Page Title
Architectural Styles
Federal
The Federal Style is characterized by the following:
- Also referred to as Adam Style, these houses date primarily between 1780 - 1820
- Houses are rectangular or boxlike in shape, often having two or more floors with smaller windows on the upper floors
- Houses may have projections on the exterior, such as a stoop with steps and wrought iron 
hand rails or a curved facade
- Roof lines are plain and of two types: Gable, sometimes with dormers, and low-pitched in the neo-classical style
- Roofs are standing seam metal, slate, or shingle
- Cornices are of brick or wood
- Flemish bond, handmade brick in walls 18 to 24 inches thick
- Typical doorways are plain, surmounted by a transom, or feature a fanlight with side windows
- Slender chimneys are included within the width of the wall and are not design elements as in earlier periods
- Lighter, more slender and refined window forms and muntins than earlier Colonial style are customary. Double-hung sashes are used with small panes 6 over 6, 9 over 9 or 6 over 9
- Windows and entrance doors may be surmounted by stone lintels, keystones, or flat arches of brick, some of which are plastered
Greek Revival
The Greek Revival Style is characterized by the following:
- Greek Revival Style is found primarily in buildings dating from between 1820 and 1850
- Use of any Greek order (Doric, Ionic, Corinthian) at front entrances or flanking a doorway, and heavy rectangular lintels over windows
- Roofs are low pitched or flat except where the standard two and one-half story town house form has a gable roof with stepped parapets and dormers
- Windows and doors have horizontal lintels. The arch is not used. Typical doors have full width transoms with side windows on either one or both sides. The transom is usually rectangular.
- Exterior brickwork is either mass produced or pressed brick Frequently pressed brick was used for the facade and common brick was used on the sides and rear.
- Bold, simple moldings are used on the exterior and interior.
- Simple, rectangular porches with two columns and pilasters and a side entablature are commonly used. Heavy stone paneled plinths and lintels are used.
Italianate
The Italianate Style is characterized by the following:
- Italianate architecture was favored between 1840 and 1870
- Straight-fronted buildings, cubic blocks when freestanding, with few or no projections or recessions in the main form are standard. However, two and three story houses may include square bays. Corner quoins are found in this style and occasionally a cupola.
- Pressed brick facades are used, and common brick is found on the sides and rear. Cast iron fronts were used in this period
- Roofs are flat or low pitched, invisible to the street, with eaves projecting and supported on wide bracketed cornices. Cornices are usually vented. Elevations are symmetrical except for houses with the side hall plan.
- Windows normally have horizontal lintels and may vary in height from floor to floor, with tall windows on the first floor. High Victorian Italianate style is distinguished by windows with arched hood or eyebrow molding Windows may be grouped in twos and threes.
- Window panes became larger in this period. Two panes in each sash are found in houses built before 1860 and larger panes thereafter.
- A prominent bracketed cornice and a bracketed hood over the front doorway are distinguishing characteristics.
- For this style, elaborate metal and wooden ornamentation was developed, including turned and scroll-sawn wooden ornaments (gingerbread) and cast iron porches and eaves
- Verandas, balconies, and entrance porches, often balustrated, are commonly used
- Paint colors were often darker than those used on earlier styles, with trim painted in lighter or darker shades or another hue. Earth tones -stone, grass, wood- were used.
Second Empire
The Second Empire Style is characterized by the following:
- This style is often found on buildings dating from 1860 to 1880
- The mansard roof with straight, convex, or concave sides which embrace the entire top floor is the distinguishing characteristic of this style. The true mansard is pierced with dormers for light
- The mansard roof may have a classical cornice or a heavy bracketed cornice
- Ornamentation usually consists of classical pediments and balustrades. Roof cresting is commonly used.
- Windows on the first floor are very tall. Eyebrow molding appears on window heads
- Porches are on the front and sides of the house.
- Except for the mansard roof, details of the Second Empire style are similar to those of the Italianate style (False mansard roofs that appear on fronts of townhouses are primarily decorative and serve only to provide a crawl space attic over the upper story. They are not a true Second Empire Style)
Highland Park Queen Anne Style Home
Queen Anne or Queen Anne Eastlake
The Queen Anne Style is characterized by the following:
- An asymmetrical structural plan employing a variety of shapes, colors, and textures
- Roofs are high, with dormers and gables. Towards the end of the period, the round or polygonal turret with tile roof is found.
- Gables, often including a large porch gable, are frequent and are given many different treatments. A projecting gable is supported by brackets over a window, a bay window, or a half turret. Turrets may be places diagonally to the building.
