Father Pitt

Tag: Storefronts

  • Some Commercial Buildings on Brownsville Road, Carrick

    2610 Brownsville Road

    The Carrick business district is oddly discontinuous, with several clots of commercial buildings along Brownsville Road interspersed with less densely developed areas. Here are a few buildings in the clot near the intersection with Churchview Avenue. Above, an interesting building that looks more Chicago than Pittsburgh, with some modernistic Prairie Style details and charming little round-topped dormers with oval windows that will probably cost a fortune if they ever have to be replaced. For some reason someone decided to paint the blond Kittanning brick of the front grey, which was not an ideal choice but might have been the simplest way to get rid of graffiti.

    Dormer
    2610
    2612

    This is a building in a style we might call Provincial Renaissance. The ground floor has been remodeled, probably more than once, and while it is not a good match for the rest of the building, old Pa Pitt will admit to a sneaking admiration for the impressive glass-block bay in the front.

    2601

    Here is a building that had the typical Pittsburgh problem of a three-dimensional triangle to solve, where the architect had to deal with not only an awkward angle but also a steep rise behind the building. Whoever it was solved the problem attractively.

    2604

    This building preserves much of its original detail, including the date 1904 in the crest. The ground floor, uglified by siding going in random directions, would look much better painted green to match the cornice and crest; but at least it is well maintained.

    Date 1904 on the crest of the building
    2600 Brownsville Road

    Finally, this building had an expensive and tasteless modernization applied about five years ago, replacing an earlier expensive and tasteless modernization that probably dated from the 1950s and had not aged well. The terra cotta around the entrance to the second floor hints at what the ground floor might have looked like originally.

  • Store and Apartments by Louis Stevens, Carrick

    2551 Churchview Avenue

    This was an early commission for Louis Stevens,1 who would be best known in his career for houses and mansions for the rich and the upper middle class. It was built in 1911 on Churchview Avenue (then called Church Avenue, but renamed Churchview when Carrick was taken into the city of Pittsburgh), just off Brownsville Road. Four years earlier, Stevens had been studying architecture in Carnegie Tech’s night school. The front of the building has been muddled a bit, but the renovations were done in a halfhearted manner that allows us to appreciate the original composition.

    2551 Churchview Avenue
    Canon PowerShot SX150 IS.
    1. Our source for the attribution is this map of Stevens’ works created by a Google Maps user, to whom many thanks. ↩︎
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  • Endangered Buildings in Carrick

    Berg Place

    It is never pleasant, but old Pa Pitt feels as though he has a duty to document things that might be gone soon. Sometimes miracles happen, and we can always hope, but without a miracle we can only turn to the photographs to remember what has vanished.

    “Berg Place,” a group of three apartment buildings along Brownsville Road in Carrick, probably cannot be saved. It’s a pity, because the buildings, in a pleasant Arts-and-Crafts style flavored with German Art Nouveau, have a commanding position along the street, and their absence will be felt. They were abandoned a few years ago, probably declared unsafe, and since then they have rotted quickly.

    Berg Place
    Decorative brickwork and brackets

    Some of the simple but effective Art Nouveau decorations in brick and stone.

    Fire-damaged buildings

    These two buildings across the street from Berg Place, damaged by a fire, may possibly still be saved. At present one of them is condemned, but that is not a death sentence, and it looks as though prompt action was taken to secure the one on the corner after the fire. They are typical of the Mission-style commercial buildings that were popular in Carrick and other South Hills neighborhoods, and they ought to be preserved if at all possible. Carrick is not a prosperous neighborhood, but much of the commercial district is still lively, and with the increase in city property values the repairs might be a good investment.

    2554 Brownsville Road
    Art glass in the display window
    2546 Brownsville Road
    Canon PowerShot SX150 IS
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  • House and Corner Store in Dutchtown

    422 and 424 Suismon Street

    A well-preserved pair of houses with a breezeway between them and an old-fashioned storefront. The corner store preserves some memories of the time when it sold auto parts.

