What is YOUR favorite style of home, and why? Do you live in it. or do you have plans to in the future? (tile, color)
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I find American Four Square lovely as well, especially those that still have a lot of the original details inside (like gorgeous moldings). I was curious and just did a google search -- lots of "kit" houses came up, which I find absolutely fascinating. I wish my current house were so interesting!
I moved to New Hampshire for my current job back in '02 and bought my first-every house in '03. I am surrounded by these beautiful old houses with huge front porches, and I love all of them, but I ended up with a basic ranch. Honestly, the problem for me with houses in New Hampshire is that most are heated with baseboard heat and I absolutely loathe it -- I have dozens of bookcases and thousands of books, and baseboard heat sometimes takes up two entire walls in each room. It just doesn't work with my furniture.
I liked my current house as soon as I walked in when I saw 20+ feet of wall space -- the shared wall with the garage. No baseboards! It has served me well, although I live in a very eclectic neighborhood and so many of my neighbors have wonderful houses with those porches I like so much. (Yes I have "porch envy"!)
I am about to buy a Colonial -- I like a lot of its details already, but hope to add a large front porch some time in the next 4-5 years. I have seen many photos of Colonials "transformed" into farmhouses with the addition of front porches, so I hope mine ends up looking as warm and cozy as the ones I've seen.
I also love Victorians just to look at (and there are quite a few in New Hampshire of course) -- interesting roof lines, big porches that often wrap around 2-3 sides, etc. I likely will never live in one, partly because I hope that the house I am buying will be my "forever" house (unless I end up with a cottage on the coast of Maine when I retire, but that's probably a pipe dream!), and partly because I'm not sure my country- and cottage-style furniture would work very well in a Victorian.
(And BTW I loved your last paragraph! What a nice story!)
Some were "kit homes" - many were sold by Sears, Montgomery Ward and Aladdin. This was especially important for people living in the American West and Mid-West. The burgeoning of the rail road at this time, permitted these homes to be delivered to the then Nether regions of the nation.
I thought that I loved Victorians, and indeed they were my first favorite house. I do love looking at them, but living in one, seems to be another matter.
With the furniture issue, you pretty much hit the nail on the head, when it comes to Victorians, and furnishings. I like Victorian homes, and I own some Victorian furniture, but High Victorians pretty much scream their need for Victorian furniture. With a Vernacular Victorian, a less fussy one, I could actually see your type of furniture working nicely!
A bungalow house would also work well, but that's a cousin to the Four Square, so they would go well with almost any decor, yours included.
I grew up in one of those (AFS) homes on a Kansas farm. It was very much as you describe -- hardwood floors throughout, massive open hardwood staircase, huge rooms, high ceilings, double pocket doors off the big foyer to the living room, built-in bookcase, linen china cabinets, big walk-in pantry. It was even white with green trim! Compared to anything I've lived in since then, it was massive, even though it wasn't one of the three-story (attic) jobs. Our neighbor had one of those. Yup. Even bigger.
My mother hated it -- too much to clean. When we moved off the farm all she wanted was something small -- the smaller the better. She overdid it, as our next home was probably 1100 sq ft (plus unfinished basement), but she never complained. She got what she wanted and was always happy with it. It was my dad who missed the room to roam -- always talking about buying something bigger or expanding, but Mom was perfectly happy with her little ranch home.
The biggest drawback for me now would be the cost of heating it.
How many square feet was your AFS?
The one we are in contract to purchase, is 2600 sf, and in comparison with my last home, a 4000 sf fuel guzzling Mc Mansion,(I took leave of my scenes in the early part of the 2000s - that's the only way I can describe the purchase of Big Hideous...) by my calculations, this should give us room with out waste.
Currently, I did that extreme thing and purchased a 1200sf Victorian. A pretty little house, but it was a reaction to the Big One.
if your Mom was happy in her small ranch, I can understand that. Cleaning a huge home on one's own is quite a task!
The purchase of this little Victorian, was a "reactionary purchase".
My hope is that this next hose will be "Juuust right!"
PS I'd love to see pictures of your Kansas Farm house.
My favorite style is the house I owned in West Seattle in the 1970's: a small, one-story, 100-year-old English Tudor, with extensive mahogany woodwork and a large front porch. I love everything about that style and age.
I had to sell that wonderful house when I moved back to Houston. I'd love to live in that house, or another like it, again -- but I bought my current small house 32 years ago and have remodeled it enough that I enjoy it....I dont love it like I did my West Seattle house, but that's ok. I'm content.
That house sounds awesome! Love to see photos
My question has little do do with architecture but how's a Texas gal do in the Pacific North Wast? White a climate change!
