Construction can reveal previously impossible views. Here we see the whole CNG tower from top to bottom, a 1980s postmodernist palace that presents radically different—but still harmonious—faces from different angles.
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CNG Tower
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Egyptian Revival
The style of architecture called Egyptian Revival had its heyday in the 1920s. In Pittsburgh it is almost always associated with death: we find it especially in mausoleums and in memorial dealers. The style always teeters on the edge of kitsch unless, as here, it is handled with restraint and taste. The setting of this mausoleum, under the shade of mighty trees, gives it a calm dignity it probably didn’t have when it was built.
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Looking Up at the PPG Tower
Looking up at Philip Johnson’s PPG Tower, the centerpiece of PPG Place and the de-facto symbol of downtown Pittsburgh, from the Diamond.
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Fifth Avenue Place from the Diamond
Fifth Avenue Place looms over the Diamond (which is spelled “Market Square,” but pronounced “Diamond”). At night, the needle at the top is illuminated from below, so it looks as if the building is about to emit a space probe.
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View from Point Park
Seeing downtown Pittsburgh from Point State Park, you might be forgiven for supposing that Pittsburgh had not existed before World War II. Not a single prewar building is visible; the “Renaissance” seems thorough and complete. The entire Point, once a seedy warehouse district, was redeveloped after the war, with a big chunk left open for Point State Park, and the rest covered with modernist towers.
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Granite Building in Black and White
Seeing the Granite Building in black and white (taken with a Zenit camera with a 28-mm Vivitar lens) brings out the variety of textures and ornaments. In the background is the Keenan Building.
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More of Gateway Center
Taken with a Zenit-B camera, which is a Soviet-era SLR, and a Vivitar 28-mm lens, which is of course not Soviet, this picture from Equitable Plaza shows Gateway Center as the perfect modernist ideal. No wonder it got so much attention.
Gateway Center is just across the street from the Gateway Center subway station.
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Porter Aluminum Building
Another aluminum company built another aluminum skyscraper that, like the Alcoa Building behind it, bears a more than passing resemblance to a stack of television sets. Here we see it from Mellon Green.
The Porter Aluminum Building (now the FHL Bank Building) is half a block up Grant Street from the Grant Street exit of the Steel Plaza subway station.
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Granite Building
The Granite Building is a riotous celebration of every style of Romanesque ornament. The architect seems to have been less concerned with a harmonious whole than with just having oodles of fun in stone.
The Granite Building is right across Wood Street from the Wood Street subway station.
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Westinghouse Building
Back in the days when Westinghouse was a giant international conglomerate, this was its world headquarters. It was designed by Harrison and Abramovitz, the same architects responsible for the similarly black and steely U. S. Steel building. Here we see it from the immaculately tended landscape of Equitable Plaza.
Old Pa Pitt can’t help thinking that the Westinghouse building looks like two Mies Van der Rohe buildings stacked one on top of the other.
The Westinghouse Building is at the other end of Equitable Plaza from the Gateway Center subway station.