During a recent visit to Pittsburgh, I visited the Cathedral of Learning at the University of Pittsburgh. At 535 feet, it’s the tallest university building in the nation and dominates the skyline east of downtown. Despite its name, it’s more skyscraper than cathedral. It’s also an historical and architectural landmark, built between 1926 and 1937 as an Art Deco “cake” with Gothic Revival “frosting.” For those of us working at historic house museums, what’s most interesting are the Nationality Rooms, a series of 29 classrooms on the first and third floors designed and furnished to represent different nations and ethnicities.
The classrooms vary in size but each have Continue reading