Knowing home's basics is important before you undergo a remodel job
Such was the case at a recent event sponsored by the Ballard Historical Society, "How to Identify Your House Type." The lecture's point: to help owners of historic homes renovate and decorate in an informed way, faithful to their homes' historical periods.
Here, the official layer portrays an exercise in pride of ownership: A group of Ballard homeowners — with framed pictures of their houses in tow — listened intently about how to discern among five house styles: Victorian, Colonial Revival, Craftsman, Box and Tudor Revival.
They need assistance with this because insensitive renovations might obscure telltale style characteristics, making identification difficult. For instance, too-small shutters might flank a Victorian's grand windows in an attempt to make it a "Colonial." As another example, one of the lecture's slides showed a downtrodden Craftsman that had been shoehorned into "Tudor" in the 1960s.
Nailing down diagnostics
Uncovering a house's intended style improves its appearance and worth. To see beyond aluminum and asbestos cladding, concrete steps and slapped-on wrought-iron railings and balustrades, art historian Caroline Swope offered those in attendance several diagnostics: massing; color; fenestration, or window placement and characteristics; exterior treatments, such as scrollwork; and roof type.
But what was left unsaid muffled the litany of defining characteristics and kept creeping into my thoughts like an uninvited guest. For me, anyway, the lecture raised bigger questions than, "Is my house Victorian or Colonial?"
More important, between flashes of clipped roofs and breakfast nooks, the question, "What is history, and how do we remain faithful to it?" came bubbling to the top. "How do we gauge architectural significance?" refused to be swallowed. And, "How do we respond to the desire to maintain architectural purity in the case of historical house renovation? How do we define that purity? Why do we want it?" all rolled over one another, necessitating further exploration.
Strangely defined standards
One goal of the presentation was to define purity to help homeowners re-create historical interior treatments. (Purity, in this case, means defining to what degree of historical accuracy one should renovate or decorate a house.)
To address historically appropriate furnishings, Swope projected an image of a "Ladies Home Journal" illustration of a Craftsman home's living room circa 1940. Craftsman houses appeared in the Seattle area after the Victorian style, 1880-1907. But the Craftsman shown in the illustration happened to contain some older, Victorian-type interior decorations. This apparent "no-no" hovered in the room for a moment. Instead of being derided as impure, as I expected, Swope offered the magazine's image as proof that it's OK if today's homeowners incorporate Victorian furniture into their Craftsman homes.
I would go even further.
Not only is there nothing impure about it, but I don't think anyone should feel guilty for having elements of other periods in historical homes. Nor should we chuck furniture and interior elements that don't match what was new at the time a historical house was designed. Did the original owners of a Victorian home have only Victorian furniture? If not, why should current owners of Victorian homes be expected to?
What if a 1980s home featured shag carpeting from the '70s? Would it be historically appropriate to attribute the shag to the '80s and then fold shag carpeting into the standards of what comprises '80s design? No.
House isn't a museum
Many homeowners believe they should renovate and decorate their houses to make them appear historically correct. Why? Because if they own a historical home, their house is a "house of record," a piece of history that needs to be maintained.
But I think there's a limit to this theory. It's not only impractical, but unwise, to expect to maintain a home like a museum piece. Houses participate in a continuing visual dialogue in society and remain as vital to our time as they were to the time of their design and construction.
Am I saying aluminum siding on a Victorian adds to its beauty, or to the neighborhood? No. However, a record of the decades that have passed since a house's original design could reflect what our culture, the house and its inhabitants have endured. Tooth-and-nail obeisance to styles of the past can become a prison, turning a house into a relic — which can look even worse than aluminum siding.
For example, publications such as "American Bungalow," a bible for renovators of Craftsman homes, provide valuable information, but also assume bungalow owners want to live in Bungalow Land, an anachronistic warp in which television sets should be shrouded in Greene and Greene- or Stickley-inspired cabinets, and hand towels must have stencils of ginkgo leaves to be appropriate.
You have to wonder how comfortable homeowners are in Bungalow Land. Do they have to walk on eggshells of historical correctness to appear as pure as possible?
What's significant?
That brings up the question of architectural historical significance. The lecture covered styles from 1880 to 1940. At lecture's end, an eager audience member stood up and asked Swope to identify his Ballard house, based on snapshots.
"I think it might be a Cape Cod, but I'm not sure," the man said.
After viewing the pictures, Swope replied, "Well, it's definitely post-war."
"Post-war" hung in the air. Not post-war! To too many, it's a dirty word. This man's house didn't fit comfortably into any category and exceeded the bracketed history most typically valued. Implied in that dreaded declaration of "post-war" was the notion that he could hang up any hopes of ripping off aluminum siding to uncover a gem, because his house is precluded from gem consideration.
While his home might not be worth as much as a renovated, pre-war style in his neighborhood, he does possess something that owners of historical homes have less of: freedom.
To that man: Your home is history, too. Perhaps you might feel freer than your neighbors to interpret its history when you complete a renovation.
Rosemarie Buchanan is a freelance writer and architecture critic from Redmond.
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