Every historic building has a story to tell
I did not enter into the field of architectural history and historic preservation for the money (I know this comes as a shock). In addition to the oft-paltry salary endured by many of my colleagues, the most interesting projects in our field are usually the least well-funded. Money is always in short supply (at least (read more)
Bell bottoms. Beanie babies. Disco and the Atkins Diet. Fads are curious, strange creatures, and likely to reappear (especially in fashion) when least expected. I am not certain that this truism exists in architecture, for I have yet to spy the fad of octagon houses taking hold again. In mid-19th century America, the octagon house was (read more)
Categories: Architecture, Historic Preservation, Kentucky architecture, Kentucky churches, Kentucky history, National Register of Historic Places, Vernacular
Tags: Benjamin Henry Latrobe, Octagon Cottage, Octagon Hall, octagon house, octagon house in Kentucky, Orson Fowler, Poplar Forest, Thomas Jefferson, West Virginia octagon, William Kent
A healthy imagination is a vital part of my profession – that, and a good dose of optimism. Otherwise, I would be inundated by depression from watching countless buildings fall and communities wither. Whenever I visit a new place, I always find a building I would like to adopt – and if I ever won the (read more)
One of my favorite daydreams – and mental exercises – involves the possibility of time travel. Should I be hurtled back into Kentucky’s history, would I be able to find my way around, using landmarks to chart my path? I always wonder if I would recognize our family farm circa 1860 or so (I never go too far (read more)
My grandmother’s house is for sale. I stumbled across the listing yesterday in my attempt to discern what is on the Central Kentucky real estate market that may interest potential buyers like…me. House-hunting is not actually something I enjoy that much. As an architectural historian, my standards can be exacting (that is probably an understatement). Plus, (read more)
Storytelling is a selective art, and since buildings and landscapes form the foundation of my stories, I cannot capture them all. Yesterday afternoon, while perusing Facebook (you know you do it too…), I flinched at the photograph of a bulldozer tearing into a small house in Paris, Kentucky. The realization that I photographed that house (read more)
My first Frank Lloyd Wright experience was shortly after college, when my mother and I visited Fallingwater, the iconic house he designed for Edgar Kaufmann, and Wright’s nearby Kentuck Knob, both in rural southwest Pennsylvania. I’ve since returned to both sites, my enchantment with the architecture, site development, and every intricacy that Wright controlled not (read more)
Categories: Architecture, Historic Preservation, Landscapes, Other Places, Tourism
Tags: Fallingwater, Frank Lloyd Wright, Kentuck Knob, Prairie School, Taliesin, Wisconsin
Buildings, like people, evolve, grow, and even shrink. Of course, this cycle of change happens to buildings through the actions of people. Inaction, commonly referred to in its final phase as “demolition by neglect” also acts as an agent of change on a historic building. I’ve experienced my share of needless demolitions since entering the (read more)
Traveling, it seems, does not do much for my productivity. I enjoyed my time in Chicago tremendously, but my intention to publish a blog post a day for Preservation Month took a severe blow…forcing me to admit that committing to that lofty goal doesn’t actually make much sense, and drains the joy of this venture (read more)
Categories: Architecture, Historic Preservation, Kentucky architecture
Tags: Blogging, Preservation Month, Writing
I really should be moving on to the letter “C,’ but there are so many delicious architectural terms that begin with “B” that I wanted to talk about two more: bay windows and brackets. A bay window is a window that projects from the outside wall of a building. Unlike an oriel window, the bay (read more)
Categories: Architecture, Kentucky architecture
Tags: architectural terms, bay window, brackets
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