    Corner store
    E. J.’s Auto Parts ghost signs
    Canon PowerShot SX150 IS; Sony Alpha 3000.
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  • Three Buildings from the 1880s on Shiloh Street, Mount Washington

    131 Shiloh Street

    Some day some clever inventor will patent a way to match mortar colors in brickwork and make a fortune. (That was sarcasm, by the way: it can be done, but first you have to realize that it ought to be done.) Nevertheless, this building looks much better than it did a few years ago, when the front was covered with aluminum, fake stone, and asphalt shingles. Was it absolutely necessary to brick in all the side windows? Well, probably. Otherwise light might leak in. The original building comes from the 1880s, and the basic outline of it remains Victorian Gothic.

    Gordo’s
    200 Shiloh Street

    This building also seems to have been put up in the 1880s, or possibly as early as the 1870s. It has been so thoroughly remodeled so often that it would be hard to guess what it looked like originally; Father Pitt’s best guess would be that it had a Second Empire mansard roof and details, replaced in the 1970s by the parody of a Second Empire roof we see today. In the past two decades, the ground floor has been completely redesigned twice; the current incarnation is better than the way it looked twenty years ago.

    203 Shiloh Street
    Canon PowerShot SX150 IS.

    Here is a Second Empire building that retains much of its original detail, in spite of the complete remodeling of the ground floor (the original design probably let in far too much natural light) and the artificial siding on the dormers.

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  • Apartment and Commercial Block on Murray Avenue, Squirrel Hill

    1914 Murray Avenue

    A commercial building and apartment block in the eclectic style popular in the 1920s: it carries a whiff of Spanish Mission, but also a bit of Renaissance. Liberal use of terra cotta enlivens the façade.

    Crest
    Apartment entrance
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  • Arch Street, North Side

    Arch Street

    Arch Street, which is now included in the Mexican War Streets despite not bearing the name of a battle or a general, is a typical North Side combination of dense rowhouses, small apartment buildings, and backstreet stores. Here are just a few sights within one block of the street.

    1225 Arch Street

    An exceptionally elaborate Queen Anne house whose owner has used bright but well-chosen colors to emphasize the wealth of detail on the front.

    1300 and 1228

    Two modest houses from before the Civil War; the brick house at left is dated 1842.

    1301 Arch Street

    A small apartment building with a well-balanced classical front.

    1301
    Front door

    Some fine woodwork surrounds a front door.

    1320

    The colorful dormer steals the show, but enlarge the picture to appreciate the terra-cotta grotesques on the cornice.

    1322

    This little building looks as though it dates from the 1920s. Although it is quite different in style from its neighbors, it fits harmoniously by sharing the same setback and similar height.

    1327

    A backstreet grocery that is currently functioning as a backstreet grocery—an unusual phenomenon in city neighborhoods these days. The apartment building above it has some interesting and attractive brickwork.

    1327
    Sony Alpha 3000.
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  • Store and Apartments on North Charles Street, North Side

    2139 North Charles Street

    This section of North Charles Street has had at least four names. It began as Union Avenue; then it took on the name of Taggart Street, the continuation of the street to the south; then, when Allegheny was absorbed by Pittsburgh, Charles Street, the continuation of the street to the north and east, was renamed Taggart Street, to distinguish it from Charles Street on the Hill, which itself was soon renamed Elmore Street; and then for some reason the whole street was renamed Charles Street North, which has gradually turned into North Charles Street.

    At any rate, under all its names, this used to be the central street of a narrow neighborhood in the valley or ravine leading up to Perry Hilltop. Whole streets crowded with little frame houses have disappeared, leaving occasional isolated survivors. This substantial brick building may go back as far as the 1870s, though if so it has been heavily altered; or it may have replaced another brick building of similar dimensions. Either way, it is an interesting building to look at, so we need no more excuse for publishing its picture.

    2139 North Charles Street
    Canon PowerShot SX150 IS.
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  • A Backstreet Corner of the South Side in the Snow

    Corner of Sidney Street and South 19th Street

    The corner of Sidney Street and South 19th Street, where we find a Second Empire building with a beautifully kept storefront.

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  • Elias Kauffeld Building, South Side

    Elias Kauffeld Building
    Fujifilm FinePix HS10.

    A particularly splendid mid-Victorian building from 1881, as we can see by the beehive date stone in the middle of the façade.

    The architect would probably have told you that the style was Renaissance, but mid-Victorian architects were much freer in their interpretation of historical styles than the next generation would be.

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