The Georgetown Metropolitan

GM is off to Europe this week, in his absence enjoy this rerun of his series on Georgetown architecture:

This week GM has been delving into the varieties of historic architecture that we have around Georgetown. For the final installment he is going to highlight the odd ones out, in other words the homes that weren’t built in the dominant styles of Federal, Greek Revival, Italianate, Second Empire, Queen Anne and Romanesque.

First up: Neoclassical

The Neoclassical style was born at the 1893 Chicago’s World Columbian Exposition, where some of the greatest architects of the time gathered to design a grand city of monumental buildings based in the classical style. Since nearly 26 million people visited the “White City”, this new style had wide exposure and quickly became a dominant building style in the early 20th century. Downtown DC was basically rebuilt in the White City’s image. Continue reading →

GM is off to Europe this week, in his absence enjoy this rerun of his series on Georgetown architecture:

This week GM is exploring the variety of historical architectural styles around Georgetown. Today GM explores the early Victorian period.

The two styles that dominated early Victorian architecture were Second Empire and Stick. However, there are no examples of Stick architecture in Georgetown that GM could find (the Stick style is not surprisingly tailored to wooden homes, which was not a popular building material in bricky Georgetown). So for Georgetown early Victorian architecture means only Second Empire. Continue reading →

GM is of to Europe this week, in his absence enjoy a rerun of his series on Georgetown architecture:

This week GM is exploring the varieties of historic architecture in Georgetown and offering a field guide to help you identify each particular style.

Today: Romantic Period

For American architecture, the Romantic period stretched from 1820s to the 1880s representing the last years of the Federal Period through to the middle stages of the Victorian Era. In Georgetown the two most common Romantic Period styles are Greek Revival and Italianate.

First up: Greek Revival.

Greek Revival style homes were the dominant style across the U.S. from 1830s to 1850s. So much so that it is also called the “National Style”.  Whereas Roman designs influenced the Federal period, increasingly intellectuals looked to Greece as the more appropriate model for the young democracy. Continue reading →