Father Pitt

Tag: Woodwork

  • Victorian Gothic in Lawrenceville

    294 Fisk Street

    Hidden behind bushes and later additions is an exceptional example of Victorian Gothic domestic architecture. It seems to have been built in the 1870s to face Sherman Street, a street that vanished by 1890, or possibly existed only on paper; today the original front faces a nameless private alley behind the midcentury-modern Arsenal Place townhouses. The corner has been filled in with a later addition, and then another even later frame-and-stucco addition has been added; but the gables and dormers survive with their Gothic-arch windows and original ornamental woodwork.

    For many years, this house is marked on plat maps as belonging to the Rev. J. G Brown, D. D., who already owned the property (possibly with a smaller house on it) in 1872.

    Dormer
    Fujifilm FinePix HS10.

  • Valley Presbyterian Church, Imperial

    Valley Presbyterian Church

    This charming Arts-and-Crafts Gothic church is the most distinguished building in the little hamlet of Imperial. It was built, according to the date stone, in 1911 for a congregation that had been founded in 1840, and the large cemetery behind the church has tombstones going back to that foundation.

    Date stone: 1840 and 1911
    Valley Presbyterian Church
    Tower

    The outstanding feature of the church is its belfry, with simple and massive woodwork that echoes the Gothic arches below, but also flares out into bell shapes, like a Sunday-school-supplement illustration of the bells within.

    Belfry
    Belfry
    Rear of the church
    Kodak EasyShare Z981; Kodak EasyShare Z1285.

    A postwar Sunday-school wing in the rear is built from nearly matching brick.

  • Front Door on Sarah Street

    Front door on Sarah Street
    Woodwork
    Samsung Galaxy A15 5G.

  • St. James Convent, Sewickley

    St. James Convent

    Even though it is on the grounds of a parish that is still open, with a school that is still open, this glorious Second Empire building is abandoned and crumbling, with scraggly Trees of Heaven—the badge of abandonment—taking root all around it. In its current state it looks like a drawing by Charles Addams.

    St. James Convent
    Roof woodwork
    Close-up of some woodwork
    Dormer
    Dormer from the side
    Dormer from the front
    Different dormer from the front
    St. James Convent
    St. James Convent
    St. James Convent
    Fujifilm FinePix HS10.

  • Gatehouse, Mount Lebanon Cemetery

    Gatehouse at the Mt. Lebanon Cemetery

    The gatehouse for the Mount Lebanon Cemetery is a well-preserved vernacular-Gothic frame house. Not all the details have survived—the ugly front door is certainly not original—but more of the original decoration is preserved than we usually see on houses of this type in our area.

    Gable and chimneys
    Chimney
    Roof bracket
    Porch bracket
    Gatehouse
    Kodak EasyShare Z981.

  • Front Porches on Main Street, Lawrenceville

    Front porches with Victorian woodwork

    An experiment with the 50-megapixel phone camera, cropped to 39 megapixels. The noise reduction is smeary at full magnification, especially because the houses had to be brightened considerably (while leaving the sky correctly exposed, which we accomplished in the GIMP through the magic of layers). But on the whole it is a pleasing if somewhat artificial picture, and old Pa Pitt is not ashamed to use this phone camera every once in a while.

  • Brackets and Shutters

    Brackets

    On a building on Western Avenue in Allegheny West.

    940 Western Avenue
    Fujifilm FinePix HS10.

  • Second Empire Mansion in Allegheny West

    841 North Lincoln Avenue

    Built in about 1865, this grand house on North Lincoln Avenue is decorated in the highest Victorian manner, and the current owners have put much thought into the color scheme for painting the elaborate wood trim.

    Woodwork and lilacs
    Porch
    Porch woodwork
    Oriel

    Though it is hidden in the shadows between houses most of the day, this oriel is nevertheless festooned with decorative woodwork, including these ornate brackets:

    Bracket
    Lintel
    Dormer
    Dormering tower
    Second Empire mansion
    Front of the house in winter

  • Victorian Commercial Building on Sarah Street, South Side

    2616 Sarah Street

    Formerly a storefront with apartments above, but the storefront—as with many backstreet stores—has been converted to another apartment. The well-preserved Victorian details are picked out with a colorful but tasteful paint scheme.

    Lintel
    Dentils and diamond
    Cornice
    Kodak EasyShare Z981.

  • Second Empire House, Allegheny West

    827 North Lincoln Avenue

    One of the grandest of the Second Empire houses in Allegheny West, this one has an elaborate cornice with delightfully folksy wood-carving.

    Cornice
    Corner
    Second Empire mansion in Allegheny West