- Windows may be of any shape, with large and small panes. Pointed arches are not used for windows in this style. Commonly used are large panes, or small panes on the upper sash with a single pane on the lower sash. Colored glass may be used for small panes. Bay windows are frequently used.
- Different materials may be found on a single building or row of buildings: Red and white brick, stone blocks, shingles, terra cotta and stucco. Paint color is used for variety and effect. Small-scale carved stone or terra cotta is used, as are decorative brick patterns.
- Dormer windows may have pediments adorned with sunflower or sunburst ornaments.
- Chimneys are important decorative features, often being paneled or made of patterned brick.
- Later in the Queen Anne period, the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, house plans were simple and more uniform. They have bold shapes and more balanced unity, and the turret appears to bulge out from the house.
- In row houses of this later period, Queen Anne is identified by a projecting bay front topped by a gable or pinnacle roof, decorative brick patterns, and colorful glass transoms.
- Roof and porch cresting was common from 1850 until 1900 and is found on almost any architectural style, but predominantly on Second Empire and Queen Anne.
- Originally, Queen Anne houses used up to three or four paint colors to point up the various architectural patterns.
- On porches and balconies, Eastlake style ornamentation is frequently used.
Eastlake
Eastlake is a decorative style of ornamentation found on houses of other styles.
- Such ornamentation as porch railings, spindle and spool-like balusters, brackets and pendants were machine made and resembled heavy furniture of the period.
- Posts of porches may resemble table legs.
- Rows of spindles form open-work friezes along porches.
- Knobs and circular cutouts are seen.
The Richmond Row House
The Richmond Row House is characterized by…
- Attached houses built in a contiguous row, usually along one face of a street block.
- Various architectural styles from Federal to Colonial Revival.
- Many rowhouses in Richmond were built by speculative developers from the late 19th century through to the early 20th century.
- In Richmond’s oldest neighborhoods such as Church Hill, many rowhouses were built as an “in-fill” structures to close the gap between older existing structures that dotted the street grid.
- Because of their construction date, most of the rowhouses in Richmond are Italianate or Queen Anne in style either frame or brick construction. These houses grace the streets of many of Richmond’s oldest neighborhoods such as Church Hill, Union Hill, Oregon Hill, Jackson Ward and many parts of the Fan.
Colonial Revival
The Colonial Revival Style is characterized by…
- This style can be found in buildings dating from 1890 to present.
- Colonial Revival Houses may be built with historical accuracy or may be a combination of colonial and modern adaptations.
- Houses are usually rectangular, with symmetrical elevations and minor projections. Both brick and wooden siding are used.
- Roofs are hipped, double pitched, or gambrel and are of medium height. Roofs may be slate or shingle.
- Decorative, pedimented gables are typical of this style.
- Chimneys are placed for overall symmetry.
- Porticoes and porches have pediments instead of gables and may have balconies.
- Windows are rectangular; the double-hung sashes may have large panes, divided panes, or a combination of both. Horizontal lintels are used.
Transitional
- When identifying the architectural style of a building, note how the structure has been changed or has evolved. That is part of the history of the structure. Every area of the interior and the exterior has pieces of evidence to the past, both visible and hidden. When the clues are pieced together, the original style and function emerges.
- Note the use of more than one architectural or decorative style: Greek Revival style going into Italianate or Queen Anne and Colonial Revival style blends, for example.
- Additions and renovations may have been built in a current style with little or no regard for the original style. Notice what has been removed from the building - porches, turrets, wings, balconies, balustrades, or what has been replaced out of character.
- Panes of glass, if original, are a clue to age and style. Before 1850, each half of a double-hung window was divided into six panes or nine panes, typical of Federal, Greek Revival, and some early Italianate styles. Larger and larger panes became available as the nineteenth century progressed. From 1860 until the 1880s 2/2 panes (each half divided into two vertical panes) were stylish. From 1880 on, each section of the window could consist of one pane, a common feature of Queen Anne.
- Houses may have shutters on the inside instead of the outside; such houses are usually brick. Houses with elaborately carved windows usually do not have shutters. Genuine shutters, hung correctly, are placed on either side of the sash - not outside the entire window frame; they are fully functional and should swing to meet each other in the middle of the window. Early eighteenth century houses had solid shutters for protection against intruders. Louvered shutters were used later as a sun shield in warm climates when protection from the street was not of paramount importance.
- Until 1890 foundations are not likely to be concrete.
- Original colors in their original arrangements tend to be most flattering to a particular architectural style.