Downtown Walking Tour: Penn-Liberty Cultural District

The Penn-Liberty corridor in Downtown Pittsburgh was an important retail and commercial center in the 19th and early 20th centuries, featuring excellent examples of early skyscrapers standing cheek-by-jowl with more modest structures. Today, after a decades-long period of decline in the mid-20th century, it is the site of a thriving arts scene, much of it housed in stunning historic buildings that have been restored and creatively repurposed. In addition to seeing many such examples of historic preservation in action, tour participants will learn of the crucial roles of the Pittsburgh Cultural Trust and PHLF in creating what has been called the country’s “most impressive and successful” example of urban economic revitalization through the arts.