Raleigh’s Richard B. Haywood House
About a month ago an article was published on this blog about Raleigh’s “nail buildings”. It cited two adjoining downtown businesses, Poole’s Diner and Doug Van de Zande’s photography studio, as examples. The term ‘nail house’ or ‘nail building’ is used to describe businesses or residences whose owners refuse to allow their buildings to be demolished, even in the face of development all around them. (The phrase refers to a nail in wood that is difficult to remove.) That description made me think of the historic Richard B. Haywood house, located at the corner of Edenton and Blount Streets. However, the encroaching development in this case is not a high-rise building or construction site, but a four-acre expanse of state government parking lots.
(Read the rest of this article …)
On the eastern fringe of downtown Raleigh an imposing Jacobean manor stands sentinel over the surrounding neighborhood. I am referring, of course, to the former Thompson School on East Hargett St. Although the school itself closed with the merger of the city and county public school systems in 1976, the building still bears a prominence in the community as Wake County’s A.A. Thompson Center.
(Read the rest of this article …)
From Treasure to Trash: The Demolition of the Wake County Courthouse
When I was a teenager back in the mid-1960s, Raleigh was fast losing all too many of its architecturally significant buildings to the wrecker’s ball. These included most of the grand Victorian homes on Blount Street, the magnificently turreted Chateauesque style Mansion Park Hotel, (which I referred to then as The Castle), the Jacobean style Hugh Morson High School, Sullivanesque Wachovia Bank building, Italian Renaissance Olivia Raney Library and Wake County’s Beaux Arts courthouse. Downtown Raleigh back then was a veritable treasure trove of late 19th and early 20th century American architecture.
(Read the rest of this article …)
At 8:45 Thursday night, a crowd gathered to see the most beautiful building in Raleigh have one side illuminated by thirteen hundred LEDs funded by Cree to create the most awe inspiring piece of public art to grace an urban area.
(Read the rest of this article …)
The Prince Hall Masonic Lodge
The photo above shows how the Prince Hall Masonic Lodge appeared in 1971. Below is how it appeared a few nights ago.
A recent post on this blog (Looking Due East From Above) captured a view of four structures that are now relics of Raleigh’s historic African American community. Among them* is the Prince Hall Masonic Lodge.
(Read the rest of this article …)
The Relocation of the Seaboard Railroad Office Building
While watching the relocation of the Merrimon-Wynne House last weekend, a friend jokingly remarked: “What historic house in Raleigh has NOT been moved from its original site?” Indeed, in the last thirty years or so, Raleigh has seen more than its fair share of “a whole lotta movin’ and a-shakin’ goin’ on.”
(Read the rest of this article …)
This is the side of the Convention Center as seen from Fayetteville St.
The former Heilig-Levine furniture store has always caught my attention when in the area around Wilmington and Hargett Streets. This building truly is one of the gems of the downtown area. Visible in Mr. Drie’s famous 1872 aerial map of Raleigh, it dates back to around 1870.
(Read the rest of this article …)
[photo credit: Jonathan Pulley]
Pictured above is WRAL/FOX50 Studios on Western Boulevard as captured by Jonathan Pulley, a reader of this site. This building was mentioned just a few days ago in the article titled G. Milton Small - Best Architect Ever?.
(Read the rest of this article …)
