What area has the best looking Bungalows?? (Chicago, Oak Park: zoning, beach)

[Avengerfire]

Originally Posted by supernerdgirl

nah, there will always be idiots with no taste.

Sometimes function comes before style in design.

[Lookout Kid]

^And there will always be idiots with no taste to build ugly but "functional" crap.

[Milwaukee City]

I just love the Chicago Octagon style bungalow:

[surlycue]

^^That one is gorg' but they definitely do run the gamut from Jekyll to Hyde.

[noid_1985]

Originally Posted by Johnny Northside

Here's one boxcar bungalow that I always had a good laugh at when I lived in the neighborhood:

Cook County Assessor's Office Search Results (http://www.cookcountyassessor.com/data/searchflat/ParcelImage.asp?pin=15242100330000 - broken link)

Two houses down, there's this:

Cook County Assessor's Office Search Results (http://www.cookcountyassessor.com/data/searchflat/ParcelImage.asp?pin=15242100350000 - broken link)

So one homeowner did it, then someone else thought "Hey, that looks great. I'll do it too!"

Or maybe the idiot builder or architect had a 2-for-1 special on f***ing up a bungalow.

those pics almost made me cry- you just don't do Bungalows like that

[BRU67]

Back to topic, there is a really nice little cluster of Bungalows near Brainerd Park in Washington Heights (just east of Beverly). The area is roughly Vincennes to the east, Bishop to the west, and 95th St. to the south. I don't know how far north it goes as I haven't fully ventured through it yet. It is definitely not the most affluent area in the City but the houses seem more or less well maintained (though there are few boarded up ones as a reminder of the housing boom's impact on lower middle class neighborhoods) and they are very attractive. Many octagons!

[anoroc]

Originally Posted by Johnny Northside

Here's one boxcar bungalow that I always had a good laugh at when I lived in the neighborhood:

Cook County Assessor's Office Search Results (http://www.cookcountyassessor.com/data/searchflat/ParcelImage.asp?pin=15242100330000 - broken link)

Two houses down, there's this:

Cook County Assessor's Office Search Results (http://www.cookcountyassessor.com/data/searchflat/ParcelImage.asp?pin=15242100350000 - broken link)

So one homeowner did it, then someone else thought "Hey, that looks great. I'll do it too!"

Or maybe the idiot builder or architect had a 2-for-1 special on f***ing up a bungalow.

Boy, did someone lose a bet. Why in the world would you copy that house?

[noid_1985]

My grandmother lives on 111th and peoria- on her block someone bought a really decent looking Bungalow for only $77k (cash). It had been on the market for two years for about $275k but I guess the owners really wanted to get rid of it...

[otters21]

Originally Posted by BRU67

Berwyn has toyed with the idea of just landmarking all of them, to save people from themselves. Don't know if I agree but I understand the sentiment. We have one on 26th St. which looks like someone dropped a Roman Catholic Church on top of the thing. It's bigger than the lower portion of the house! I guess given a choice between destroying a chunk of farmland for a tract home or the adaptive reuse of an existing bungalow, I'll take the latter every time. Still, my hope is that as bungalows become more and more appreciated as historically significant structures, this sort of thing will become less common.

The pop top houses may not be the best looking homes but they are still much better looking than the cookie cutter houses built in the 80s and more recent in sprawling car centrics areas. As far as I am concerned they ( pop tops) are the lesser or two evils.

[Lookout Kid]

Originally Posted by otters21

The pop top houses may not be the best looking homes but they are still much better looking than the cookie cutter houses built in the 80s and more recent in sprawling car centrics areas. As far as I am concerned they ( pop tops) are the lesser or two evils.

I just wish they'd leave the integrity of the orginal house intact a bit more. I've seen pop tops with second story setbacks to preserve the original roof line on the front, and they aren't great looking but they're better than most.