Concerning the post up above a little ways, with my name on it, sorry I put a picture that had no talky with it and sorry the pic is really too large. I tried to delete it yesterday but it's still there. The photograph should have been part of a post like this, after a couple other pics that first showed the exterior of my favorite style, which is MEDITERRANEAN. Now, the ones I'm showing all come from a list of photos in a nice Bing Search Result, a collection of pictures relating to Med houses, altho there are Med variations OFF other styles of homes in the pics I selected, but they're still all Med style overall.
(1) THE PIC ABOVE AND UP A FEW POSTS is a courtyard that will sometimes be found as an interior part of Mediterranean homes, and the one you're looking at up there, while part of a Med house, is more properly described as a New Orleans style courtyard. I like smaller Med homes with smaller courtyards, tho, but they don't all have them.
(2) THE BELOW NEXT PICTURE is the outside of a typical modern Mediterranean style home, and it contains most of the variations that you can find in them: Octagonal "turrets" like this pic (think of Jefferson's Monticello), palladian windows and arched doors, stained glass, several porches on diff levels, and often a courtyard. There are other elements you can find in these homes, combining lots of interesting characteristics of other styles, like the Queen Anne's round turret, and the Spanish stucco with red roofs. This pictured house is a rather luxury version and quite modern:
http://homewah.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/Luxury-House-Plans-Photos.jpg (broken link)
(3) THE BELOW LAST PICTURE represents one of the less-expensive versions of the Mediterranean home, a Med redo of a somewhat compatible Mission Style. When I was a girl, I lived in France overlooking the Med in a villa, built in Roman times, perhaps, and I loved it, lots of the features I still find charming, arches, open spaces, porch overlooking garden. The below pic reminded me of the Venice homes in California:
Now, as for the original questions of if I dream of or plan to have a home like the ones pictured, which would be the Mediterannian in some form or fashion, if I could afford one and felt up to moving again, sure, I'd love to have it near a beach and rather southerly U.S., even in the Bahamas, but rather smallish, with staircases to diff levels, turret, brick drive and iron gates, arches, stained glass. Some French and Spanish furniture, a great big Tuscan country kitchen table, one very large signed art piece, and vines dripping everywhere. GG
For me is it easier to define styles I do not like. I like everything else.
Mostly I dislike mondern mish mash catalogue homes. I cannot assign them a style becasue they have none. The bigger and most hideous are dubbed McMansions. Maybe "Modern Schlock" is an apt description. "Garage door with attached house" describes most of them. There are a few modern custom homes that are actually designed with a style to them. Most of those I like.
I have never wanted to own a tudor style home. I think they are neat. I am glad they are around but I find them kind of dark, scary, and foreboding. I would not choose tudor for a home at the top of my list. I am glad other people like them.
Storybook style homes are the same way, I love to look at them. I am glad they exist. I do not want one.
My favorites are proabably queen anne, stick and shingle style. I like Italiante to look at but prefer them for other people to live in. Some craftsman homes are awesome. Some are kind of boring. It depends on the home. Most but not all of the craftsman homes that I like are smaller ones. Not really sure why, it just is. Some colonial Revival and greek Revival homes are neat, some are kind of dull. Federal Style is another great to look at, but not for me. I would not mind a good prarie style home. Eichler homes are really cool on the inside. A bit bland on the outside. Oriental motif homes form the later 1800s are pretty neat. I live in a colonial revival with an oriental motif when I am in California.
I do not know the style of our current house. Some call it a Windsor house. It is really old, and predates the fancy featuers of the victorian age. It was originally built in 1836, but majorly remodeled in 1850 when it went form Georgian revival to whatever the style is today and the remodeled again in 1868, but without changing the style of the house. . Although it is not my favorite style, it has a lot of neat features and we still love it. It is really fun to live in. I will probably never had another home. This one is a keeper.
(This is an old picture, we removed the sunroom on the side and restored the wrap around porch).
Last edited by Coldjensens; 03-12-2012 at 03:20 PM..
Greene&Greene's
Gamble House (American Arts and Craft)
It was also Doc Brown's house in "Back to the Future"
Frank Lloyd Wright's Prairie-style-
Fredrick C Robie House
and of course, Fallingwater
The Sears "kit house" Foursquare "Magnolia"
The Craftsman Bungalow-
This particular example is a modern construction based on original designs. The term "Bungalow" is so widely used it gets generic in nature. But, this example has the correct details; centered dormer (they could be "dog-house" like this one, shed, or eyebrow), centered doorway, covered porch with masonry column bases and square tapered columns. Exterior masonry fireplace and exposed rafter tails.
But, my all-time favorite-
Lagoon 550
It has 4 cabins (bedrooms), 4 heads (bathrooms), Living/Dining Combo, Alfresco dining area/covered deck, open deck, no grass to mow, washer/dryer, central vac, and I can practically see any part of the World through a porthole (window). And when the natives get a little restless (nosey or noisy) I can pull anchor (foundation) and move to a new locale- anywhere the Cohibas are good!
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