Buildings Tell a Tale

By

Oldest type of building

Buildings in Old Town Riga tell the story of this great city. Just the shape of the building can tell a person how old it is. The building on the right is very old, probably late 15th Century, with several hints to that fact. 

First, the protruding wood at the top tells us that originally there was a pulley system installed there to lift heavy objects to the different floors of the building. The items raised by pulleys would be pulled into the building through doors on each floor. Those doors are now just wooden boards. 

Another hint of it's age is the size of the windows. Tiny windows kept in the heat during winter. Imagine how dark the rooms would be, however. 

The ancient door is hard to see in the shadow, but it is crude wood planks fastened by an iron bar. The door was large to allow the horses and wagons to be brought into the basement. 


 The late 16th Century saw this next type of house. Notice the windows are larger. The old door can still be seen on the left of the building. The buildings were built right next to each other very close to the street. 

Very narrow street 

To the left, you can see how narrow the streets were built during the 17th Century. They haven't changed at all with only pedestrian allowed on this street today. 


The buildings built during this time are decorated today for the tourists. Many times they are colorfully painted and turned into restaurants. I'm sure that they were originally houses. 

1221 Restaurant on the right


The 18th to 19th Century buildings are easy to spot. They look so similar to the ones we saw all the time in St. Petersburg, Russia. Buildings four to five stories tall, with not too much character at all, built in a row. 

19th Century buildings





Sometimes they added facades on them to make them look fancier. They are more attractive to tourists this way at least. 

Facades for tourists


Key to Riga
It's interesting to see buildings that blend the older styles with more current styles of today. An example of this is the home of one of the expensive restaurants in Riga "Key to Riga." This 19th century building was remodeled on the lower floors for the restaurant while still maintaining the turrets from the original building. It makes for an eclectic look. 


All of these types of buildings make our walks around Old Town very interesting just looking at the architecture. 

Come and join me for a walk about town sometime. 



Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

"Home Sweet Home" - Not American Version

By
Image
Older apartment buildings We've lived in St. Petersburg for close to two months and have yet to see "the American dream" - a single family house. Here, everyone lives in an apartment, located either in an old building in the historic city center or in a new high-rise farther out. The high-rise buildings are everywhere you look--in the center of everything, or at the edge of one of the many rivers. We keep hearing about the communist era cement buildings, but we haven't seen many that look too old and dilapidated. They are probably replaced by the new high-rises built since freedom came in the 1990s. We live in one of these new high-rise complexes. Our third-floor apartment is in a 21 story building in a complex of five other buildings (called korpus in Russia). We live in Korpus 3. This complex includes several modern, colorful play areas for the children. It also includes an underground parking garage for the many cars that people own. In fact, the pl
Read more

The Golden Domes of Riga

By
Image
Orthodox Cathedral - Riga  The golden domes of the Nativity of Christ Cathedral stand out above the trees near Old Town Riga. We walk past this large building in the park not far from our apartment.  The domes shine out to the citizens on sunny days. Surrounded by the trees in the park, the walls of the cathedral are not easy to see in summer, but the size is undeniable. Of course, the golden domes tell everyone that this is a Russian Orthodox Church. After living in St. Petersburg, that is easy for us to define with the Russian style architecture. This cathedral was built between 1876 and 1883 when Latvia was a part of the Russian Empire under the reign of Tsar Alexander II.  Main Door This is the largest Orthodox Church in the entire Baltic area. A massive tower rises toward the sky when a visitor approaches the front door.  Entryway painting I visited several orthodox churches during my years in Europe. The thing that they have in common is that the interiors are covered with images
Read more

Why Roosters?

By
Image
Rooster on top of Dom Cathedral  Last week I wrote about cats being on the roof of a building, but today I'm going to share the reason that we have roosters sitting on the tip of churches in Riga. When we first moved to Riga, we noticed that some churches have the usual crosses on the top of them, but others have roosters sitting on top of the steeple. I couldn't recall ever seeing a rooster on top of a steeple. On doing more research, I was wrong to think that other countries don't have these on steeples. I found out that's it's common in European countries to see roosters on top of Lutheran churches. Our Lady of Sorrows Church The more common cross on the top of a steeple is found on Catholic churches in Europe. We have a couple of them in Old Town Riga as well. And, some Catholic churches in Europe have roosters sitting on top of crosses. So, the question popping into my head is why a rooster? After looking at several sources, it seems like ther
Read more