12/11/2008: Summit Avenue West Christmas Hike (St. Paul)
Join the hiking group for a hike along the west end of St. Paul's historic and quaint Summit Avenue. Summit Avenue in St. Paul, is one of the best preserved upper-class Victorian promenade boulevards in America. Summit Avenue is a monumental boulevard of houses, churches, synagogues, and schools that stretches four-and-one-half miles from the Cathedral to the Mississippi River. Summit Avenue was the abode of St. Paul's rich and famous, who, in the 1850s, began ascending Summit Hill and erecting splendid homes as monuments to their success. Of the structures built, an assortment of Queen Ann, Romanesque, Beaux Arts, Georgian Revival, and Italian Villa styles, 85 percent remain intact. Summit Hill's first homes, built on scattered plots of ground, preceded the construction of Summit Avenue. The west end of Summit Avenue developed from 1890 to 1920. The architecture of Summit Avenue does not lack critics, however. Frank Lloyd Wright, for instance, assailed it for being "the worst collection of architecture in the world."
If Driving: The group will meet in the parking lot of St. Thomas More Church, 1093 Summit Avenue. From I-94, take the Lexington Avenue exit and go south about one mile on Lexington Avenue, almost to Summit Avenue. The parking lot for St. Thomas More Church (the former St. Luke’s Church) is behind the church, just south of the alley between Portland Avenue and Summit Avenue and just north of Summit Avenue.
Interested hikers will reassemble after the hike at a nearby restaurant (St. Clair Broiler, 1580 Saint Clair Avenue (St. Clair & Snelling)) after the hike for dessert or dinner.
West Summit Avenue/West Portland Avenue Architectural and House History Hike Route and Directions
Observations on Architecture along the Hike-Summit Avenue
Observations on Architecture along the Hike-Portland Avenue
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This webpage was last updated on December 4, 2008.