City Directories and History: ALLAN-KERRISON COMPANY BUILDING Constructed before 1860; renovated 1890s
“This mid-nineteenth-century Greek Revival style building was substantially re-faced in the 1890s with a Beaux Arts Neoclassical facade. A stuccoed frieze with a floral motif tops the original surviving storefront, while decorative panels with delicate reliefs and vertical Corinthian pilasters terminate above the arched third-story windows. A bracketed parapet with a garland frieze, dentiled cornice, and surmounting balustrade provides an elegant cap to this building used for many generations as a jewelry store. Neoclassical urns that once decorated the balustrade have been lost.
Perhaps the oldest building in continual use as a jewelry store in the city, it housed the antebellum firm of James Allan and Company from 1865 until the 1920s. Allan’s company survived the Civil War and enjoyed a wide reputation for its “reliability.”
Information from: The Buildings of Charleston – J.H. Poston for the Historic Charleston Foundation, 1997
Other resources: Charleston Tax Payers of Charleston, SC in 1860-61, Dwelling Houses of Charleston by Alice R.H. Smith – 1917, Charleston 1861 Census Schedule, 1844 Map of Charleston, and a 1872 Bird’s Eye View of Charleston, S.C. The Hist. Charleston Foundation may also have additional data at: Past Perfect
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