One of two new signs on the landmark Koppers Building was unveiled Monday on the William Penn Place side of the 34-story Art Deco office tower.
The other, on the Seventh Avenue side of the building, is expected to be finished by the end of the month.
Both signs will be illuminated at night and were designed by Shamrock Signs in a limestone shade of green to match the building's limestone facade and distinctive copper roof. Koppers Co., for which the building was constructed in the late 1920s, no longer owns it but is the largest tenant. The owner is an investment group in Radnor, Pa.
Seeing how much the city is changing is why I got into the urban planning field in the first place. I am currently an urban planning student at the University of Cincinnati and continuously check on the forum for progress on current projects, along with potential future project. I was born and raised just outside of Pittsburgh in Carnegie, and am hoping to find a Pittsburgh-based company to do an internship/co-op for the fall semester. Any suggestions on some companies or firms that may need an extra (and cheap) hand?
The Bank Tower is also being sold, but apparently the new owners aren't planning many changes (which is fine since it is in good shape as is).
That is encouraging news. I really hope some gets done with the Bank Tower though. The exterior could be amazing if restored. If you look at the details it is one of the more unique buildings we have Downtown.
Wigle Whiskey, the Strip District-based distiller of local and organic spirits, has purchased a warehouse in the Spring Garden section of the North Side and will begin converting it into a barrelhouse. “We were quickly running out of room, so we’ve been searching for a space for a while,” says Wigle’s Meredith Grelli. “The building fit all our needs and we love the neighborhood.”
The space, which occupies about 10,000 square feet at 1055 Spring Garden Avenue, is the former home of the Balestreire Produce Company. It will house Wigle’s barrels of aging spirits, its innovation lab and a state-of-the-art whiskey garden, thought to be the first of its kind in the country. “We imagine it as this seasonal kind of space where we’d have community events and small concerts, and the garage would become kind of a bar area,” Grelli says.
Architectural firm Edge-studio will design the new space. Wigle has hired contractor Marty Marra to undertake the construction. Grelli says they hope to open the space in the summer of 2014.
That is kind of a big deal for Spring Garden, which has so far not seen a lot of redevelopment activity. Streetview of the location:
Lot 24 luxury apartments open in the Strip District
Wednesday, June 19, 2013
A brand new 96-unit luxury apartment building in the Strip Distrct held its grand opening last Thursday.
Lot 24, located at 2404 Railroad Street, is the second joint venture from McCaffery Interests, Chuck Hammel and Bob Beynon, who renovated and opened the Cork Factory Lofts in 2005. MI-Home, a McCaffery subsidiary, will manage the building.
“This was a different type of situation because with the Cork Factory, it was an existing building. Lot 24 is entirely new.” says McCaffery’s Pamela Austin, adding that its red brick and corrugated metal exterior serve to create an industrial feeling that compliments the neighboring Cork Factory and blends in well with the aesthetic of the Strip District.
Antunovich Associates of Chicago designed the building, and California-based hospitality designer Intra-Spec fashioned the interior. Pittsburgh-based contractor Massaro Corporation completed construction on the building in December 2012, and it was fully leased within six months.
Lot 24 offers studio, one-bedroom and two-bedroom apartments in a variety of sizes and floor plans, and its amenities include a swimming pool, a spa, concierge service, a fitness center, a club room and building-wide WiFi.
Austin says that while the Cork Factory drew a diverse crowd of people, from young professionals to downsizing empty-nesters looking to downsize, Lot 24 is designed to skew young.
man, i've been wanting to visit pittsburgh for a while and these photo really got me excited, so i had a look with google maps and was sort of shocked to see that the downtown peninsula is mostly freeways. hard to believe that so many freeways could be built in such a small area, really boring and depressing, titanically ugly
man, i've been wanting to visit pittsburgh for a while and these photo really got me excited, so i had a look with google maps and was sort of shocked to see that the downtown peninsula is mostly freeways. hard to believe that so many freeways could be built in such a small area, really boring and depressing, titanically ugly
Well if you explore a city from space you might miss some of the smaller details...
^ obviously, i don't know pittsburgh, i explicitly stated as much. i was just shocked at the very high percentage of that peninsula that is given to freeway roads, seems like ~50%. how does it make me a troll to point something like that out? are you saying that you're proud that it looks like that?
^ obviously, i don't know pittsburgh, i explicitly stated as much. i was just shocked at the very high percentage of that peninsula that is given to freeway roads, seems like ~50%. how does it make me a troll to point something like that out? are you saying that you're proud that it looks like that?
Yes. We are quite proud of our collection of Downtown freeways.
^ obviously, i don't know pittsburgh, i explicitly stated as much. i was just shocked at the very high percentage of that peninsula that is given to freeway roads, seems like ~50%. how does it make me a troll to point something like that out? are you saying that you're proud that it looks like that?
It's way over 50% freeways... probably like 75-80%. We're very proud of it... hopefully we'll get it to around 90% by 2020. You wouldn't want to visit.
Location: The absolute western-most point of the Philadelphia urbanized area. :)
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Wow... Lot 24 looks awesome!
I applied for a city planning position with the City of Pittsburgh, and I reaally hope I get it! I would love to move back home! I feel such a tug to move back it's not even remotely funny...
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Transportation planning, building better communities of tomorrow through superior connections between them today...
I'd agree there are too many open highways running through Downtown, although obviously they don't take up anywhere close to 50% of the surface area, and their visual impact is somewhat lessened in several cases by being below the level of the main part of Downtown. That in turn leads to a possible amelioration, which would be to put deck-parks over at least some portions of the highways.
PNC is letting Pittsburgh know it’s nearing occupancy — likely in November — at 500 Smithfield St. by unfurling four banners Friday on the building’s exterior.
PNC bought 500 Smithfield, the former home of Mellon Bank, a little more than a year ago to house administrative offices and is renovating the interior to LEED standards. Some of the materials and furnishings have been tagged for preservation or reuse. The marble check-writing desks are being repurposed as tables in the employee cafe.
[QUOTE=photoLith;6169353]Heres some photos of stuff going on during a ride on my new bike.
PhotoLith, great pics. The Market Square restoration is the old Thompson Building, which is being renovated by the Pittsburgh History & Landmarks Foundation. It will be part of their Market at Fifth project. I understand that a restaurant is negotiating for two floors of the Thompson building. Landmarks is also doing the renovation of the three cast iron buildings on Wood Street (oldest surviving cast iron buildings in the city) as well as the ISDA Building, which suffered for years as the orange metal McDonalds at Forbes and Wood.
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