LITMIR.BIZ

      The Taft Museum of Art features paintings by American and European masters.

      BOUNDARIES: Plum St., Court St., Pike St., Fourth St.

      DISTANCE: 3 miles

      DIFFICULTY: Easy

      PARKING: Metered parking on streets; $1 parking for up to 59 minutes at 2 garages, including Fountain Square

      PUBLIC TRANSIT: Metro (go-metro.com) and TANK (tankbus.org) buses serve downtown with routes radiating from Government Square. Cincinnati Bell Connector streetcar (cincinnatibellconnector.com) connects The Banks, downtown, and Over-the-Rhine with 18 stations. Cincinnati Red Bike (cincyredbike.org) has bicycle rental stations at Fountain Square, Duke Energy Convention Center, Main Library, and elsewhere.

      As Ohio’s third-largest city, Cincinnati benefits from a downtown that is walkable and easy to navigate, mostly because it was built before the invention of the automobile. Although most streets are one-way and connect with a freeway ramp or other major thoroughfare, downtown has retained its human scale. It has a growing mix of entertainment options, green spaces that encourage both interaction and relaxation, and diverse architecture. Eateries boast a range of flavors and ethnicities, while Broadway tour productions and museums offer people multiple ways to spend their days. In all, downtown Cincinnati is a good place to experience city life.

      Walk Description

Start your tour with a cup of coffee at Booksellers on Fountain Square inside Fountain Place. Maybe you bought this book there! Across the street is Fountain Square, Cincinnati’s primary public space and its heart since 1871. Enlarged and remodeled most recently in 2005, Fountain Square serves as the site of free concerts, festivals, demonstrations, and relaxation year-round. At its center is the Tyler Davidson Fountain, possibly Cincinnati’s most recognizable landmark, dedicated in 1871 and named in honor of hardware magnate Henry Probasco’s brother-in-law and business partner. Aside from the fountain, Probasco is known for his historic Oakwood mansion in Clifton.

Walk south on Vine Street and turn right on Fifth Street. On the left is Carew Tower, Cincinnati’s second-tallest building. Built in 1930 and rising 49 stories, it offers spectacular views of the city for $4 from its observation deck. Carew Tower and the adjoining Hilton Cincinnati Netherland Plaza together create one of the nation’s finest French Art Deco ensembles. The hotel is a member of Historic Hotels of America, a program of the National Trust for Historic Places. Its famed shopping arcade is the final point of this tour.

Turn right on Race Street. On the left, between Fifth and Sixth Streets, is the headquarters for 84.51°. This nine-story, charcoal-gray, concrete tower features an asymmetrical zipper design with first-floor restaurant space. Past Fountain Place on the right is the former Terrace Plaza Hotel. Designed by Skidmore, Owings, & Merrill and built in 1948, the hotel was the first major building to rise in downtown after World War II and the first International Style hotel building constructed in the United States. Architectural historians claim it as one of America’s Modern Movement buildings. Cincinnati’s Terrace Plaza Hotel: An Icon of American Modernism, by Shawn Patrick Tubb, is a good source of additional reading on this often-misunderstood building. As this book was going to press, development offers continued to be presented and considered. Across from Terrace Plaza Hotel on Sixth Street is The Cincinnatian Hotel, the city’s finest surviving French Second Empire building from 1882.

      Cross Sixth Street and enter the Race Street Historic District, a group of 24 contributing buildings listed on the National Register of Historic Places. The Streamline Moderne building at 604 Race St. was originally a two-story J.J. Newberry department store and is now Newberry Lofts on Sixth. For a quick alley tour, turn right on Morand Alley and then left on College Street. To the right is the rear of the former Cincinnati Enquirer Building, at 617 Vine St. Designed by the firm of Lockwood Greene and Company and completed in 1926, it is now a Hampton Inn and Homewood Suites. To the left is the gleaming back side of the Macy’s Inc. Building, at 7 W. Seventh St. Turn left on Seventh Street and walk to Race Street, one of downtown’s most impressive corners. The four buildings contributing to this epicenter of urban architecture include (clockwise from the southwest corner) Shillito Place, Pearl Market Bank Building (1910), The Groton (1895), and Jewelers Exchange (1915). The most notable building is the massive John Shillito & Co. department store. Designed by James McLaughlin and built in 1878 (and modernized in 1937), it originally featured five elevators and is considered a precursor to Marshall Field’s State Street flagship store in Chicago. The landmark building is now Lofts at Shillito Place apartments. It served as a set for the movie Carol, starring Cate Blanchett and Rooney Mara and filmed almost entirely in Cincinnati in early 2014.

      Backstory: Betts-Longworth Historic District

      The Betts-Longworth Historic District on the eastern edge of the West End is named for its early landowners: William Betts and Nicholas Longworth. Betts owned 111 acres in the West End where he and his family farmed and ran a brickyard. His house, the oldest brick house in Ohio still on its original site, stands at 416 Clark Street and is now a museum. The family slowly began subdividing their property in the early 1800s, around the same time Longworth acquired 33 acres adjacent to the Betts parcel. Longworth immediately divided his entire property for development, including selling a small lot on Chestnut Street to a Jewish congregation for a cemetery, now the oldest Jewish cemetery west of the Allegheny mountains. The neighborhood was home to well-to-do businessmen, including architects Henry and William Walter, department store owners Frederick Alms and William Doepke, jeweler Frank Herschede, and James Gamble, cofounder of P&G.

      Turn right on Race Street and walk to Garfield Place and then Piatt Park, the city’s oldest park. Donated to the city in 1817, the park stretches between Vine and Elm Streets. A bronze statue of President James Garfield stands at the east end of the park. On the south side of the park is the Doctor’s Building (19 Garfield Pl.), a stunning Late Gothic Revival building from 1923 that serves as headquarters for LPK, an international design agency. North of the park is Cuvier Press Club Building (22 Garfield Pl.), a rare surviving Italian Renaissance residence designed by Samuel Hannaford and built in 1861.

Turn left on Garfield Place and walk past Gramercy on Garfield and Greenwich apartment buildings to the statue of William Henry Harrison on horseback at Elm Street. Cross Elm Street to Скачать книгу