I had the opportunity to explore more of Covington, Kentucky, which is directly across the Roebling Bridge from Cincinnati. There is a stunning quarter of houses built around and after the Civil War to the northeast of the approaches to the bridge, with houses in various styles. You can walk or bike to your office…
Tag: Kentucky
Newport, Kentucky
Alright, alright, we’re done with Cincinnati, at least for a year or so until I go back. But before we head back to St. Louis, we’re going to visit the two historic suburbs across the river in Kentucky. We’ll start with Newport, which is one of those surprises I never expected to find across the…
Old Louisville, Part Three
Finishing up the Old Louisville neighborhood, we encounter older houses, including one from the Second Empire and also several from the Italianate style. Three story Italianate townhouses such as these were once common in St. Louis, but they are now almost entirely erased in urban renewal. It is interesting to see how these houses would…
Old Louisville, Part Two
Continuing our look around the Old Louisville neighborhood of Louisville, we see an evolution of styles, but again, they are in keeping with what we would expect to see in St. Louis. In this case, we now see what would be best described as Renaissance Revival. Also, there are houses that have elements of the…
Old Louisville, Part One
I thought it would be interesting to look at neighborhoods close to the downtowns of several major cities in proximity to St. Louis that I had visited in 2021. I have often noted that you just can’t walk to residential neighborhoods from downtown in St. Louis; there are train tracks, vast swaths of vacant land…
Jefferson County Courthouse, Louisville Metro Hall
I realized I had gotten away from posting photos from my trip to the northeastern Midwest, and continuing on my theme of the Greek Revival that I had been examining in St. Charles County, I thought I would look at two excellent examples of that style, the first in Louisville, Kentucky. Originally built as the…
The Roebling Bridge, Between Cincinnati and Covington
One of the most important bridges in the history of architecture and engineering spans the Ohio River in between Cincinnati, Ohio and Covington, Kentucky. Opened in 1866, years before the revolutionary Eads Bridge in St. Louis, it served as the important prototypical step for the Brooklyn Bridge in New York. Construction faced the same challenges:…
Cave Hill Cemetery, Louisville
St. Louis was not the only city in America to embrace the rural cemetery movement. Louisville has Cave Hill Cemetery. Two famous men are buried there, and colored lines lead visitors to their graves. A green line leads you to the grave of Muhammad Ali. On the day I was there, beautiful flowers and inspirational…
St. Mary’s Cathedral, Basilica of the Assumption, Interior, Covington, Kentucky
The interior of Covington Cathedral is no less impressive than the exterior. And first to note: the presence of real stone groin vaulting! In St. Louis churches the builders usually cheated with the much easier wood timber vaults. It’s wonderful to see them made from stone. But the expression of the Gothic style here is…
St. Mary’s Cathedral, Basilica of the Assumption, Exterior, Covington, Kentucky
Who would have thought that one of the magnificent cathedrals in America was waiting to be discovered in the industrial suburb of Covington, on the south bank of the Ohio River opposite Cincinnati? While the Archdiocese of Cincinnati is on the north side of the river, the Diocese of Covington covers the south side of…