Father Pitt

Tag: Apartment Buildings

  • Entrance to the Gerber Apartments, Shadyside

    Otherwise not remarkable among the many classically inspired apartment houses in Shadyside, this one has an entrance that certainly stands out. It makes a spectacle of itself, in fact. The capitals on the massive square columns are more or less Corinthian, but Corinthian is usually the lightest and airiest-looking of the classical orders, whereas this construction gives the impression that it outweighs the whole building behind it.

    This picture was taken with what might be called a toy camera. It was a no-name digital camera with stated 18-megapixel resolution, but clearly those 18 megapixels are achieved by multiplying some much smaller number of pixels. It may amuse you to enlarge the picture to full size and examine the results.

  • The Lionhead, Shadyside

    Twin lion heads guard the entrances to the Lionhead, an apartment building in Shadyside.

  • Apartment Building, 17th and Sarah Streets, South Side

    This modest apartment building (it looks as though the ground floor used to be a store) is enlivened by interesting brickwork.

  • King Edward Apartments

    King Edward Apartments

    This splendid apartment block in Oakland occupies an awkward plot. The intersection is not precisely perpendicular, which means the plot is not precisely rectangular. The architect has attacked this problem by making a staggered façade along Craig Street, skillfully manipulating the ornamentation so that it appears to be more symmetrical than it is. In this picture, the ground floor—given over to retail shops—is being renovated.

  • Hampton Hall

    Hampton Hall

    The Tudor style adapts itself to an apartment building with some success. Old Pa Pitt can’t keep himself from wondering whether there are actually apartments up there under those peaked roofs with the dormers. Most of the Tudor atmosphere is in the detailing of the stone, but we have a few cartoonish suggestions of half-timbering just so nobody mistakes the style for anything else.

    Addendum: According to the city architectural inventory (PDF), Hampton Hall was built in 1928.

  • D’Arlington Apartments, Oakland

    D’Arlington Apartments

    Edward Keen was the architect of this intriguing apartment building on the edge of Oakland, just where it meets Shadyside. It was built in 1910, and the style seems to old Pa Pitt to be something like Italian Renaissance fading through Prairie Style to modernism. It has the simplicity and squareness of all three styles; the details are subtle but rich (especially the cornice); and the inset balconies, with much effort put into preventing them from breaking the lines of the rectangular walls, presage the simplicity-at-all-costs of the modernists.

  • Webster Hall

    Webster Hall

    A full view of the Fifth Avenue façade of Webster Hall. The design is by Henry Hornbostel, who successfully created a conservative Art Deco classicism that harmonizes with the other grand monuments on Fifth Avenue.

    The building was apparently put up as fancy bachelor apartments, but soon became a grand hotel (it is now apartments again). It was famous for the Webster Hall Cake, whose secret recipe is still treasured by little old ladies all over Pittsburgh. But old Pa Pitt is delighted to discover that the Pittsburgh Jewish Chronicle has a whole article on Webster Hall Cake, including two recipes that claim to be close approximations. Father Pitt suspects that there are still little old ladies out there who claim to have the real thing, but these recipes are a good start.

  • The Adrian

    The Adrian

    Another elegant Renaissance palace, slightly smaller but very similar in style to the Aberdeen. Once again, the view is marred by intrusive utility cables.

  • The Aberdeen

    The Aberdeen

    An apartment building in the graceful form of a Renaissance palace.

  • Bayard Manor

    Bayard Manor

    A Tudor Gothic apartment block in North Oakland whose details are worth pausing to appreciate.