Midtown’s Sun Theater is So Appealing

Few vacant buildings in St. Louis are as captivating to me as midtown’s Sun Theater. Why is that? The massing & detailing is pleasant but not extraordinary. The materials used compliment each other nicely. But what if the neon sign were gone? See a nighttime photo of the sign at Cinema Treasures.

Michael Allen successfully argues the appeal is not the sign, but the facade:

The Sun’s main attraction is its gorgeous neoclassical front elevation, articulated by glazed cream terra cotta, a projecting cornice and striking framed brick panels. The terra cotta includes theatrical grotesques over the arched windows at center and in the cornice’s upper garland course. These grotesques and other pieces are accented with a brilliant blue glaze. Two fluted pilasters with ionic capitals at the center bay over the entrance project a sense of gravitas contrasting with the more Baroque sensibilities of the rest of ornament.

Landmark’s Association placed the Sun on their Most Endangered List in 2007:

Putting the *Sun Theater at 3627-31 Grandel Square on our endangered list is merely an early warning. The pedestrian-friendly Renaissance Revival theater, built by the German Theater Society in 1913 from plans by Widmann & Walsh, is graced by an elaborately decorated front elevation complete with grotesque theatrical masks and heavy garlands. Inside, the $120,000 playhouse originally featured an 1800-seat, first-floor theater for German-speaking stock companies; a lecture hall was located on the second floor. The 1915 City Directory documents the two original names in use at the same time: The Victoria Theatre and The German Theatre.

With World War I came a national backlash against Germans and the theatre closed. Reopened after the war under new management as The Liberty, the building (with seating reduced to 1000) has since housed movies, vaudeville, burlesque, a night club and an evangelical church. (Later name changes included the World, the Sun and the Lyn.) LANDMARKS’ Midtown National Register nomination from 1978 described the remains of the interior as follows: “Bits of maroon, red and gold are faintly visible through the gloom of an interior picked by scavengers.” Vacant since 1981 and now owned by the city’s Land Reutilization Authority (LRA), the exterior (sporting volunteer trees and a cheerful “Sun” sign installed and maintained by Grand Center) is starting to show alarming signs of deferred maintenance. Recent hopeful rumors suggest that a media-related reuse is under consideration.

Apparently the Grand Center Arts Academy plans to renovate the building as an expansion of their newly renovated space next door, to the east. Let’s hope they, or anyone, renovates and occupies the structure soon.

– Steve Patterson

Readers: Find Another Way to Stop Meth

In the poll last week readers made it clear they don’t want to need a prescription to buy common cold & allergy medication:

Q: Should St. Louis County & City Require Prescriptions for Cold & Allergy Medicines to Stop the Production of Meth?

1. No, don’t punish innocents in an effort to stop the illegal activities of a few 52 [48.6%]
2. Yes, meth is a regional problem 26 [24.3%]
3. Only if the other four counties agree to fund homeless services in the city 12 [11.21%]
4. No, rural counties don’t care about our problems, why should we help them? 8 [7.48%]
5. Other answer… 7 [6.54%]
6. Unsure/no opinion 2 [1.87%]

So much for regional cooperation. Here are the seven other answers:

1. no, current laws are strict enough (and just shifting production to Mexico)
2. Put it behind the counter
3. These choices are ridicules. Yes, by prescription, to protect the innocent.
4. Why isn’t the electronic tracking system, in place now, doing the job?
5. Could write the law to expire in a few years?
6. What do homeless services have to do with cold
7. No. This will drive up the cost of the medicine by forcing everyone to see docs

The answer with the most votes was not originally one I provided.  The poll software allows me to convert a reader submitted answer into an official poll answer, which I did early on the first day of this poll.

– Steve Patterson

New Hyde Park Homes Never Occupied

I shouldn’t have been surprised when I made the connection: tacky faux-historic new house in ruins with numerous ties to realtor & developer Mary “One” Johnson.

St. Louis is littered with half-finished developments started by one of Johnson’s numerous companies.  Johnson is also the vice chair of St. Louis’ Preservation Board.

Hopefully the economy has stopped the proliferation of these sad little boxes. We have enough nice buildings that are vacant & boarded, we don’t need these adding to the problem.

– Steve Patterson

Can St. Louis Learn From Newark NJ & Cory Booker?

