#lost architecture

[webdiggerxxx]

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[seraphica]

Cincinatti's Old Main Library

Officially opened in 1874, the Old Main Library in Cincinnati, Ohio, was a behemoth of wrought iron and books. A glass ceiling, heated marble floor, and wooden furnishings made for a building fit for a fairytale.

Unfortunately, the library's need for space quickly outgrew its premises, while other issues with the building accumulated over the years. In 1955, it was demolished and the various parts sold off for scrap. The building site is now a parking garage.

[learn more / sources]

[alovelywaytospendanevening]

Pickfair was a sprawling estate in Beverly Hills, California purchased and further renovated in 1919 by silent film actress Mary Pickford and her husband Douglas Fairbanks, the "Queen and King of Hollywood." The 25-room mansion was named by combining parts of their last names ("Pick" + "fair").

Pickfair was considered one of the most celebrated private homes of America, and became a famous symbol of Hollywood glamour and excess in the 1920s/30s. It hosted iconic parties with famous guests like Charlie Chaplin, Albert Einstein, Amelia Earhart, Helen Keller, F. Scott Fitzgerald and presidents Coolidge and Roosevelt. Life magazine described it as “a gathering place only slightly less important than the White House… and much more fun.”

After divorcing Douglas Fairbanks in 1936, Mary Pickford married actor Charles "Buddy" Rogers and continued living in Pickfair until her death, in 1979. A new owner, actress Pia Zadora, eventually demolished the mansion in 1990, despite some outcry. Zadora later claimed the place was haunted: “You can deal with termites, and you can deal with plumbing issues, but you can’t deal with the supernatural.”

A new mansion stands on the site bearing no resemblance to the original Pickfair.

[vanpeltfoto]

blork

(Photo: d.)

[ufoandmermaid]

Cliff House, San Francisco, 1906.

[itsr0bin]

Villa Wilmer / Tränenburg (1890 - 1971)

(also know as The Palace of Tears)

Location: Hanover, Lower Saxony, Germany.

Photograph by: Karl Friedrich Wunder (c.1890)

After the heirs of Friedrich Willmers sold their villa to Hannoversche Industries in 1970, it was immediately scheduled for demolition for the purpose of building new apartment - which now has turn into a parking lot!

[gentlyepigrams]

The Midway Gardens by Frank Lloyd Wright. This Beer Garden style/entertainment venue was in Hyde Park, Chicago. Constructed 1914, it was demolished 15 years later due to mismanagement and bankruptcy.

[actiniaria]

Golden hour on the dismantled railway.