Fern fiddleheads unrolling along the Trillium Trail, Fox Chapel.
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Lanark Street, Fineview, in 1994
Most of the houses along the right are gone now, perhaps destroyed by a fire; one of the remnants has been so tastelessly mutilated that destruction might have been kinder. There is now a little park with an overlook at the bottom of this street. Fineview is an odd Pittsburgh phenomenon: a working-class neighborhood with cheap houses and magnificent views. In most other cities, the views would have driven house prices into the astronomical range, and houses would be destroyed to be replaced with luxury condos instead of vacant lots. But Pittsburgh has so many magnificent views that the demand simply cannot outpace the supply—at least not yet.
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Sunset on Polish Hill
The domes of Immaculate Heart of Mary Church. The picture was taken more than twenty years ago, but the view would be the same today if we could arrange the same sunset.
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Blowing Engine
This was the blast in a blast furnace: the machine that provided the air that rushed into the furnace to keep the chemical reactions going. Surprisingly, this one was not used in Pittsburgh: it was brought down from Sharpsville, a little steel town in Mercer County. But it was built by the Mesta Machine Company in West Homestead. Now it lives at Station Square, right in front of the Glasshouse apartments.
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Panhandle Bridge
When Amtrak stopped using this bridge and the downtown tunnel into which it led, the Port Authority seized the opportunity. The bridge now carries the streetcars over the Mon and into the subway, the first part of which uses that old railroad tunnel—so that, like many other things in Pittsburgh, our subway is cobbled together from spare parts.
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West Penn Building
Charles Bickel designed this small skyscraper at First Avenue and Wood Street, which was finished in 1907. It’s a perfect demonstration of the base-shaft-cap form of an early skyscraper. In fact we can use this building as a textbook in our short course on how to read a Beaux-Arts skyscraper. The two-storey base contains the public aspects of the building—retail stores, public offices, and so on. The shaft is the main body of the building, a repeated pattern of windows and wall. The cap gives the building a presentable top, since a gentleman would not appear outdoors without his hat. Note also the floor just above the base outlined with a prominent border. That is the bosses’ floor, where the managers and other important people have their offices. “Form follows function,” as Louis Sullivan said; and in this case the form gives concrete shape to a social reality. You have now completed our course, and may award yourself a certificate.
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A Walk in the Bluebell Forest
Virginia bluebells line a trail in Fox Chapel.
Bluebells are not necessarily always blue, as you can learn at our sister site Flora Pittsburghensis.
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Skinny Building Under Wraps
The Skinny Building and its neighbor the Roberts Building have been bought by PNC. Here they are shrouded for renovation work. The last old Pa Pitt heard, PNC was planning on displaying art in the upper windows of the Skinny Building.
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