Top Things to do in Charleston, SC

By Van Sturgeon, Certified Tour Guide with Palmetto Carriage Works

Contemporary musicians often engage in a practice called “sampling,” taking bits and pieces from older songs and blending them into new compositions. The Beatles sampled the French National Anthem in the opening notes of “All You Need is Love.” For you younger readers, Beyonce’s hit “Crazy in Love” from her 2003 debut album “Dangerous in Love” samples a song from the 1970s, “Are You My Woman,” by an almost forgotten group called the Chi-Lites. You probably have your own favorite examples.

Well, it turns out that architects have long practiced sampling. They frequently incorporate older motifs into creative, new designs. As you travel around Charleston, you’ll discover dozens of examples of this “architectural sampling.”

Here are three of my favorites. The first is widely used. The second is ostentatious. And the third one is somewhat obscure.

Let’s start with a really obvious example of “architectural sampling.” It can be seen on Robert Mills’ design for the upper window on his Fireproof Building. That upper window is sampled from a building in Rome. Its defining feature is that it is a segmental arch divided into thirds by two vertical mullions.

The original is seen below.

This is the Baths of Diocletian, built in 306 CE. This design has been sampled so often since the Renaissance that it has been given its own name — the Diocletian Window. Mills did a delightful job of tying his Diocletian Window into the windows beneath it, creating a lovely vertical composition.

You’ll find Diocletian Windows in some really random places elsewhere in Charleston:

As you can see, it faces the parking lot on the south side of Magnolia’s Restaurant on East Bay Street. And I’d love to know why.

Now for an extravagant example of “architectural sampling.”

The capitals on the Chisolm House at Rutledge and Tradd were sampled from a motif that is very rarely found anywhere in Europe or North America.

These were copied from a rather diminutive monument, only 33 feet tall, that can be found in the heart of the Acropolis. Erected in 334 BCE, it is the most elaborate version of the Greek Corinthian Order surviving from ancient times. Now badly eroded, here’s what the original capitals would have looked like as sketched in 1754.

This style was considered too costly and difficult to execute for domestic architecture and too monumental as well. It first appeared on a building in England in 1769, on the Shugborough Estate, which was the property of Thomas Anson, the elder brother of Lord High Admiral George Anson, after whom our Ansonborough neighborhood gets its name.

It was first sampled in America in 1817, on the capitals inside Statuary Hall in the US Capitol Building. From that time until 1857, it was the Chamber for the US House of Representatives.

You would be correct if you called these Corinthian Capitals. But I would bet that Alexander Chisolm took obvious pride in correcting any hapless observer who thought these merely Corinthian. Let’s imagine that he talked like Foghorn Leghorn. If you complimented his Corinthian capitals, he might have puffed out his chest and intoned, “I say, boy, you’re showin’ your ignorance . . . look at me when I’m talkin’ to ya, son. Those are not simply Corinthian capitals . . .  I say, those are exact copies of the capitals on the Choragic Monument of Lysicrates!”

Finally, let’s examine a truly obscure instance of “architectural sampling.”

Below is a picture of the Jacobson Building, right across from the People’s Building on Broad Street. The structure has obviously been altered. The upper floors seem to bear no relation to the temple-like entryway. The building dates from 1817. The entryway was added in 1840, by The South Western Railroad Bank. The News and Courier took over in 1872, so you may hear it identified as the Old News and Courier Building. Badly damaged by the 1886 earthquake, the upper floors of the original facade were replaced by stucco covered brick.

Here’s a closeup view of the entryway.

This was sampled from The Choragic Monument of Thrasyllus, built in 320 BCE in Athens. It marked the entrance to a shallow cave on the south side of the Acropolis. Here is a sketch of its original, unweathered entablature:

The sample in Charleston is considered one of the most faithful renditions of the Thrasyllus Monument. But what I find most interesting is that this same motif was sampled in 1920 by the architect Henry Bacon for a monument in Washington, D.C. that has become one of the most beloved and frequently visited sites in the world. Here’s a closeup:

This, my friends, is the entablature on the Lincoln Memorial.

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By Van Sturgeon, Certified Tour Guide with Palmetto Carriage Works

One of the most alluring architectural vistas in our country can be seen as you travel north on Church Street and gaze up at the portico and steeple of St. Philip’s Church. The church’s beauty is enhanced by the fact that it extends beyond the sidewalk into the middle of Church Street, which gracefully curves around the triple portico.

The church you see today is the second on this site. The original held its first service on Easter Sunday 1723, and burned down in a fire in February 1835.

The so-called Old Church (sketched below) was situated so that it provided a visual terminus to the city’s central north-south thoroughfare. It was, after all, as far north as you could go in the colonial walled-city at that time.  It’s grandeur was magnified by the manner in which it majestically crowned Church Street. Charleston’s most famous architect, Robert Mills, observed that “the effect produced upon the mind in viewing the edifice is that of solemnity and awe.”

In the 1739 map below, north is to the right. As you can see, the Old Church was bounded on the north by a wall. Just outside the wall was Daniel Creek, which is the current location of Market Street. This map also imagines what that section of the city would look like if the walls were gone, the creek filled in, and Church Street extended, which would happen in the late 1700 and early 1800s.

You can see that Church Street narrows significantly as it winds around the church. Since the road was never intended to carry heavy traffic past the church, that bottleneck initially presented no problem. But that had all changed by the time the Old Church burned in 1835.

Church leaders met the day after the fire and heard a resolution offered by Nathaniel Russell Middleton that “a new Church should be built on the same plan and on the same foundations as the old church.”

But, not everyone in the city agreed with Middleton’s proposal.  Many wished to take advantage of the opportunity created by the destruction of the Old Church to straighten and widen Church Street. As the city had grown, the road had been extended well to the north, but that choke point in front of the church had remained.

A letter to the Charleston Courier signed by “Citizen,” described the hazards he believed this inflicted on travelers:

When you remember, gentlemen, the number of lives that have been lost by persons thrown from horseback and their brains dashed out against the pillars of that Church, humanity calls upon you to arrest that mad project.

It’s hard to argue against riders getting their “brains dashed out.” But a member of the church penned a mocking reply proposing that action be taken to protect all travelers, at all times, and in all locations. He wondered whether

it might not be an improvement to have our brick walls well padded, stuffed, and cushioned? If this cannot be done, I would have you apply to our humane city council to raze our city, and rebuild another on a new and improved plan . . . then a man, especially when sober, may drive in perfect safety of brain, limb or cranium.

Members of City Council may have been amused, but they were not convinced. They voted 11-1 to straighten Church Street by moving the foundations of the “New Church” back 48 feet so its front would be in line with the street’s eastern edge. But, the state-appointed Commission for Opening and Widening Streets, Lanes and Alleys objected to that plan because of the disruption it would cause to the existing grounds and burial sites, “which are consecrated by feelings the dearest to the human heart.”

As a compromise, the Commission suggested moving the “New Church” back 22 feet, which would bring the north-south porticoes in line with the east side of Church Street. The road would be widened to 50 feet.

That plan was adopted so that today, the steeple of the “New Church” projects beyond the sidewalk, and the road still curves gracefully around. The “New Church” remains an apparent visual terminus to one of Charleston’s loveliest and most historic colonial streets.

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