7521 Graymore Road, House

We recently looked at the very memorable Parkstone Dwellings, which were commissioned by siblings Harry and Rose Rubins. 

Rose commissioned 7521 Graymore Road, and there's a hint of the Parkstone Dwellings in them -- a slight nod to the tiled "Oriental rugs" that hang over the side. This tiled design spruces (Scheiblers!) up a two-story window seat on an otherwise plainer house. 

There is also an original tile over the front door.

Graymore Road is a treasure hunt in itself. It's just steps off of Braddock Avenue, across from the Old Heidelberg, and borders the eastern edge of Frick Park. The little cluster of out-of-the-way homes is quiet and hilly.

The winding road down to the noise and traffic of Braddock Avenue. 

Graymore Road is a private road, the kind where people look out from their yards as though to say, "How did you even find us?" But Porter and I headed that way anyway. I can't imagine a girl with a camera can look very threatening with this face in tow.

Highland Towers, 340 South Highland Avenue, apartments

Are you ready for a treat? Tonight I'm going to show you Shadyside's amazing historic landmark, designed in 1913-14: Highland Towers. 

When it opened on Highland Avenue, Highland Towers Apartments was the height of modernity. The building, which originally contained four 10-room flats, featured such modern wonders as telephones, electrical connections in every room, clothes dryers, a central vacuum cleaning system, a Modulated Vapor System adjustable for each room and a room for servants in each unit.

While the Old Heidelberg promised cozy, fairy tale-like spaces, Highland Towers boasted a high-class home that was the product of modern art and science. The flats' living rooms, dining rooms and solariums were located towards the front of the building, with the bedrooms, libraries and servants' rooms towards the back.

Today, Highland Towers has been much-altered. The four flats are now 36 apartments. 

The front sides are covered with tile mosaics!

Like me, Porter remains ever-hopeful that someday, someone will invite us inside.

This building, unlike so many of Scheibler's others, sprawls right to the sidewalk. There is, however, a small garden court above the sidewalk (between the two staircases) for the eyes of the residents. 

This is just to show you the side and rear. Even the side has been artfully designed! The building's original brochure promises a garage with rooftop gardens, but unfortunately, I didn't go looking for it. I should have.

Now for an extra treat... Franklin West, the company that manages Highland Towers, has photos of the incredible interior on their website. I can not get over the art glass, arches, fireplaces, built-in dressers and other details.

You can visit their site over here, or check out my favorites below. Of course, I did not take these photos.

See how some rooms are divided by 3/4 walls.

Parkstone Dwellings, 6937-6943 Penn Avenue

What a treat! Today I get to show you the romantic, whimsical Parkstone Dwellings!

I'm thinking it like this: The Parkstone Dwellings!!! 

Many people who have never even heard of Frederick Scheibler know of "that building in the East End that looks like it has Oriental rugs hanging over the side."

The Parkstone Dwellings, an absolutely amazing Historic Landmark on Penn Avenue, are a true testament to Scheibler's imagination. The building is magical from the inside out. 

First of all, there are four side-by-side front entries, ornamented with concrete toad stools and stained glass twining-roses. The four separate doors make these homes dwellings instead of apartments--as Aurand writes, they are "private beyond the first stoop."

He compares the roof's multiple, delicate folds to origami. There is also, apparently, a random and fully sculpted seagull perched on the southeast corner of the facade.

See how the chimney stands at the center of the house. Martin Aurand explains that the fireplace flues have to jut at odd angles over the entrances to make this design decision possible.

Click to enlarge this!

And the rounded windows look like turrets!

One day several years ago, I saw that there was an estate sale in the garden of the Parkstone Dwellings. I made a beeline for it. I begged for a tour and, since there was a vacant dwelling at that time, got to go inside. 

I felt like I was absolutely bewitched. It was stunning. And best of all, the architecture seems playful for the sake of playfulness. After basking in the Parkstone Dwellings, I know I could never, ever live in a boring cookie-cutter home.

What you'll see now are the dreadfully bad photos I managed to snap with the only camera I had when I stumbled upon that estate sale--my free-with-the-plan LG Cosmos cell phone camera. Here goes.

This is one of the tile mosaics that, from Penn Avenue, looks like a regal rug draped over the balcony. The tiles were reportedly arranged and assembled by Scheibler himself, because he just couldn't trust anyone else to do it.

The "rugs" were reportedly requested by Harry Rubins and his sister Rose Rubins, who commissioned the home. They lost the home at sheriff's sale just ten years after it was built.

Front door with stained glass

The massive fireplace just inside the front door. You can't see the mosaic detail in this photo but the interior mosaics depict panthers and kingfishers.

Living room, paneled with Laguna mahogany

Art glass again. Look to the left!

Living room, looking into the dining room. Amazing art glass details.

Dining room

My friend Ken in the bedroom, with window seat. 

Ken again in the shower, which had body sprayers! 

Second bathroom

Hallway ceiling painted to look like sky. This is a recent detail, but large murals are historically appropriate in houses like this.

Fireplace detail from Martin Aurand's The Progessive Architecture of Frederick G. Scheibler, Jr.

The Parkstone Dwellings were somewhat later work, designed in 1922. 

It's hard to articulate the thrill that Scheibler's architecture gives me, but this building leaves me breathless. It's one thing to appreciate art. But this is art you can go inside, and live inside--art that stands and survives time and weather for a century or more. My heart flutters with both love and longing, to be inside it, to look at it, to photograph it, to smell it, and to lay my hand against the walls and try to absorb the decades of history that unfolded inside it. 

I hope I get to go inside the Parkstone Dwellings again one day.

Update! May 3, 2015: Article and photos published

Click over here to read an article in the Tribune-Review about Scheibler's work in Pittsburgh.

It comes with these and other great photos: