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The Divine Lorraine isn't the only Willis G. Hale masterpiece to be passed around from developer to developer, begrudgingly prompting the phrase "I'll believe it when I see it."
The Keystone Bank Building, otherwise know by its' architect as The Hale Building, at Juniper and Chestnut has been an uncertainty since its unremarkable Valu-Plus closed a few years ago.
The bizarre building, which has been hacked up and altered about as many times as it's changed hands, is a pedestrian favorite amongst both locals and tourists. For years its upper floors served as a gay bathhouse. Hidden City showcased a spectacular walkthrough photographed by Michael Burlando, offering us a glimpse at what so many wonder: "What the hell is up there?"
Turns out, quite a bit of odd history but not much worth anything to developers. When scaffolding flanked the sidewalk, many had hoped that work had begun. Unfortunately the crumbling building had spawned fears in the city's office of Licenses & Inspections, and what looked like a construction site was just a safety precaution to keep concrete and stone from falling on passing by Instagrammers.
But if all goes according to plan, the Hale Building will be bought by Brickstone Realty Company, it's upper floors converted into offices with two restaurants on the ground floor.
Sure, as is the case with the Divine Lorraine, we've heard this all before. But Brickstone Realty isn't just one of the more experienced developers in the region, they also have a knack for acquiring uniquely historic properties and salvaging what makes them so special.
To put that into perspective, Brickstone renovated the Wanamaker Building and Lit Brothers on Market East.
Jacob Adelman of the Philadelphia Inquirer put together a great retrospective on the building's genealogy of tenants, a family tree that reads like a history of modern Philadelphia, all of which tell the kinds of stories that could write their own film noire.
With Chestnut Street's redevelopment and emergence as a shopping destination and Market East being rebranded for the first time since the Gallery at Market East opened, the Hale Building - modest in size - has always been a no-brainer. It's just been silently laying in wait for the right developer with the right ideas.
Philadelphia - historic as it may be - has always functioned as a working city and as a result, has no inherently true "historic districts". Center City's one seemingly historic district is the result of a mid-century attempt to reconstruct a Colonial past, one which is only as important as a number of other movements responsible for the PSFS Building, the Divine Lorraine, even the Cira Centre. The result, Society Hill's "historic district", is a collage of questionable reconstructions which sacrificed dozens of 18th and 19th century buildings, some by Willis Hale and Frank Furness. This attempt at architectural cohesiveness created a very peaceful, historic illusion, but compared to the rest of Center City is one of the less interesting neighborhoods to look at. Historic districts are important but it is just as important to respect the existing history of a neighborhood which has naturally evolved. The Keystone National Bank Building is a prime example. Is it more historically respectful to replicate the original facade which was replaced less than ten years after it was constructed, or do you pay homage to the five successive facades implemented over the following 100 years by designing something truly modern that represents the needs of the existing urban fabric of a culturally, historically, and architecturally diverse neighborhood? Unfortunately we usually fall somewhere in the middle, attempting to appease the devout advocates as well as the needs of the client, and we end up with bland, historic interpretations. Instead we should be replacing the avante garde masterpieces we've lost over the decades with exciting new architecture. An empty construction site or blank facade has the potential to be architecturally significant someday. In a city as aesthetically diverse as Philadelphia, architects should be creating tomorrow's history and not wasting their time recreating yesterday's.
Willis Hale's legacy in Philadelphia is often as macabre as his architecture. With the eerie Divine Lorraine, once home to the International Peace Movement Mission and Father Divine's followers, vacantly awaiting a new owner after being stripped of it's soul and left behind by an absent European investor, and the Keystone Bank Building's upper floors of the former Drucker's Bellevue Health Baths on Chestnut and Juniper quickly decaying above the retro-fitted Value Plus facade.
Unfortunately most of Hale's neo-Gothic Victorian examples were razed in the mid-century quest to return Philadelphia to its Colonial roots. These two in particular, arguably his most well known works, share a distinctly Halian identity.
Developer Alon Barzilay and architects JKR Partners have been in a debate with the Preservation Alliance for Greater Philadelphia on a rendering of what will be the latest of six interpretations of it's lower facade in the building's 123 year history. While Barzilay intends to fully restore the existing, historic masonry, the PAGP is concerned with JKR's interpretation of the 1960's addition. I just hope the roof survives the PAGP's stubbornness.
The numerous facades of the Keystone Bank Building - also known as the Lucas Building and the Hale Building - throughout its 123 year history. Seen here in 1893, 1900, 1930, 1955, 1970, Today, and JKR's rendering.
Everything and nothing is historic about the facade. It would only be fitting for its latest incarnation to be specifically dated to modern, 21st century architecture. Unless Barzilay plans to alter the remaining original details, any historical organization has no business dictating design. The PAGP can and should be offering suggestions, but it is not their place to halt progress based on the replacement of an insignificant facade. Their area of expertise is in existing, historical structures, not design, and they seem to have successfully hijacked an absolute authority over this building that they have no business exercising.
