Emerging from this, we come into a new and beautiful building, erected on Chestnut Street below Fifth. For this edifice, so conveniently situated, so light and airy, so admirably adapted to postal business, the community is solely indebted to Postmaster Cornelius A. Walborn, Esq.
A GLANCE AT THE PHILADELPHIA POST-OFFICE FROM AN ARCHITECTURAL POINT OF VIEW.
The Philadelphia post-office was completed and ready for the transaction of business on the 23d of March, 1863. It is situated on Chestnut Street, between Fourth and Fifth Streets, adjoining the custom-house. The contrast between these two buildings is most remarkable: one presents the view we have in classic illustrations of the Parthenon of Athens; the other, disdaining all the associations which the history of Greece and Rome throws around our ideas of classic architectural beauty, looms up before us, blending the style of the rural districts of France (Alaon) with that of the city of Paris in the seventeenth century.
The Exchange of Paris (La Bourse), in the Rue Vivienne, seems, at least in part, to have furnished for our post-office the idea for its architectural construction. This is more observable in its Attic design, known in the modern French school as the “masked Attic.” The front of the Philadelphia post-office is cased or veneered with white marble, and, in connection with the peculiar Attic style, presents an appearance by no means flattering to the architect who designed it.
Modern architects consult variety rather than harmony in drawing their plans. Thus, foreign ornaments of a more classic form are occasionally mingled with them: hence we have presented to us an incongruous style, offensive alike to good taste and judgment.
The Philadelphia post-office reminds us very much of the Paris post-office (Hotel des Postes), which is situated east of the Palais Royal: it has a handsome front, but in its tout ensemble does not present to view much architectural beauty either in style or design. France, like England, never considered the architecture of a country as being inseparable from its history: hence her public buildings present to view the combined peculiarities of the styles and eras of the sixteen different orders which have marked the progress of architecture since the building of the great temple of Samos.
In this country, with few exceptions, we have not studied architecture with an eye to a national feature: on the contrary, our artists have copied the styles of all nations, from which designs are made to please the eye only, without regard to originality or the age in which we live. This cannot be called an architectural construction, but rather an adaptation of Grecian models to the buildings of our own time. There is no originality here.
A building may be well arranged for all purposes of mere convenience, but in reality, if destitute of harmony in its outward appearance, it cannot be called an architectural construction. This remark will apply to the buildings in our country generally, and equally, as stated, to those of England and France.
If the Philadelphia post-office is devoid of these requisites as regards its exterior, its interior makes full amends.
Every department is so constructed and arranged that there is no clashing or cause of impediment in the general routine of its business. Each man has his position, each bureau its place, and over all the chief clerk, from an elevated position, has an eye to every action and movement of the employees. To Cornelius A. Walborn, Esq., the present efficient postmaster [1866], is the department indebted for the admirable arrangements of the Philadelphia post-office.