Popular lore credits "world’s skinniest building" to the Sam Kee Building in Vancouver, B.C. The building measures 4-foot-11 on the ground floor and 6 feet on the second floor to accommodate overhanging bay windows.
But Pittsburgh Mayor Bill Peduto said Monday that record keepers might want to reconsider, because Pittsburgh’s Skinny Building at the corner of Forbes Avenue and Wood Street measures just 5-foot-2 on each of its three floors.
Peduto called the structure, which was built in 1926, “our own unique, quirky little building.”
“And aren’t there are so many of them that dot downtown?” Peduto said. “Places that we think of when we think about our childhood. Places that we think of when we think about our first visit to Pittsburgh and looking up, and understanding how unique and beautiful this city is.”
The Skinny Building restoration is the most recent of 11 historic façade restorations downtown, thanks to a $4 million grant from the state’s Redevelopment Assistance Capital Program.
The state grant was originally intended to pay for restoration of just six facades, but the Pittsburgh History and Landmarks Foundation was able to stretch the money to nearly double the number of buildings restored.
Next to the Skinny Building on Wood Street sits the former John M. Roberts & Son Company Building, which underwent its own restoration through the same funding.
Tom Keffer, the foundation's property and construction manager, pointed to ornate canopies adorning the Roberts Building high above a small crowd Downtown. Crews restored its facing with an egg-and-dart-patterned copper cladding lit from the underside with soft, LED lighting, he said.
The Pittsburgh Urban Redevelopment Authority acquired both the Skinny Building and the Roberts Building and is working on figuring out how to best use the latter, which is too narrow to safely use beyond the first floor. Foundation President Arthur Ziegler said they will likely use the windows as a display of some sort.
URA director for economic development Robert Rubinstein said a lot of grant funding has been funneled toward large, whole-block projects, but that smaller façade restorations are important as well.
Boarded up windows can be disconcerting, he said.
“Let’s fill in that connective tissue. Let’s make these seamless zones so that when you’re walking form the ballpark into Market Square, that Market Street experience is going to be something that doesn’t scare you,” Rubinstein said.
As redevelopment continues in Pittsburgh, Peduto said it is important not to lose sight of the city’s past.
“As we see this growth happen, as we see all this new development happen, it has to happen in tandem … with taking along with us those gems from the 19th century, those amazing buildings that were built at the turn of the century when Pittsburgh was an industrial giant and to see that as part of our future as well,” Peduto said.
Landmarks Design Associates helmed architectural plans for both the Roberts and Skinny building restorations. Waller Construction served as lead contractor.
Other recent Downtown restorations include the Fifth Wood Building and adjoining buildings at 445 Wood St. and 254 Fifth Ave., Italian Sons and Daughters Building at the corner of Forbes and Wood, three cast iron façade buildings from 418-422 Wood St. and the Thompson’s Building at 435 Market St.
