Father Pitt

Tag: Gothic Architecture

  • Old Church in the West End

    Now a sports bar, so it has been converted to a different religion.

    An update: This was St. George’s Episcopal Church, built some time in the 1890s or very early 1900s.

  • John P. Robin Civic Building

    Entrance to the John P. Robin Civic Building

    Built in 1907, this small skyscraper (originally the Jones & Laughlin Building) was just barely spared by the Boulevard of the Allies a decade and a half later. It was designed by the always-tasteful MacClure & Spahr in the restrained Gothic style popular in the early twentieth century.

  • Tower of East Liberty Presbyterian Church

    This picture was taken in 1999 with a Smena 8M, a plastic Russian all-manual 35-millimeter camera that was cheaply made but surprisingly capable.

  • St. Bernard’s from Mt. Lebanon Cemetery

    A winter view of St. Bernard’s from Mt. Lebanon Cemetery, featuring a fine silhouette of a tree. Below, more church and less tree.

  • Mt. Lebanon United Presbyterian Church

    The west front of this church, with its outsized towers, was inspired by York Minster; it makes the church look a good bit bigger than it actually is. The hilltop location makes it a landmark visible from miles away. The congregation, a descendant of the early-settler congregation that established the St. Clair Cemetery across Scott Road, now belongs to the Evangelical Presbyterian Church, a young denomination founded in 1980.


    Map

    Addendum: According to the September, 1931, issue of the Charette, the magazine of the Pittsburgh Architectural Club, the architects were “O. M. Topp and T. L. Beatty associated.”

  • St. Bernard’s, Mt. Lebanon

    St. Bernard’s Catholic Church, Mt. Lebanon

    Begun in 1942, this church is more elaborate than many cathedrals. The architect, William Perry, grew up in Dormont, and he seems to have realized that this was a chance to leave a magnificent legacy in his own back yard.


    Map

  • Mount Lebanon Cemetery Office

    This fine vernacular-Gothic house serves as the gatehouse and office for the Mount Lebanon Cemetery, which was founded in 1901. It’s charmingly out of place in its neighborhood, which is a later development where most of the houses date from after the First World War.

  • Cathedral of Learning on a Winter Morning

    Morning sun illuminates the Cathedral of Learning.

  • First Baptist Church

    The First Baptist Church in Oakland was designed by Bertram Goodhue, a disciple of Ralph Adams Cram, the greatest figure in American Gothic architecture.

  • First Presbyterian Church

    First Presbyterian was designed by the Philadelphia architect Theophilus P. Chandler, whose name makes him sound like the obstructive villain in a Marx Brothers farce. Above we see it from across Trinity Churchyard, with the last leaves of autumn still clinging to an oak tree in front of Trinity Cathedral. Below, details of the Gothic decoration.

    Not many churches are confident enough of the permanence of their service times to have them literally set in stone.