Agenda - 08-25-1997 - C2 - Laserfiche WebLink

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034 picturesque stirred up ornamentation along porches and roof lines in rural Orange County,the conservative culture held on to traditional building practices and house-types well into the 1900s(Mattson 1996, p.47). With the availability of milled lumber, frame houses conforming to familiar shapes and layouts proliferated the landscape. Versions of the gable-roofed,one-room deep,symmetrical dwelling,with a front porch and rear kitchen ell, remained popular among Orange County farmers until at least 1910. Both one-story and two-story models, usually with simple shed porches and open plans,were built for tenants. Land owners also continued to select the rectangular symmetrical form for their own houses,usually with a formal central passage. Decoration and scale varied according to taste and means. The standard two-story model was repeated throughout Orange County from the late 1860s to about 1910. Testifying to the deeply rooted conservatism of this agrarian society,the picturesque movement introduced very few new house types to rural Orange County(Mattson 1996,p.48). Architecture of the 1910s to Post-Civil War The availability of materials made possible by the advent of the railroad in the twentieth century yielded an introduction of several house-types to Orange County. These included the Colonial Revival American four- square(2-story double-pile with four rooms on each floor)and the Craftsman-influenced bungalow(1 or 1 1/2-story with several irregular floor plan variations)(Mattson 1996,p.52). Colonial Revival was the preferred style among Orange County land owners by the 1910s as its classical and more sophisticated design appealed to the prosperous middle-class farmer(Mattson 1996,p. 52). Builders integrated Colonial Revival motifs and detailing into traditional house types as well as applied it to the two- story four-square form. A fine example of Colonial Revival architecture in the Cedar Grove Historic District is the Dr. Claude M. Hughes House(9). Built in 1912,this handsome frame house is executed in a two-story four-square form which is covered by a high hip roof with smaller cross gables. A projecting cutaway bay, wrap-around verandah, and decorative sawnwork in the gables allude to the transition from the Queen Anne style. The cubic symmetry,Doric porch columns,and pedimented entry bay exemplify the domestic Colonial Revival style.