Italianate Houses In The Victorian Era

899 Words2 Pages

Hannah Noel
Ms. Gleason
AP Human Geography
13 December 2016
Italianate Architecture Italianate houses became the new trend in the 1840’s when the Victorian era was just starting. It started in England as a reaction to the rigid formalist that dominated nineteenth-century architecture. It came from rambling farmhouses in Italy that were usually built out of masonry, with their characteristic square towers and informal details. Italianate architecture is an eclectic style derived from the palazzos of the Italian Renaissance. This was the period where businessmen and entrepreneurs took their life into their own hand and it was also a period of great religious, political, and intellectual upheaval, where the thinkers were trying to put whatever …show more content…

Some even have a cupola roof. They also have wide projecting cornices with heavy brackets and richly ornamented windows, porches and doorways. Most American examples, however, mix details originated from informal rural models and formal renaissance town houses. The ornamentation of this style was usually made of wood, but occasionally the brick homes had elaborate, durable cast iron window and door hoods. The window sashes typically had one-over-one or two-over-two glazing and the window trim had exuberant variations, for example, pedimented crowns with decorative hoods. The doors of Italianate houses occurred in as much variety as the windows. Italianate style doors were the first to have large panes of glass in the door itself in substitute of sidelights with small panes. The porches for this style were restrained in decoration and size, compared to other Victorian …show more content…

People will get bored of looking at the same houses over and over again and they need something new to look at and with the Italianate house, it has its own decoration and style that is unlike other normal houses in the United States. These types of houses are what make neighborhoods pop. People wouldn’t normally see these types of houses around, but when they do they would think they are very pretty and haven’t seen anything like them. The Italianate style also adds a mix of Italian and English culture to the country. This architecture brings that cultural diversity and enlightens people about cultures other than our own because they won’t learn unless it’s right in front of their

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