Architect Karen Loysen first got mixed up with 5115 Penn Avenue in Garfield six years ago. This winter, she and partner Peter Kreuthmeier and their small staff finally moved in.
The building – famous on the avenue for its distinctive arched-entrance façade – was one of the original 11 abandoned buildings that the Penn Avenue Arts Initiative took on when it formed in 1999 as a partnership between the nonprofits Bloomfield-Garfield Corporation and Friendship Development Associates.
When Loysen discovered the three-story brick building, it was missing a few things – namely, windows, floors and sections of the roof. Even the glass blocks that formed the front window had been systematically punched out, one by one. The renovation was “more like an organ transplant than cosmetic surgery,” says Kreuthmeier.
The building was also attached to a run-down frame house and shed next door, too far gone to be saved. In their place will be a modern courtyard, connected to the main building with wide glass doors. The demolition also let in light through original window openings that had been covered for decades. In the main building, the old red brick is now exposed, complemented with doorframes and other features in weathering steel.
The top two stories of the building have also been renovated into two one-bedroom loft-style apartments, with views that stretch all the way to the hillsides north of the Allegheny River.
The project would have never been completed without a long view of its own. “In 2003, I started to think, ‘this is never gonna happen,’” Loysen recalls. “It was clearly not a project where you could fix it up and leave. You’d have to be here for a long time; it’s quite a commitment to the neighborhood and the community.”
Source: Karen Loysen and Peter Kreuthmeier, Loysen + Kreuthmeier Architects
Photo copyright © Jonathan Greene