The Return of the Oriel

In May 2012, as part of an observance of Preservation Week, Gossips did a series of the posts about the oriels of Hudson. Those posts can be found here, here, here, here, and here. Around that time, the New York Times published an article called "Useful Vocabulary for Building Watchers" which provided a method for distinguishing between an oriel and a bay, both of which are structural projections from a facade: "Here's the trick: does it rest on its bottom? Then that's B, for bay. Or, does it stick out from a higher floor on the facade with nothing under it? That's O for oriel, with zero underneath."

Hudson seems to have an unusually large number of oriels. Some we know from photographic evidence are original to the buildings, such as the impressive row of oriels at 512 through 518 Warren Street.  

Others we know were added at some time after the buildings were constructed. Examples are 362½ Warren Street . . . 

and 2 East Court Street.

Oriels--actual and ersatz--are making something of a comeback in Hudson. It all started with this building at 211 Warren Street--the first new construction on Warren Street in more than two decades. (The construction of the building was completed in May 2022.) 

The designers of the building said they were inspired to include an oriel by the oriel on the building next door, at 209 Warren Street. At a public hearing about the proposed building held by the Historic Preservation Commission in September 2019, Christabel Gough called the oriel an "excrescence," saying it had "none of the characteristics of a real bay." Chip Bohl, who in 2019 was serving as the architect member of the HPC, pointed out that bays, or oriels, typically have windows on all sides whereas this one had windows only in the front. He urged the designers to create an oriel that was "more delicate, more charming, and more transparent." He was told that, because this was to be a passive house, the walls were eighteen inches thick, and it was "logistically impossible" to have windows on the side of the oriel.

Bohl, now no longer on the HPC, is the architect for the building proposed for 9 Partition Street. The design for that building includes an oriel, which rises two stories over the garage door, extends out over the sidewalk, and has windows on the sides. 

In presenting the design f0r 9 Partition Street to the HPC, Bohl said the concept was to transition from the "finer homes on Allen and Union to the industrial buildings at the waterfront." The oriel, which he called a bay window, is a detail meant to be reminiscent of Hudson's 19th-century buildings.

Oriels, or details that vaguely resemble oriels, are featured in the designs of two other projects proposed for Hudson. The revised design for Mill Street Lofts, presented to the Planning Board in March, has some projecting window features on the third floor of both buildings, which could be taken for oriels.

When Gini Casasco, who was then serving on the Planning Board, asked what the rationale was for the changes, Sean Kearney, the architect for the project, did not, as one might have expected, talk about echoing features found on historic buildings in Hudson. Instead, using the terms "Victorian" and "Second Empire" to describe the original design for the buildings (shown below), he explained, "We thought it didn't translate as well to the larger building, so we tried to break it up."

Whether or not such ersatz oriels are conscious nods to Hudson's authentic historic architecture, they seem to be a recurring theme in designs for new construction. They also appear in the rendering of the townhouses the Hudson Housing Authority is proposing for Second and Columbia streets, on the site of what is now a community garden.

COPYRIGHT 2025 CAROLE OSTERINK