Tag: Domestic Architecture

  • A Twilight Stroll in Seminole Hills, Mount Lebanon

    Front door with rays

    The back end of Seminole Hills developed later than the section nearer Washington Road, with more modest houses, many of them built during the Depression. But even many of these modest middle-class homes are pleasing designs, doubtless by some of our more distinguished architects. These pictures were taken after sunset in dim light, so expect some grain if you enlarge them.

    18 Allendale Place
    100 Iroquois Drive
    100 Iroquois Drive
    87 Iroquois Drive
    87 Iroquois Drive
    83 Iroquois Drive
    80 Iroquois Drive

    This house sits in a triangle where Iroquois Drive meets Allendale Place at an acute angle. It faces the street on three sides, and it was designed to be a good composition from any angle.

    80 Iroquois Drive
    80 Iroquois Drive
    80 Iroquois Drive
    80 Iroquois Drive
    75 Iroquois Drive
    69 Iroquois Drive
    65 Iroquois Drive
    65 Iroquois Drive
    61 Iroquois Drive
    Fujifilm FinePix HS10.
  • Hillside House in Carrick

    15 Wynoka Street
    Canon PowerShot SX150 IS.

    Dutch Colonial meets Normandy in an attractively eclectic house that you can see from a long way away, because it perches on the side of a steep hill.

  • Victorian Row in Lawrenceville

    247–253 Fist Street

    Separate ownership does funny things to rowhouses. This row of four would have matched originally; some owners have doubled down on the Victorian style, and some have done what they could with modern materials, leading to interesting effects along the property line.

    A porch pediment divided
    247 Fisk Street
    247–253 Fisk Street
    Fujifilm FinePix HS10; Kodak EasyShare Z1285.
  • Textures of the South Side

    Houses on Sidney Street

    A street of Georgian rowhouses, all in identical red brick, is a beautiful sight. But there is something jazzy and invigorating about the endless variety of textures in the back streets of the South Side, even if individually some of the artificial sidings people applied to their houses in the twentieth century were never very attractive. The textures are probably best appreciated in black and white, so old Pa Pitt stuck some monochromatic film in his Retinette and went for a walk around the block.

    Houses on 17th Street
    1615 Mingham Street
    Houses on 18th Street
    Kodak Retinette with Kentmere Pan 100 film.
  • Penn Main

    4111 Penn Avenue

    “Penn Main” is the name Pittsburghers give to the district around the intersection of Penn Avenue and Main Street, which (this being Pittsburgh) is not the main street of anything. On city planning maps, Penn Avenue is the border between Lawrenceville and Bloomfield; and since the sun was shining on the Lawrenceville side when we visited, all these buildings are counted as being in Lawrenceville for planning purposes. We begin above with a nicely preserved example of a typical small Victorian store with apartment above.

    Corner of Penn and Main

    Penn Avenue and Main Street do not meet at a right angle, so the buildings on the corner are forced into odd shapes. The one above deals with its acute angle by blunting the point of it. The one below (seen in a picture from two years ago) has a less offensive obtuse angle to deal with.

    Wilson Drugs
    4059

    The Second Empire style in its Pittsburgh incarnation is common in this section of the city. Little incised designs often decorate the lintels.

    4059
    4057 Penn Avenue

    This building would have matched its neighbor originally, but at some point the storefront was filled in to make an apartment. Now that Penn Main is becoming a desirable neighborhood, the alteration might be reversed.

    4043 and 4045 Penn Avenue
    Canon PowerShot SX150 IS.

    Two quite different houses. The one on the left is a duplex, though it may have been built as a single-family house. The one on the right is a kind of lean-to parasite on its larger neighbor, uncharacteristically set back from the street so that it has a front yard and a porch, as if someone was trying to create a little country house in the city.

    4045 Penn Avenue
    This picture only: Samsung Galaxy A15 5G.

    This one is getting a going-over. Father Pitt would prefer to see more original-looking windows, but at least the size of the windows has not been altered, and any future owner who feels motivated will be able to replace them with proper double-hung two-over-two sash windows.

  • More of Robin Hill, Moon Township

    Robin Hill from the front

    The only excuse we need for publishing more pictures of Robin Hill is that we have more pictures of Robin Hill. It’s a beautiful Georgian house designed by Henry Gilchrist for Francis and Mary Nimick; it was left to the township by Mary to be a park for the residents. We’ll walk around the house counterclockwise.

    Front door
    Perspective view of Robin Hill
    Right side of Robin Hill
    Perspective view of the garden side
    Garden face of the mansion
    Robin Hill mansion seen from the gazebo
    Back door of Robin Hill
    Window of Robin Hill
    Stairs up from the garden
    Left side of Robin Hill
    Garden face of Robin Hill
    Kodak EasyShare Z981; Kodak EasyShare Z1285.

    More pictures of Robin Hill, and a composite of the garden face.

  • Milgate Street, Bloomfield

    Houses on Milgate Street in the Bloomfield neighborhood of Pittsburgh
    Kodak EasyShare Z1285.

    These frame houses were built in the 1880s and 1890s. They are detached houses—detached by just enough room for an average person to walk between them. As a group, they form a good document of the things ambitious salesmen could sell to middle-class homeowners in the twentieth century. Not a single one retains its original details: they have all had their siding replaced, and most have smaller windows than the originals. And, of course, several have sprouted aluminum awnings.

  • Houses on Goettmann Street, Troy Hill

    Houses overlooking the Allegheny River
    Composite of three photographs from the Kodak EasyShare Z981.

    Modest frame houses with spectacular views across the Allegheny.

  • Two Houses on Centennial Avenue, Sewickley

    106 Centennial Avenue

    Two houses on one of Sewickley’s toniest streets. First, a house with the simple dignity of the Greek Revival.

    106 Centennial Avenue
    106 Centennial Avenue
    114 Centennial Avenue

    This house has the form of what old Pa Pitt calls a center-hall foursquare, with details taken from colonial New England.

    114 Centennial Avenue
  • Some Houses on Maple Lane, Sewickley

    707 Maple Lane

    Three houses on one of the many pleasant residential streets in Sewickley. First, a late-Victorian fantasy of Georgian architecture.

    707 Maple Lane
    709 Maple Lane

    This house has probably had some alterations over the years, but it preserves a unique dormer on the side.

    Dormer
    712 Maple Lane

    Finally, an extravagant riot of gables and dormers.