| Historic Name: |
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Common Name: |
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| Style: |
Modern |
Neighborhood: |
Wallingford |
| Built By: |
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Year Built: |
1953 |
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| Significance |
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This 5 unit apartment building was erected 1950-53. According to the building permit it was designed and built by the owner, Martin Donaldson (4510 Eastern Ave. N.) at an estimated cost of $20,000. It is significant as an example of the small apartment buildings, often just simple decorated boxes, that began to fill out the neighborhood in the years after the Second World War. It was built in an area of the neighborhood that is no longer zoned for multi family housing. In following the aesthetic tenants of the Modern movement, designers of this period made the most of stock materials to enliven very simple and efficient forms; this building is an instructive example of this approach.
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| Appearance |
| A five unit, two story frame apartment building on concrete foundation over a full basement. There are two apartments per floor on the first and second floors; the fifth apartment is in the daylight basement on the eastern side of the building. The structure is capped by a hipped roof so shallow that the ridge is barely visible from the street (the ridge runs parallel to the street). The detailing of the facia is so delicate that the roof almost disappear entirely. Some of the masonry veneer units are turned to expose a rough or broken surface to the weather, giving the wall surface some texture. This masonry veneer covers most of the building's exterior, relieved only at the window and door openings and by the vertically oriented wood paneling at the spandrels that visually connect the upper and lower story galzing units. The windows themselves are metal framed, horizontally oriented rectangles, divided into quadrants by muntin bars that appear almost too delicate. As is the case with many modern era buildings, the design of the structure is assisted by the "softening" offered by the mature landscaping and the neutral coloring of the once blazingly white spandrels. Except for this change to the coloring, the design does not appear to have been significantly modified. |
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