-
Garlic Mustard
Garlic Musard (Alliaria petiolata) is one of those invasive weeds that make forest-lovers see red, although more recent studies suggest that its ill effects on our woodlands have been exaggerated. It does have two advantages: first, it has pretty white flowers; and second, you can eat it. It came to this country because it was a tasty and nutritious vegetable.
-
Bicolor Grape Hyacinth
Muscari latifolium is much less often encountered than the common Muscari neglectum. You can recognize latifolium by its broad leaves (thus the name) and the tendency of the flowers to darken as they age, creating an attractive bicolor flower spike.
-
Station Square from Across the River
A large panorama (click on it to see it at full size) of Station Square in the winter as seen from across the Monongahela. The bluff of Mount Washington lowers behind, with the Monongahela Incline at the left of the picture.
-
Court Place in Chinatown
Pittsburgh’s Chinatown was tiny but packed. Much of it was destroyed in the building of the Boulevard of the Allies after the First World War, but it remained a Chinese enclave for another decade or so, and Chinese businesses rebuilt along the stump of Second Avenue beside the Boulevard ramp.
The Chinatown Inn is the only business remaining from the old days of Chinatown. Another Chinese restaurant is a modern addition. The rest of the two blocks remaining in Chinatown is mostly given over to lawyers’ offices.
Addendum: The Chinatown Inn occupies the On Leong & Merchants Association building, designed by architect Sidney F. Heckert.
-
One Oxford Centre
One Oxford Centre is a cluster of octagons put up during the 1980s construction boom downtown. In fact it was to have an even taller partner next to it, but that never materialized before the boom went bust. The architects were the firm of Hellmuth, Obata + Kassabaum, now known as HOK, currently the biggest architectural firm in the United States.
