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.
Rockwell Hall was not quite finished when it was featured in an Alcoa advertisement as one of the Pittsburgh skyscrapers made possible by aluminum. The restrained modernist classicism of the building has been faithfully maintained, so that it looks just about the same now as it did when it was new.
Now, who designed the building? Father Pitt asked Google, “Who was the architect of Rockwell Hall at Duquesne University?”—and instantly got a confident answer from artificial intelligence: “The architect of Rockwell Hall at Duquesne University was Newman-Schmidt. The building, also known as the Duquesne University Building, features a student lounge, vending area, and computer labs, and connects to downtown Pittsburgh via a skywalk.”
Newman-Schmidt was a photography company that provided this excellent picture, and the rest of the information comes from the “description” at that page, which our friend with the artificial brain has confidently misinterpreted.
So we asked a human architect, who told us that “the real answer is William York Cocken (probably with others).”
It seems to old Pa Pitt that, if he has to do the research himself anyway, then AI just adds an unnecessary step that can be profitably eliminated.
Mr. Cocken died just a week before the building was dedicated, and yet none of the articles on the dedication mentioned the name of the architect. However, the building was mentioned in his obituaries in all three daily papers (for example, this one in the Press).
Built in the 1950s as the Duquesne University Hall of Law and Finance, this building was featured in the Alcoa advertisement “How Many of These Pittsburgh Skyscrapers Can You Name?” as an example of the new ultra-modern sort of aluminum-clad skyscraper.
The lower side of College Hall as seen from Locust Street. We also have pictures of the front of College Hall.
Looming behind Duquesne University on the Bluff.
Built in 1968, this is the only design in Pittsburgh by Ludwig Mies van der Rohe; it was one of his last works. (The IBM Building at Allegheny Center was designed by Mies’ firm after Mies died.) This is a composite of four long-telephoto photographs taken from the back streets of the South Side across the Monongahela River. At full magnification, atmospheric distortion makes the straight lines slightly wavy.
We also have some closer pictures of Mellon Hall.
Built in 1885 from a design by William Kauffman, this was an astonishingly lofty building when it went up—our first skyscraper college. Its position up on the bluff gave it spectacular views, at least when the smoke from the city below was not too dense, from the cupola that used to stand at the peak of the roof.
We also have a picture of the building as it was built, along with a modern picture from the same angle.
A comparison shows that Old Main has gradually been un-Victorianized over the years, losing chimneys and a cupola. The building is still an elegant and commanding presence on campus, though inside there is nothing left on the main floor to indicate that it was built before the twenty-first century. It has been old Pa Pitt’s observation that Catholic universities tend to treat old buildings as embarrassments rather than assets.
A Tudor Gothic building that fits well with Old Main and the chapel across the street. The cornerstone was laid in 1922 by Archbishop Canevin himself (Pittsburgh was not an archdiocese, but Canevin was titular Archbishop of Pelusium).
Like many Pittsburgh buildings, Canevin Hall has more than one ground floor.
College Hall was built in 1970, two years after Mellon Hall across the way, and we notice that the architect (whose name old Pa Pitt was not immediately able to find) took the idea of stilts from Mies Van der Rohe and applied it to an otherwise very different style of modernism. Although every element is indubitably twentieth-century, the whole effect gives us the impression of a classical temple. The interior is drab and utilitarian, but the exterior has a restrained dignity that is very attractive.
