I was in Brooklyn the other day and happened across this: a quite nice terra cotta facade on a building with the Studebakername in the parapet. The windows of the first three floors and the facade at those floors within the project piers is a little odd, but overall a very good buiding. It turns out that the …
The side of a rowhouse in Brooklyn. There’s a wide-flange steel beam sticking out of it, painted to match the wall. It’s not original to the house because (a) traditional New York rowhouses didn’t include steel framing, even if some have had it installed during alterations, (b) at the time the house was built, wide-flange …
I know what you’re all thinking as you look at that photo: you’re wondering where I got my incredible fashion sense. I have to disappoint and say that I’m going to be discussing the cast-iron manhole cover. The first part is easy. “DPW” is the city’s Department of Public Works. That agency was in existence …
The 15 Broad Street site has a narrow wing facing Wall Street that extends north from the main block of the building. The picture above shows that wing as empty space: the gap between the Morgan Building on the right and 37 Wall Street (another building where I performed FISP work in 1989, before it …
A few months after the foundation excavation started, in the winter of 1927, the first steel was erected at 15 Broad Street. The cranes, the riveted built-up columns, and the column splices are all details I’ve pointed out in other old construction photos. This one happens to clearly show the temporary guy wires used to …
