Father Pitt

Tag: Neville Street

  • Trio of Small Apartment Buildings on Neville Street, Oakland

    414–410 North Neville Street

    Father Pitt is not sure whether these three buildings were originally built as apartments or as single houses, but he is almost positive they were built as rental properties. Old maps tell a clear story: at some point a little before 1910, T. Herriott, who owned a house to the right of these buildings (where the Mark Twain Apartments are now), bought his neighbor’s large lot, demolished the frame house on it, and had these three buildings put up, which he continued to own at least through 1923. They obviously had porches, since the scars where the porch roofs were removed are covered with vertical clapboards.

    410 North Neville Street

    The Flemish-bond brickwork is arranged with the headers in a different color, so that it looks surprisingly like Wikipedia’s color-coded diagram of Flemish bond:

    Brickwork in Flemish bond by Jonathan Riley
    Brickwork in Flemish bond, by Jonathan Riley, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
    414–410 North Neville Street
    Kodak EasyShare Z981.
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  • Modern Apartments on Neville Street, Oakland

    Mark Twain Apartments

    In the boom years after the Second World War, new housing couldn’t be built fast enough to satisfy the demand. Architects were busy, and modernism was the rage. The Mark Twain and the Stephen Foster brought clean modern lines to Neville Street and doubtless filled up as soon as they were opened to eager renters.

    Stephen Foster Apartments
    Mark Twain and Stephen Foster
    Kodak EasyShare Z981.
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  • Victorian Survivor on Neville Street, Oakland

    326 North Neville Street

    As this part of what used to be Bellefield turned into an apartment district, a few old houses remained here and there, turned into apartments. This one suffered less alteration than most, and its splendid curved porch hints at the leisurely exurban atmosphere of Victorian Bellefield.

    326 North Neville Street
    Kodak EasyShare Z981.
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  • Neville House, Oakland, in Black and White

    Port cochere of the Neville House apartments

    We saw Neville House in color earlier. These three monochrome pictures were taken with a Kodak Retinette made in the middle 1950s. Above, the exit from the porte cochere under the building. Below, the main entrance, including the porte cochere and the patio in front of it.

    Entrance to Neville House
    Entrance to Neville House
    Kodak Retinette with Kentmere Pan 100 film.

    Thanks to Bodega Film Lab for developing the film and making it worth taking the Retinette out for a walk.

  • Neville House, Oakland

    Neville House

    Tasso Katselas designed this apartment building, which opened in 1959. James D. Van Trump described it a few years later: “Glass, brick and concrete cage raised into space on arched stilts in the manner of Le Corbusier and at the time it was built the most ‘advanced’ apartment house in Pittsburgh.”

    Entrance portal

    The drama of the building is in those arched stilts. They make approaching the building from the street an event. In typical Katselas fashion, they also solve a practical problem: they make room for a useful porte cochere while allowing the rest of the building to take up as much of its lot as possible.

    Front
    Entrance
    Neville House
    Canon PowerShot SX150 IS.