ClientMangan Group Architects
LocationWashington, DC
Project typeHistoric Preservation
American History meets Wiemann Heritage
Built in 1878 and home to Senator John A. Logan through the 1880s, 4 Logan Circle anchors one of Washington’s best-preserved Victorian neighborhoods, the Logan Circle Historic District. When Mangan Group Architects and Bell Builders took on a full restoration of the house, Wiemann Metalcraft was brought in to return its ornamental ironwork to original form.
The centerpiece was the P Street “Steamboat Gothic” balcony. Bell Builders removed and crated the surviving original castings and shipped them to our Tulsa shop. We cleaned every piece, repaired what could be saved and used the originals as patterns to recast the railing, 16 corner brackets, 82 feet of inverted cresting and 12 decorative column bases and capitals. The same patterns produced a matching railing for the rear lower roof balcony, so both porches read as one design. Every new casting left Tulsa primed and ready for finish paint.
The work reached every edge of the property. We fabricated 181 feet of cast iron perimeter fence with 22 posts, a 14-foot bi-parting drive gate cast in aluminum to match, and 133 feet of cresting for the widow’s walk and rear lower roof. VA Metals installed the work in the field.
The restoration gave the house back the profile seen in 19th-century photographs of the circle: crisp Gothic tracery, a continuous iron fence line and a crowned roof. From salvaged casting to finished streetscape, every piece of metal on the house carries the original design forward.
