Learning from Lewisburg
5. What houses tell us.
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The compact old brick and stone houses by the river
along Water St. were built in the 18th Century by store keepers and
millers. The bulky Federal buildings from the early period of commercial
growth stretch from Front St. to Second St. The Hotel was built in
1831, two years before the canal arrived. Other fine buildings were
homes for grain merchants and the schoolmaster. |
| What house types tell us. |
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Three broad eras of American architectural ideology
are visible before you. |
A.
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The traditional, or folk, house type was a statement
of inclusion, a house built the "right" way to complement
the houses around it and permit the builder to endorse conformity.
Folk housing was stable in time (changing little over centuries) but
unstable in space (different here than elsewhere ... even nearby).
Otherwise identical folk houses consistently have slightly different
trim treatments only 40 miles from here. |
B.
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After 1880, "national" styles were rapidly
adopted, then considered passe within a short period for times. Styles
—Greek Revival, Gothic Revival, Italianate, etc. — swept
rapidly and sequentially through the entire Northeastern US, such
that many 19th Century houses can be dated to the decade by a cursory
look at their style. National styles, like popular culture of today,
are consistent over space — the same here as in Ohio —
but unstable in time, shifting rapidly over the years. |
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National styles of housing were expressions of the
class and wealth superiority of the builder compared to the adjacent
houses. National styles were adopted within wealthy towns such as
late-19th Century Lewisburg — but are nearly unknown in the
country side. National house styles gained importance as industrialization,
wealth, and communication gave both the means and the permission for
part of society to seek to demonstrate its perceived superiority.
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| C.
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"Modern" housing of the second
half of the 20th Century enables house owners to express their own
self-image, unconstrained by either a strong drive toward conformity,
as in the folk era, nor a clear sense of an evolving national style.
Modern houses satisfy the (perceived) domestic needs of the owner
and communicate little about the owners taste in any stylized language,
within the relatively anonymous discourse of contemporary cities.
Wealth, of course, still wishes to speak its own name. |
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Traditional vernacular architecture:
the 4-over-4 (referring to the room count in the standard floor plain)
was the standard Pennsylvania house for 250 years — a generally
symmetrical 2 or 2 1/2 story building with roof-ridge parallel the
road, built of any material. This house type is at root a farm structure,
ultimately designed for its capacity to contain a large family of
agriculturalists. |
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Earlier traditional houses were built
without rigid plans — see the uneven window and door spacing
and the slight asymmetry of the halves of this double. |
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Late traditional architecture —
by 1870 — is a highly formalized version of traditional styles.
Dimensions, spacing, and fancy finish are precise and replicable. |
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Hesitant early manifestations of national
styles comprise minor add-ons of stylish accoutrements to what is
basically a Pennsylvania farm house in lay-out ... does a cute little
campanile stuck on the front of this 4-over-4 building really make
it Italianate? |
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A confident national building, at last
— the Mansarded "Victorian" style house on University
Avenue is the one of the first to break from the rigid constraints
of the farm house roof line and floor plan. |
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"Modern" housing ... demonstrating
the owners self-image (wealth, leisure), unconstrained by any conventional
language of recognizable styles. Near Stein Lane, south of the university
golf course. |
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The large houses of 19th Century's wealthy families
line this main artery leading to the commercial district of town.
The wealth and interaction that the canal, and later the railroad,
brought induced the relative exuberance of the older buildings around
Lewisburg's market blocks, from Second to Fourth Sts. Classical Revival
architecture is rare for residences in Pennsylvania, but clubs, banks,
churches, and the courthouse are all done in elegant imported styles.
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The hotel, build in 1831, as the canal
was arriving. This hotel passed through its pathetic "Hotel/Motel"
phase in the 1960s and 1970s, when it catered to truck drivers and
featured frequent pool cue fights. Recently it's been renovated for
the carriage trade, with lots of oak and faux burnished brass. |
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Architectural exuberance of indeterminate,
eclectic style expresses the prestige of some 19th Century merchant
or professional |
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Interspersed with these are a few longtime local stores
— a framing gallery, a stationery store, Stamm's Art-Deco stainless-steel
appliance store, a bargain priced movie theater, and the in-town grocery.
Lost in recent memory are the local butcher, the old time drugstore,
the newsstand, and (several generations of bank buy-outs ago) all
the local banks. |
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Stamm's, a downtown appliance store,
remnant of the old small-town economy still able to hold out against
Sears' economic pressure. It is an enamel-and-stainless-steel remnant
of a bold earlier architectural moment, as well. |
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Frankly, the town is giving lessons in
gentrification, in redefining a traditional cultural landscape as
a locus of style and leisure. Beyond Front St. look for (at last tally
& in recent memory): the Guinness-certified pub, the earring store,
the glass / gold jewelry / leather wallet store, the Celtic everything
store, the art gallery, the fly fishing and mountain bike store, the
art gallery, the “collectibles” store, the cigar store, the beer-brewing
supplies store, the several pricey restaurants, the other art gallery,
the gourmet-coffee-and-new-age-personal-growth-bookstore, the the
Italian ices store (oops — now a chiropractor’s office), and
the ammunition store. |
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