HISTORIC PAINT COLORS CITY OF DUBLIN, OHIO
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5.0 Years from 1891 – 1940
5.1 Architectural Trends
The years between 1891 and 1940 were an eclectic period
drawing upon a wide variety of architectural trends from
Classical, Medieval, Colonial, and Modern architecture. By the
end of the nineteenth century and into the early twentieth
century, architectural trends began to turn to the simpler
lines inspired by the American colonial past. This started after
the 1876 Philadelphia Exposition and the 100th anniversary
of the American Revolution. The trend was further promoted
by the World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago in 1893. This
interest in the past was not only directed at the early English
houses of the east coast, but also Dutch homes. Details from
two or more of these early styles, such as Georgian, Federal,
or Dutch Colonial architecture, were freely combined to
create an eclectic mix of buildings that paid less attention
to scale and proportion and more emphasis on details
(McAlester, 320-326). In some areas of the country, Spanish
or French Colonial elements were revived. As such, there was
a tremendous variety in architectural trends in terms of scale,
level of details, and interpretation of elements.
However, an emphasis on more modern styles began around
1900 with Craftsmen architecture. It was inspired by the
English Arts and Crafts movement and became popular in the
United States through the work of Charles Sumner Greene and
Henry Mather Greene, who practiced in California from 1893
to 1914. Their designs were featured in popular magazines
such as House Beautiful, Good Housekeeping, and Ladies
Home Journal, as well as trade magazines such as Western
Architect, The Architect, and Architectural Record. Pattern
books and mail-order house catalogs followed, both of which
helped spread the style across the country. The style shared
many features with the concurrent Prairie style popular in the
Midwest, such as massive square or rectangular piers used
to support porch roofs, geometric patterns of small-paned
window glazing over single sashes, centered roof dormers,
and wood doors with vertical panels (McAlester, 438-443;
452-55).
Craftsman homes also emphasized low, horizontal lines
and a design that became part of its natural setting. Wide
projecting eaves, overhanging gables with exposed rafters,
open porches with heavy square porch piers (often on
top of masonry bases) give these homes a sense of solid
construction. Elements of the style combined with the Prairie
style to produce a two-and a half-story variant with a hipped
roof or pyramidal roof, centered dormer in the roof, and a
square plan which became known as the American Four-
square house. And simple, one-story vernacular examples
were often called bungalows.
Another modern style of this period was Art Deco, which was
popular in commercial and public buildings from around
1920 to 1940. Much of the style was inuenced by elements
in popular culture and technological advances, such as the
design of skyscrapers, ships, airplanes, and automobiles.
However, it was extremely rare in residential architecture
(McAlester, 464-466).
Architectural styles in this time period include:
No Academic style – Vernacular
Queen Anne (1880-1905)
Colonial Revival (1895-present)
Craftsman/Arts & Crafts (1900-1925)
French Colonial/Norman Revival (1910-1940)
Art Deco (1927-1940)
Building types in this time period include:
Four-over-Four (1825-1870)
Bungalow (1905-1930)
Cape Cod (1920-1950)
5.2 Recommended Paint Colors
The beginning of this period saw the use of white, o-
white, and softer pastels such as grey and yellows. Popular
colors include ochre, yellow, tan, gray, blue, and green. The
windows should be the same color as the trim, usually white
or o-white. If the home had a garage, it should be painted
the same color as the main house.
However, in later buildings, a wider range of paint choices
was popular, especially rustic earth tones of the Arts and
Crafts movement such as brown, russet, dark beige, dark
green, red, olive, and dark grey. Like in earlier periods, these
earth tones help integrate the building with its natural
materials and its surroundings. As Gustave Stickley notes his
Craftsman Homes (1909):
In this case the walls are treated with a pigment that gives a soft
warm creamy tone, almost a biscuit color, and the roof is dull
red — a scheme that is excellently suited to the prevailing color
in California or in the South, where yellows, browns, and violets
abound. For the coloring of the northern or eastern landscape,
the cement walls might either be left in the natural gray, or
given a tone of dull green, which, applied unevenly, gives an
admirable eect upon rough cast plaster….In fact the design
shown here is chiey suggestive in its nature, making clear the
fundamental principles of the Craftsman house and leaving
room for such variations of detail as the owner may desire (
Stickley, 11).