Father Pitt

Tag: Rowhouses

  • Early-20th-Century Rowhouses, Manchester

    Abdell Street rowhouses

    Update: We are happy to report that the burned-out house has been neatly restored: see new pictures here.

    An attractive row of small houses built a little before 1910. One of them has had a fire and is under sentence of condemnation; we hope it can be rescued, but it may not be worth enough to restore. It is only yards from Allegheny West, a very desirable neighborhood; but that neighborhood line is there, and these houses are technically in Manchester.

    From the back we can see how a good bit of thought was put into making these houses bright and airy while still using the small space efficiently.

    Rear of the houses

  • Rooftops of Oakland and Phipps Conservatory

    Looking across the rowhouses and apartments of central Oakland toward Phipps Conservatory. In the distance at upper left is the Park Mansions apartment building.

  • Milliken Row, Manchester

    Milliken row, Manchester

    The tall houses here probably date from the Civil War era, and they were probably built to be rental properties; they appear on our 1872 map as belonging to A. Milliken. Originally there were three pairs of houses and one single on the corner, all matching; one of the pairs has disappeared and been replaced by smaller modern rowhouses. The newer houses do a good job of matching the style of the neighborhood, but they would have done better if they had been built at the same setback from the street. As for the height, it is probably useless to quibble about that. It is old Pa Pitt’s impression that builders of any given era are very dogmatic about the proper height for a ceiling. Look at the third floor of the house on the corner, and compare it to the third floor of the house next to it: you will see at once that modern ceilings are much lower than ceilings from the 1860s, and that is simply the way it is and nothing can be done about it.

    This street is now North Avenue, but when these houses were built it was Fayette Avenue; it did not connect to North Avenue until the later twentieth century.

  • Wrights Way

    Wrights Way, 2400 block

    Two blocks of alley houses on Wrights Way, South Side.

    2400 block
    2300 block

  • Second Empire Houses on Sarah Street, South Side

    Second Empire houses

    Two Second Empire rowhouses whose upper floors are fairly well preserved. The one on the right has had some adventures on the ground floor, possibly including a storefront at some point. Note the wooden shingles on the house on the left.

  • Victorian Row on Sarah Street, South Side

    A fine block of rowhouses on the north side of Sarah Street.

  • Victorian Row on Grandview Avenue

    1880 row on Grandview Avenue

    Built in 1880, this row of modest townhouses has been altered a bit to take advantage of the view, but retains much of its ornamental woodwork.

  • Second Empire Houses on the South Side

    Pair of Second Empire houses

    A matched pair of Second Empire houses in nearly perfect shape except for the modern dormer windows. The folk-art etching in the lintels is charming.

    Lintel

  • Rowhouses on Fifth Avenue, Uptown

    Uptown is a neighborhood in transition, and it still is not entirely clear what it will become. Will these rowhouses become valuable properties worth restoring? Or will they be knocked down for skyscraper apartments? Or will the development mania grind to a halt before it reaches this block? These two houses are in pretty good shape and worth preserving for their nearly intact fronts. Both have some fine woodwork. The one on the left has had some unfortunate renovation done to the dormer, but otherwise nothing bad has happened to it. It has newer windows, but in the right size and shape, and if you painted those aluminum frames they would be indistinguishable from the originals. The one on the right is even more perfectly intact. Note its proper Pittsburgh stair railing: in Pittsburgh, railings are a plumber’s art.

  • Frame House on the South Side Slopes

    A good example of how a frame house can be restored to look very attractive without breaking the bank. The most important thing is to preserve the trim if at all possible, or to substitute new trim that has the same proportions as the old. This house in what we might call vernacular Second-Empire style is on Pius Street.