Work of Bradford Architect to be Featured at UPB Art Gallery, Arts Endowment Gala

The University of Pittsburgh at Bradford’s KOA Art Gallery will feature the work of Bradford architect Preston Abbey this month.

The show, featuring original drawings of campus buildings as well as landscape paintings by Abbey, will be open Sept. 12-23. The gallery, located in Blaisdell Hall, is open from 8:30 a.m. to 8 p.m. Monday through Thursday and 8:30 a.m. to 6 p.m. Fridays. The show will also be open for those attending Pitt-Bradford’s Arts Endowment Gala Sept. 17 in Blaisdell Hall.

After serving in the U.S. Marines during World War II, Abbey returned home to Port Allegany and began an apprenticeship in architecture with Raymond Viner Hall.

Abbey would finish his apprenticeship with the Bradford architect Earl Wheeler, who was designing both the Zippo Manufacturing Co.’s headquarters on Barbour Street in Bradford and the new Kendall Refining office building at the time of his death.

When Wheeler died, Abbey finished those projects and took over his practice. After designing a drive-through office for Producers Bank on East Main Street, he was referred to another bank in Tioga County for which he also designed a drive-through office.

It was the beginning of Abbey’s relationship with many banks. He designed more than 120 banks in northwest Pennsylvania, including the three banks on Main Street in Bradford.

Locally, he also designed Floyd C. Fretz Middle School, the Zippo Manufacturing plant on Congress Street, the Bradford Area High School auditorium and music wing and the Pavillion at Bradford Regional Medical Center. He also designed many churches and schools throughout northwestern Pennsylvania.

When the University of Pittsburgh acquired land from Kendall Refining for the current campus, Abbey designed a master plan for the location that included the buildings of the Robert B. Bromeley Quadrangle and Sport and Fitness Center. He personally designed Swarts Hall, the Frame-Westerberg Commons, several of the campus’s residence halls, McDowell Fieldhouse and Hanley Library, which was one of the last buildings he designed before retiring in 1988.

He also designed the headquarters of Fisher Price Toys in East Aurora, N.Y., and Little Tike Toys in Hudson, Ohio.

Abbey says the first thing he did in designing any office building or plant was to interview the people who use the building so that it would be the most usable and efficient for their needs. His designs always included interior decorating, too, from choosing carpets and drapes to cabinets and hardware.

After retiring, Abbey turned his artistic talents to painting, taking professional art lessons in Bar Harbor, Maine.

Many of Abbey’s landscapes include a family member, friend or animal gazing out onto the landscape, also. He often gives these away to the subject in the painting.

The KOA Gallery exhibition will feature about three dozen such personalized paintings.

Abbey has donated two of his paintings for an auction at the Arts Endowment Gala Sept. 17 in Blaisdell Hall. For more information or tickets, contact Patty Colosimo, assistant director of arts programming, at (814)362-5155.

Pictured, Bradford architect Preston Abbey with one of his landscape paintings to be exhibited Sept. 12-23 in the KOA Art Gallery at the University of Pittsburgh at Bradford.
Courtesy of Pitt-Bradford