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Colonial Architecture
End-chimney Structure
The first dwellings were often split log cabins serving as both eating and
sleeping quarters. Roofs were generally thatched with bundles of reeds and rushes about a foot thick. When their longest logs
were 20 feet tall, that's how long the room was. Cracks were filled with clay. Read more about log cabins here. It'll even tell you how to make one if you're so inclined.
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| What's a dogtrot cabin? |
Dogtrot Cabin
After they grew out of one-room living, it was more practical to build a second cabin and add a breezeway in
the middle. (It was difficult to attach a room to an existing log cabin.) In the South, the open area was built so the
wind could cool folks off. With no home improvement stores around, they might have used oiled linen for windows or just openings
in a wall.
See the interior shots here.
Sleeping and storage lofts accessed by ladders were built as the need arose.
Sorry about the perspective in this picture, but I was being very blonde and didn't get it right.
Garrison Colonial
Some of the first New England homes were influenced by the houses of medieval England. These houses had steep gabled
roofs, small diamond paned windows, and a second story overhang across the front facade. They were sided in unpainted clapboard
or wood shingles.
This house has obviously just been built because the clapboard hasn't weathered. You can see the farmer resting on his
laurels.
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| Cantilevered house |
New England Colonial
There were lots of trees to make timber-framed structures with clapboard siding that added further protection.
Thanks
to winter snow, their roofs needed to be steeply pitched. They used massive central chimneys for heating both sides of the
house and evening lighting.
Small leaded windows were used because imported glass was expensive and fragile when transported.
Southern Colonial
There were lots of trees there, too, but to cool things off, they put massive chimneys at each end of a house.
The
structures were either brick (often with patterned masonry) or framed with timber. Generally they were narrow and only one
room deep.
Saltbox
Both New England and the South used the saltbox style, particularly after they began to need lean-to areas. In New England
the steeper side of the saltbox shielded them from the wind, in the South from the hot sun.
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| Salt box |
At first windows weren't symmetrical because they were used for light and/or ventilation instead of decoration. Many
of them were just openings in a wall. In most saltbox houses, they tended to put off installing windows in the lean-to section
altogether.
Originally left to weather, wood houses were later painted white or sometimes pale yellow. In the South,
they were called "cat slides".
After they added second storeys, they sometimes gave them a cantilevered overhang to
add space to the original attic space. There were two rooms on each floor, one on either side of the fireplace.
Windows
were often leaded diagonals. Board and Batten Doors didn't have frames and were easily made from vertical boards nailed together
with other boards. Drafty.
French Colonial
Since French settlers in Louisiana and parts of Mississippi built no interior halls, their stucco-sided homes had expansive
two-story porches and narrow wooden pillars tucked under the roofline.
Spanish Colonial
In the Southwestern United States, Florida, and California, settlers used adobe or stucco with flat or slightly
pitched roofs finished with red clay tiles. Some Spanish Colonial homes, which drew on Spanish and Moorish influences,
featured a Monterey-style, second-story porch.
The Cape Cod
While all this was happening, people in New England were building cottages low to the ground to protect them from the
winter wind.
Half House
The family ate and gathered in the kitchen or "keeping" room. There was a buttery
used for food preparation. There was a "borning" room (the lean-to in the saltbox style) near the kitchen and also used as
a nursery or infirmary. The parlor was used only for weddings and fancy gatherings.
Three-quarter House
This cottage had a larger kitchen and an additional small bedroom.
Full Cape Cod
This version had pairs of windows flanking a central door.
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| Cape Cod |
The Cape Cod continues to be built because it's an excellent starter home for those of us not born with a silver spoon
in our mouth. Thanks to central heating, the floor plans may be different, but throughout history we've had more poor people
to house than rich ones so this style may be around for a long time to come
Dutch Colonial
I got carried away with creating Dutch colonial doors and stoops, so it got its own page. Click here.
Spanish Colonial
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