A massive new apartment tower for Duquesne University students, and a big improvement in the Uptown cityscape (it replaced a parking lot). The architects were Indovina Associates, who designed the building in a subdued version of the currently popular patchwork-quilt style, with materials that harmonize well with the other buildings along the Uptown corridor.
Burt Hill Kosar Rittelman, a firm that began in Butler and grew to be an international architectural titan, would become famous in the middle 1980s for postmodernist buildings like Liberty Center. This building, however, is prepostmodernist. It opened in 1981, and it is a straightforward modernist box with a Miesian look. Although it doesn’t arrest our attention the way some of the firm’s later projects do, it was a harbinger of Renaissance II, the building boom of the 1980s that remodeled Pittsburgh with a postmodernist skyline.
If it isn’t the sharpest, it must at least be close. Father Pitt remembers when the East Wing of the National Gallery of Art was going up in Washington (Big Worshington, that is): it was boasted that I. M. Pei’s design included the most acute angle in any American building. This angle is nearly congruent with Pei’s, except that here the point has been slightly blunted. The architect has made sensible use of that sharp corner by putting the stairwell there, with a column of windows to light it.
The destruction of the Lower Hill and the destruction of central Allegheny were the two great urban-renewal catastrophes in Pittsburgh’s history. A century ago, the Lower Hill was the classic American melting pot, where black and white, Christian and Jewish, and every other kind of people all lived together in a crowded but lively neighborhood. That made it a slum, according to middle-twentieth-century definitions. When “slum clearance” became an urban-planning buzzword, the Lower Hill was the prime target.
Many of the synagogues had moved to Squirrel Hill and other neighborhoods in the East End by that time. The Beth Hamedrash Hagodol congregation had not. It had stayed in its 1892 building right next to Epiphany School, where downtown workers could easily walk to prayers.
When the Lower Hill was demolished (except for Epiphany Church and School, which we’ll be seeing shortly), the old synagogue was one of the buildings in the way. But the congregation didn’t give up. It built a new synagogue just around the corner on Colwell Street, taking the elaborate Torah ark from the old building.
The new synagogue lasted for about forty years, but then it, too, found itself in the way. It was torn down when the new arena was built.
Still the congregation didn’t give up. Architect Harry Levine remodeled an abandoned building into a new synagogue, and in 2010 the congregation, after meeting in borrowed space at Duquesne University for a couple of years, moved into its current home on Fifth Avenue at Diamond Street. Here it is still convenient for downtown worshipers, and here it stands, a block away from its Lower Hill location, an indomitable survivor.
Father Pitt’s information in this article comes from the article on Beth Hamedrash Hagodol Congregation at the Jewish Encyclopedia of Western Pennsylvania, along with the story “ ‘A Hidden Gem’: The history of Beth Hamedrash Hagodol-Beth Jacob Congregation” at the Pittsburgh Jewish Chronicle.
The last time we looked at this church, it was undergoing some renovation. Here it is with a fresh coat of paint. It was perhaps a shame to cover up the original blond bricks, but in a transitional neighborhood like Uptown, paint is certainly the easiest way to keep a building looking sharp and fresh. The painting was done with care to leave the stone trim unpainted, and the church looks very good.
This church was also known as Second German Lutheran, and to English-speaking neighbors it was known as the Dutch Lutheran Church. It now belongs to an Anglican ministry called Shepherd’s Heart.
Charles Bickel was the architect of this factory and warehouse, which, like many industrial buildings of the time, takes its inspiration from the Marshall Field’s Wholesale Store by H. H. Richardson. Bickel, however, added his own sensibilities, and made it an impressive and distinctive building. It is on the National Register of Historic Places.
Since we were looking at department-store warehouses a week ago, here is another one. This one was built in 1901 for Kaufmann’s department store, and as a work of architecture it is the most pleasing of the department-store warehouses we’ve seen. It is on the National Register of Historic Places, with the architect listed as D. H. Crisman; but old Pa Pitt, with all due deference to the experts, thinks that attribution is a mistake.1 Crisman was probably the contractor. He is listed in a 1900 city directory as a carpenter, and in 1902 we find him hiring an architect to design an apartment building, strongly suggesting that he was not an architect himself.
If Father Pitt had to make a guess, he would guess that Charles Bickel was the architect. Bickel designed the store for the Kaufmanns downtown, so he would be an obvious choice. He was also our most prolific producer of warehouses, so he is the safest bet. The style of the building is similar to that of Bickel’s colossal Pittsburgh Terminal Warehouse & Transfer Company on the South Side.
The architect gave the bricklayers a workout. The bricklayers were up to the challenge.
Other department-store warehouses: Frank & Seder and Rosenbaum’s, Gimbels.
This curious structure is at the back end of a commercial building on Fifth Avenue, where it faces the alley called Watson Street. It’s hard to tell from the old maps, but this may be the back end of the building that used to be the Uptown postal station, Pittsburgh 19. The tower is curious for multiple reasons: first, that there is a tower here at all along the alley rather than at the front of the building where it could be seen; second, because it looks as though it was put together from two slightly mismatched halves; third, because of the extraordinarily narrow Romanesque windows that look as though someone was expecting an attack by enemy archers. The upper floor, which is what makes this look like a tower, may be a later addition.
If you enlarge the picture, you will notice a ghost sign on the building next door: Progressive People Want Perfect Liquors. The position of this sign—where it is all but invisible unless you are looking down on it from a distance with a long lens—suggests that it may be even older than the tower that obscures it.
Uptown is a neighborhood in transition, and it still is not entirely clear what it will become. Will these rowhouses become valuable properties worth restoring? Or will they be knocked down for skyscraper apartments? Or will the development mania grind to a halt before it reaches this block? These two houses are in pretty good shape and worth preserving for their nearly intact fronts. Both have some fine woodwork. The one on the left has had some unfortunate renovation done to the dormer, but otherwise nothing bad has happened to it. It has newer windows, but in the right size and shape, and if you painted those aluminum frames they would be indistinguishable from the originals. The one on the right is even more perfectly intact. Note its proper Pittsburgh stair railing: in Pittsburgh, railings are a plumber’s art.
This is a particularly grand rowhouse: note how much taller it is than its neighbor, indicating high ceilings. It seems to be abandoned right now, but perhaps it has a chance if the urban pioneers moving into the neighborhood get to it before it mysteriously catches fire. There is much worth preserving: the woodwork is in fairly good shape, and the windows—mostly unbroken—are still original and proper for the period. The location of the house on Fifth Avenue might make it attractive, but also might put it in the way if development mania reaches this part of the street.
