A fire swept through the shoe district in Haverhill in 1882, leaving all but four buildings upright. Three thousand people became jobless overnight.
The fire was devastating, but the city’s leaders were determined to return the factories to their former glory and rebuild the district in a year. They beat their ambitious timeline, unveiling 24 new buildings at the end of an eight-month construction period.
These postfire buildings and their intricate brick facades are the subject of “A Symphony in Brick,” a photo series by Steve Rosenthal showing at the Paul Dietrich Gallery until Dec. 4.
The brick configurations seen through Rosenthal’s camera lens follow the Queen Anne and Italianate style, introduced by the lead architects of the reconstruction, Josiah Littlefield and C. Willis Damon.
This style is characterized by geometric configurations such as checkerboards or Tetris-like patterns, offset to create a sense of depth. The cornices and window treatments are particularly fascinating, like stacks of pixels.
Also visible in Rosenthal’s frames, near the apex of every reconstructed roof, is the inscription “1882,” a reminder of the year the shoe district burned and the resiliency of a town that rebuilt so quickly.
The designs are a stark contrast to the wooden factories that existed before. The “Queen Slipper City,” a nickname the town earned as one of the nation’s leading shoe manufacturing hubs, survived its “trial by fire” and the rebuilt shoe district wasn’t planning on disappearing anytime soon.
The Washington Street Shoe District was listed in 1976 on the National Register of Historic Places, honoring its place in the architectural and economic legacy of Haverhill and preserving it for future generations.
Today, 51 buildings stand in this former hub of manufacturing, which has since transitioned to the commercial and living spaces in Rosenthal’s imagery. If you focus your attention above the street level, it’s possible to imagine what it may have felt like to be one of the first shoemakers to return to the district following its destruction, admiring the artistry that made your own craftsmanship possible again.
“You don’t see brickwork like this anymore. It’s artisanal. People used to train to build like this,” said Millie De Olio, a staff member at CambridgeSeven, the office that houses the Paul Dietrich Gallery.
If you can’t make it to Haverhill to see the beauty of the brick in person, this exhibition is a free, worth-it stop a hop, skip and a jump from Harvard Square.
“A Symphony in Brick” is showing at the Paul Dietrich Gallery (20 University Rd, Third Floor, Cambridge) through Dec. 4.
