Even the tiniest houses could be romanticized in the age of what Father Pitt calls the Fairy-Tale Style of domestic architecture. The little bungalow above and the mirror-image cottages below probably date from the 1930s. A coating of snow helps the fairy-tale atmosphere.
A typical Pittsburgh Foursquare, just like hundreds of others in Beechview and thousands upon thousands in the city and inner suburbs, except that by random chance we happen to know the architect of this one: William Wolfshafer (or Wolfschaffer; like many German architects in Pittsburgh, he had a German and an Anglicized spelling of his name). He was a fairly successful architect, to judge by the occasional substantial apartment buildings we find with his name attached, and he was obviously capable of delivering just the kind of conservative but up-to-date house merchant-class Pittsburghers craved. Note the well-preserved classical details in the dormer.
