Twin Cities Parking Garages

While exploring St. Paul and Minneapolis during the SIA, parking garages seemed to be everywhere. For some reason I was struck by the variety of structures: minimal concrete to elaborate garages with building facades. Take a look.

In Minneapolis, a parking garage (across the corner from the library) … under some form of construction it seemed. A typical parking garage structure.

Parking garage in St. Paul. No mistaking its purpose!

This parking garage ramp in Minneapolis looks like a child’s toy – ramps for the matchbox cars!

Another basic parking garage in Minneapolis.

This neon sign will make sure you see it from the street.

Those above are more of your typical garage structure, though the curved ramp seemed a bit unusual. However, St. Paul has a few garages that bring it from parking structure to parking building, if you will.

A parking garage in St. Paul. Slightly hard to see, but look closely and you’ll notice the facade.

And then there’s this one:

It took a few times walking by this to decide that, yes, it was a parking garage. There is retail on the ground floor.

The same parking garage during the day. The metal cornice of the structure does well to blend it with surrounding architecture, giving the building a welcome presence on the street and when looking up (preservation tip: always look up).

This is obviously the star parking garage in terms of welcoming people and complementing the streetscape.

Listen to this NPR story about parking garages*, which states that “of all the American structures, few are so unlovable as parking garages.” It’s from 2009, when the National Building Museum had an exhibit called “House of Cars” on the parking garage.

Just a few tidbits from the story: There’s no exact beginning or inventor of the parking garage, but it was definitely a necessary structure. Early garages did look more like buildings (like the great example from St. Paul). You’ll hear that the open parking garages are from the mid 20th century. Early parking garages used elevators, and early garages were valet parked. Some had floors just for women so they felt safe. During the Cold War, you could get federal funding if your parking garage included a bomb shelter.

Thankfully, others are intrigued by parking garages, too. Read about parking garages in Chicago, And there is a book titled The Parking Garage: Design and Evolution of a Modern Urban Form by Shannon S. McDonald. More parking + garage history from the National Building Museum.

Now, what type of parking garage do you prefer? The open level type or those disguised to look like buildings with retail and services on the ground floor?

Do you like parking garages? Some can feel dark and damp, which make most people feel unsafe. Then again, parking lots can feel unsafe, too. Parking garages take up far less land than parking lots, thereby consuming less of the streetscape, hopefully preventing that urban wasteland feel. When designed to blend with the streetscape,however large or small, parking garages seem like they could solve many of our land-use and parking problems. That assumes that people will walk a bit rather than parking in front of the store, whether a strip mall or a downtown store. What do you think?

*Even if you’re not a NPR listener, give the parking garage story a chance. It’s fascinating and only five minutes long. Enjoy! 

Preservation Photos #177

Monroe Hall at the University of Mary Washington, Fredericksburg VA.

What Color is Your House?

Brattleboro, VT.

Before we get started talking about paint colors, let’s get one thing straight: historic preservation is not about telling you what color to paint your building. Really. While some colors are more historically appropriate than others (in restoration work, paint might be important), but paint is reversible.

Yet, despite its temporal nature, paint color is an important decision for many of us, whether painting a room or the exterior of our homes and other buildings. So feel free to offer up your opinion. How do you choose? Are there some colors that you think are more house appropriate than others? Are there colors that are more popular than others in your region? Often color speaks to the architectural style and era. For examples, Greek Revival buildings are often painted white while the Queen Anne style is known for many, varied color patterns.

Brattleboro, VT.

Do you have a favorite house color? Do you prefer light palettes or dark palettes? What crazy paint patterns have you seen? Have you ever seen a house painted black?

Abandoned Vermont: Wolcott House

A house in Wolcott, Vermont sits on the bend in road, settled quietly and subtly into the landscape. Warm weather foliage hides much of its facade, but the colder months allow for improved views of the house. This appears to be another one whose owner/occupant began a significant renovation and have since stopped, for reasons unknown.

Wolcott, VT

Wolcott VT – See the new basement foundation?

This house is full of architectural details & original windows.

The doors and windows are secure and blocked. Someone still cares about this house.

Looking up at the entryway.

Side view.

Original window, storm, and shutter in disrepair.

Possibly a kitchen window over a sink on the interior. Maybe this window was simply turned 90 degrees (see the change in clapboard pattern).

Another view of the front and side, with the basement foundation.

Interior view through broken window. Organized and stripped, but work was ongoing at some point.

Plaster ceiling, beadboard, stacked wood.

Weathered clapboard.

The house appears square and in good condition still; here’s to hoping its owners return.

