one and turned it into wall art.

3 Siegler’s first fine art purchase, a cityscape by Jesse Mehan, holds its own against the loud orange wall.

4 Inspired by a Redmoon theater production, Siegler subsequently acquired this stage prop at a silent auction.

5 A recent Craigslist score, the mini marquee provides creative fodder for party invitations and message-based wall decor.

6 “The leftovers”—a trail of framed postcards from their travels, random ephemera (like Taylor’s great-uncle’s masonry certificate) and artwork from friends—is a growing collection on the plain hallway wall.