Goffe Street Fire House; Dixwell Fire Station

The Dixwell Fire Station swoops around the corner of Goffe Street and onto Webster, drawing both pedestrian and driver to its bright red, brick façade. Four large fire truck bays, windows, and a glass door puncture the red and let the insider view out. The building has a mostly square floor plan with the stark exception of the street-side curve that gives the station a quirky, streamline-moderne feel (1). In sans-serif, all-caps, black lettering reads “RESCUE • TRUCK CO. 4 • ENGINE CO. 6 • ENGINE CO. 3”. The last bit of the lettering peels off the building to force the viewer into viewing the sign as both ornament and structural. Its features are characteristic of architect Robert Venturi’s philosophy, a Philadelphian vanguard in the Postmodern movement. The fire station was completed in 1974 as the last of the urban renewal fire stations in the city (2). The building is still a working fire station.