Every historic building has a story to tell
The rusticated concrete blocks arrived at Helena Junction on the train from Carlise, Kentucky. Church members transported the blocks in their own horse-drawn wagons to the site of their new church. The stained glass windows – in various sizes and shapes – were made in Paris, Kentucky. I hope the sun was out the day (read more)
Kentucky is a land of churches: big historic churches, built in the style popular at the time; small country churches; and churches in storefronts in small downtowns. All shapes and sizes of historic churches spread out over our 120 counties. Many historic church buildings though, are vacant, demolished, or transformed with a new use. The (read more)
The vernacular front gable church with two entry doors has great appeal to a wide audience. I love the simplistic, almost austere beauty of these buildings. As a historic type, they were built in Kentucky through almost every stylistic period and decade, up into the 20th century. The Ghent Baptist Church, constructed in 1843, is (read more)
Urban renewal was not kind to many areas of Louisville, Kentucky. The Brown Memorial Christian Methodist Episcopal Church (built 1864-65) weathered the waves of demolition around it, and some 150 years after Gideon Shryock designed the building on West Chestnut Street, its exterior continues to impress. But the design of the church is only one (read more)
Categories: African American History, Churches, Greek Revival Style, Historic architecture, Historic Preservation, Jefferson County, Kentucky architecture, Kentucky churches, Louisville
Tags: Brown Memorial Christian Methodist Episcopal Church, Chestnut Street Methodist Church South, Gideon Shryock, Louisville KY churches, Reverend L.H. Brown, West Chestnut Street, William Strickland
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
There are degrees of rural in Kentucky. My own experience, though it felt isolated at times (growing up on a farm does curb one’s teenage exploits), barely fulfills the definition as I see it in other areas of the Commonwealth. Despite the marked nuances of what rural means, certain themes defined the rural Kentucky lifestyle (read more)
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