Picture a 1915 trolley station at 297 Broadway, known historically as The Drinkhall, here in Saratoga Springs, New York. Built in 1915 as a trolley station by the Hudson Valley Railroad and designed by Ludlow and Peabody in the Beaux-Arts style, this is a place where transportation history meets elegant civic architecture. The building is composed of four sections: a three-bay, stuccoed central block flanked by lower 1½-story, three-bay wings, with a rear section whose open porch once served as the trolley platform.
Constructed of hollow red clay tile and topped by a slate hipped roof, the exterior is enlivened by a decorative frieze with arrowhead motifs and Beaux-Arts decorative panels. Inside, the central block rises beneath a high barrel-vault ceiling, a reminder of the station’s original public scale. The Drinkhall’s historic significance was recognized when it was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1974.
Notice the rhythm of the bays and wings, the texture of the red clay tile, and the sweep of that barrel vault overhead.