I looked at Fifth Street back in May of 2019 in St. Charles, and this time we went one block to the northwest, in what was the former St. Charles Commons, to North Benton Street. The houses reflect the wide variety of architectural styles of the Nineteenth Century as the city moved up from the…
Tag: St. Charles
St. Charles Borromeo and Shrine of Saint Philippine Duchesne, St. Charles
The parish of St. Charles Borromeo, which dates back to 1791, is named after an important Catholic Reformation archbishop of Milan and is the namesake of the city of St. Charles, as well. The current building dates from 1872, like many churches in the St. Louis region, and is an excellent much more pure example…
The Missouri River at St. Charles
We next went down to the Missouri River, which of course has been highly modified by the Army Corps of Engineers. There is the famous railroad bridge to the east, and I normally would have consulted Bridgehunter.com, but there is a new update about what the heck happened to that valuable website. It’s interesting that…
Main Street, St. Charles, Revisited
We were wandering down Main Street in St. Charles and realized I hadn’t really taken very good photos of these buildings, which are primarily in the Greek Revival style. I’ve photographed some of them before in September of 2014. These are some very old houses, and their backsides are of interest, too. Most are built…
Streets of St. Charles
I was out visiting a friend two Saturdays ago, and I was intrigued by the “new urbanism” development of the Streets of St. Charles. It’s becoming increasingly common for wealthier suburbs of major cities to build these mixed-use developments, where there are ground floor restaurants and stores below apartments or condos. There’s usually a hotel…
Frenchtown, St. Charles
North Second Street in St. Charles goes through an interesting neighborhood named Frenchtown, not to be confused with the area of the same name in St. Louis just south of downtown. This area was developed after the original French settlement, and there is some really great architecture. St. Charles wants the area to attract young…
Fifth Street and Environs, St. Charles
The Roman Catholic Church of St. Charles Borromeo dominates the northeastern part of town away from St. Charles’s downtown. There are more beautiful examples of Second Empire and Italianate houses and apartment buildings lining Fifth Street, which is wider through here and a main artery. There are also what I might call proto-Romanesque Revival cottages.
Jefferson Avenue, St. Charles
The architecture of St. Charles is interesting, because it follows the same styles as St. Louis, but yet expresses them in a different way, more akin to small towns. For starters, the lots are not long and skinny like the vast majority in St. Louis so the houses in St. Charles are more rectangular on…
Second Street Houses, St. Charles
Up above Main Street, on Second Street, are these wonderful Italianate cottages that look to be from the mid Nineteenth Century. Sometimes I get a little tired of all the flat roofs in St. Louis, and it’s fun to see these houses for a change of pace.
Queen Anne House, St. Charles
Moving up the hill, there is a row of houses that is anchored with a brick Queen Anne style house. With its complicated roof structure and fenestration on a hilly lot, it strikes quite the pose. It’s fascinating how in smaller towns like this, you can watch the passage of time and housing styles block…