Abandoned Vermont: Barre House

Abandoned for what looks like decades, this house is long gone, looking even worse on the interior than it does on the exterior. The interior, sadly, has been destroyed, missing floors, walls, joists, everything. But this house remains a story sitting on the sunny hillside down a dirt road. At one point, people lived here and loved this house.

An Italianate style house.

The frame of an outbuilding remains.

Closer view. You can see the windows were once boarded up, but now have mostly been removed.

A small porch. Note how the coat of paint stops above the porch nearest the eaves, as though no one could reach there.

Some paint here, some paint there. And the glass is no more in most of the windows.

Weathered and partially painted.

Aside from being completely destroyed on the inside, the exterior clapboard has been removed in places.

And that is one reason why we document: to remember, to see the potential, to hope we can prevent this from happening to other abandoned or neglected homes.

Winter Entrances

January thaw, you were nice while you were here in Vermont. Now we welcome February and the returning cold, snowy weather. Speaking of cold, opening an exterior door in the winter can rush in waves of freezing weather aside from the snow our boots track in the doors. In these cold climate states, winter is beautiful but often messy. Living in Vermont I’ve noticed exterior winter preparations that I haven’t seen elsewhere, whether New York or North Carolina. Most of us remove screens, put on or pull down storm windows, turn off the outside faucets, bring in fair weather plants, add water hog mats at our fronts doors, and keep shovels at hand.

Montpelier, VT. The entire hooded entrance is removed in the warm weather. The fanlight and sidelights of the entrance match those on this historic building. Historic integrity remains intact.

In Vermont, winter preparations go to another level. Lately I’ve noticed that many buildings have temporary winter entrance enclosures (see above). Rather than an open porch, a hooded, walled entrance can be installed on a building. This will provide energy savings, as well allow for less cleaning – take those boots off at the entrance! The Montpelier entrance is a good example of preserving historic integrity, even in the cold weather. Perhaps a good suggestion for residences and businesses. Have you seen any winter entrances where you live? Or other winter preparations?

Middlebury, VT. This actually is on the building year round, but it reminded me of the Montpelier example. Anyone from Middlebury? How is this different than it used to be? (This is not a quiz; it’s actually a question.)

Preservation Pop Quiz

What you see here is the interior of a a house, gutted of sheetrock and insulation (thanks, Hurricane Sandy). For orientation, the image shows a junction of two walls, where a wall from the main block of the house meets the wall of a now enclosed porch. The pop quiz question: what would you call the material in the center of the image? In other words, identify the grooved wood pieces.

Facade Additions

Additions to historic buildings are required, by the Secretary of the Interior’s Standards for Rehabilitation, to be sympathetic to and compatible with the existing building. Standard #9 is written as such:

New additions, exterior alterations, or related new construction will not destroy historic materials, features, and spatial relationships that characterize the property. The new work shall be differentiated from the old and will be compatible with the historic materials, features, size, scale and proportion, and massing to protect the integrity of the property and its environment.

Standard #10 is written as such:

New additions and adjacent or related new construction will be undertaken in a such a manner that, if removed in the future, the essential form and integrity of the historic property and its environment would be unimpaired.

With proper consideration and consultation, a good addition is usually possible. However, sometimes, you’ll come across a building that completely violates all forms and any thoughts of a good addition. Often, this will be an addition on the facade (the front of a building). Sometimes you won’t even realize that there is another building behind it. Take these examples:

Barre Street in Montpelier, VT. There is an Italianate building behind that storefront addition.

Main Street in Montpelier, VT. There is a small house behind that long front addition.

What do you think? Are facade additions ever appropriate? Considering how much of survey & determination of eligibility is based on the appearance of the street facade, it’s hard to imagine a good facade addition.

Sunday Churches

Churches are often photographed for Preservation in Pink, so here’s a good round up of beautiful architecture for good thoughts from all seasons.

East Clarendon, VT

Gaysville, VT

Bethel, VT

Waterbury, VT

Sudbury, VT

Simonsville, VT

Montpelier, VT

Montpelier, VT

An Episcopal church (Church of Our Savior) in Killington, Vermont.

West Guilford, VT Baptist Church

Shoreham Congregational Church in the Shoreham (Vermont) Village Historic District, which is listed in the State Register and eligible for inclusion in the National Register.

West Addison Methodist Church in West Addison, Vermont.

The Adirondack Community Church in Lake Placid, NY.

The Chapel in Lakeview Cemetery, Burlington VT.

United Baptist Church in East Poultney, VT.

Saint Genevieve Church in Shoreham, VT.

Middlebury Congregational Church in Middlebury, Vermont. Photograph taken in the warmer summer days.

Closer view of the 16th Street Baptist Church

Preservation Photos #164

Located near the Vermont College of Fine Arts in Montpelier, VT.