I’ve seen Cory Booker  on TV and in the news. Booker is the young mayor of Newark NJ. To some of you, 42 may not be young, but anything younger than me (44) is young in my book.

I’ve been to Newark once.  More accurately, I saw the highway exit as I was driving to Rhode Island in January 2008. I wanted to stop and visit, but my schedule didn’t permit.

Troubled cities are attractive to me for some reason, perhaps the challenge of reversing negative trends? Newark, like Detroit and St. Louis, has serious issues.  I knew in 2008 that Newark had this new mayor, 37 when he was elected mayor. Booker’s lost to 4-term incumbent Sharpe James in 2002 but when James didn’t seek a 6th term in 2006 Booker won the non-partisan election.

As I watched Street Fight, the documentary of the 2002 race, I couldn’t help think of parallels to St. Louis:

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R8jtAASYdLw

Old urban city with a large African-American population, poor performing public schools, poverty & high crime, entrenched machine politics and the dirty tricks that go along with that to discourage challengers.

Famed urban engineer Harland Bartholomew worked for Newark before coming to St. Louis.  We’d have been better off had he stayed there.

Newark does have some differences from St. Louis. Their elections are non-partisan, their municipal council has only 9 members – five from wards and four at-large. Corruption in Newark is so bad “where every mayor since 1962 (except the current one, Cory Booker) has been indicted for crimes committed while in office.” (Newsweek)

I plan to learn more about Newark’s efforts to reduce violent crime, improve schools and attract jobs. I’ve started watching episodes of Sundance Channel’s Brick City series.

– Steve Patterson

Poll: Should Preservation Review be Citywide or Continue Ward-by-Ward?

The city of St. Louis is divided into 28 wards and each alderman has authority over his/her ward, the city as a whole be damned.

As the above map show, eight of the twenty-eight wards are excluded from the city’s other  Preservation Review Districts:

Any demolition application in a Preservation Review District will be referred by the Building Division to the Cultural Resources Office for review. No demolition permit may be issued without the approval of the Office.

Criteria for Review:

The Office will consider these criteria in making its determination:

• redevelopment plans passed by ordinance;
• the building’s architectural quality;
• its structural condition;
• the demolition’s effect on its neighborhood;
• the building’s potential for reuse;
• urban design factors;
• any proposed subsequent construction;
• any commonly-controlled property.

So in 30% of the city buildings can be razed without any review by the staff hired to protect our cultural history. There are some exceptions, such as the 7th ward. It appears the CBD does have preservation review and other parts of the ward would be reviewed as part of of a National Register historic district. The same thing occurs in parts of the other seven non-review wards. Forget Team Four, lack of preservation review in six north side wards has done great damage.

But ward boundaries change this year due to redistricting. Preservation Review districts don’t automatically change, these must also be changed with new legislation.  That is, unless it was simplified and covered the entire city. Here is an example of the description of one of twenty districts:

PRESERVATION REVIEW DISTRICT THIRTEEN

Beginning at the intersection of the centerlines of Kingshighwayand Lindell, and proceeding in a generally clockwise direction east along the centerlines to Taylor, north to Maryland, east to Boyle, south to West Pine, east to Sarah, south to Laclede, east to Spring, south to Market, east to Grand, north to the Forest Park Parkway, east to Compton, south to Chouteau, west to Grand, south to Park, west to 39th, south to Blaine, west to Tower Grove, south to Interstate 44, west to Kingshighway, north to the St. Louis & San Francisco Railway tracks, west to Hampton, north to Manchester, west to Graham, north to Oakland, east to the southern prolongation of Euclid, north to Barnes Hospital Plaza, west to Kingshighway, and north to the point of beginning. (source)

Think of all the staff time to write new legislation, to alter the city’s property database.

My loft will go from being in the 6th ward to the 5th ward, from preservation review to non-review. The buildings above, in the block to the west of me,  will also go from 6th to 5th, will suddenly be at greater risk of being razed without public input once the preservation review districts are revised. The substation is on Landmark’s 2010 Most Endangered List.

All this is to introduce the poll question for this week: Should Preservation Review be Citywide or Continue Ward-by-Ward?  The poll is located in the upper right corner of the blog.

– Steve Patterson