Baltimore Building of the Week: Old Loyola College

Revealing his fondness for the history of his own institution, Dr. John Breihan, a professor of history at Loyola University Maryland, offers this week’s Baltimore Building of the Week on the historic buildings of St. Ignatius Church and Old Loyola College, used since the 1970s as the home of Center Stage,

Image courtesy Jack Breihan

Just a few blocks away from the Peabody, stretching along Calvert Street between Madison and Monument Streets, stands another massive Italian palace, built for another educational institution. The patron here was the Society of Jesus, a Catholic religious order. Again, we see arched windows with elaborate moldings, and a heavy Italianate cornice unifying the northern half, containing St. Ignatius Church (designed by Louis L. Long and completed in 1856) with the southern (designed by O’Connor and Delaney of New York and finished in 1899). Besides the parish church, this huge redbrick palace housed Loyola College and Loyola High School until they split into two separate institutions and moved away in 1922. Since the mid-1970s the long vacant southern section has been imaginatively re-used for two theaters designed by James Grieves and the firm of Ziger, Hoopes, and Snead for the Center Stage repertory theater.

Baltimore Building of the Week: Peabody Institute

If you enjoyed the tour of the Peabody Library during our 50th Anniversary Celebration back on June 11, you will likely enjoy this week’s entry in our Baltimore Building of the Week series on the Peabody Institute,

Image courtesy Jack Breihan

Although a long row of Italianate rowhouses (think Union Square) could look like one of the urban palaces of the Italian Renaissance, Baltimore boasts a few genuine Italianate palaces. In 1857 the international philanthropist George Peabody endowed Baltimore with an institute devoted to music and the arts. The architect Edmund G. Lind designed its initial building in 1859 and a large addition containing a fireproof library built 1875-78. Although the magnificent cast-iron Peabody Library draws the most attention, Lind has done an excellent job uniting the exterior facades of the two buildings beneath a heavy Italianate cornice and balustrade.

Baltimore Building of the Week: Italianate Conversions

Finishing up our series on Italianate rowhouses is this week’s post focuses on Italianate conversions in older neighborhoods such as Federal Hill and Fells Point,

Image courtesy Jack Breihan

The Italianate style, with its consistent cornice line, made for uniform and stately rows of identical houses. In older federal and Greek Revival style rowhouse neighborhoods, however, it had the opposite effect. The imposing cornices reminiscent of the palaces of the Renaissance – and the full-height top storey beneath them – proved so popular that Baltimoreans either tore down their old dormered or Greek Revival rowhouses or converted them to the Italianate style. The result is a romantic jumble of differing rooflines that lends a peculiar charm to older neighborhoods like Fells Point and Federal Hill.

Image courtesy Jack Breihan

Behind the Scenes Tour of the Irish Shrine at Lemmon Street

Diminutive but nationally significant, Baltimore’s Irish Shrine at Lemmon Street offers a rare glimpse of immigrant home life in America in the middle of the 19th century. Please join us for a tour of the Shrine, two restored 1848 alley houses in the Hollins Market neighborhood, with our hosts from the Shrine and its affiliate, the Railroad Historic District Corporation.

Image courtesy Jack Breihan

Tour Information

Dates: Wednesday, June 23, 2010 / Thursday, June 24, 2010
Time: 5:30 to 6:00 PM wine and cheese reception
6:00 to 7:00 PM tour
Place: 900 Lemmon Street – one block north of the B&O Railroad Museum
Parking is available along nearby streets
Cost: $15 (includes wine and cheese reception)
Registration: Click Here to Register
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Baltimore Building of the Week: Italianate Rowhouses

Our Baltimore Building of the Week series from Dr. John Breihan returns with Italianate Rowhouses, the second entry in our three part series on Italianate Rowhouses,

Franklin Square, image courtesy Jack Breihan

Italianate rowhouses, popular in Baltimore from the 1850s until the 1880s and beyond, were particularly suited to long, uniform rows beneath uniform carved cornices. They formed stately “street walls” around Baltimore’s squares and along principal thoroughfares like Broadway. Pictured here are Waverly Terrace, circa 1850, on Franklin Square, and the north side of Union Square, circa 1880. The latter contains the home of the Sage of Baltimore, Henry Mencken, now owned by the City of Baltimore.

Union Square, image courtesy Jack Breihan