'Evergreen on the Falls' the Albert H. Carroll House, Baltimore, MD

The Albert H. Caroll House, Baltimore, MD. 1860 Photo: Wikimedia

'Evergreen' was built by the owner of a cotton mill, Albert H. Carroll, in 1860, following an irregular plan, but an idiosyncratic design. The house does not have a tower, nor, like many tower-less irregular plans, does it suggest a tower with a cupola, fenestration, or the placement of the entrance in the center. Rather, this house places the entrance on the projecting pavilion. While the façade is painted brick, the windows have no surrounds, but the emphasis is placed on a series of elaborate wooden awnings that project further than any typical wooden awning. The entablature is nonexistent, with the s scroll brackets projecting right from the façade without any framing. The projecting pavilion has the main entrance, a triple arched palladian design; above, the window is a normal palladian design, but oddly the central window is especially long with the sides placed high up, a very unclassical formula. This is topped by a wooden awning with an engaged rounded pediment in the center and very elongated c and s scroll brackets. On the recessed façade, a double window on the first floor with a wooden awning with a tent roof design sits underneath a single window. The simple side façade has a spare bay window with a round window in the gable. A unique house, unfortunately much of it was destroyed by a fire in 1970, but it was well restored by the Maryland SPCA.

'Orianda' the Thomas Winans House, Baltimore, MD

The Thomas Winans House, Baltimore, MD. 1856

Photo: Wikimedia

The Thomas Winans house is another one of these Russian themed estates of the 1850s. Winans' father was an inventor who worked on the construction of the Russian railroad, like Harrison in Philadelphia. He named his estate Crimea, after the peninsula in the Ukraine, and his house Orianda, after a Greek revival palace in the Crimea designed by Karl Friedrich Schinkel as one of his commissions for the Greek royal family (never built). The house has a five bay plan (the entrance is to the right of the above photo) with a porch around the door matching the porches to the sides and to the rear. The house, like other country houses around Baltimore, is finished in fieldstone with stone molded window lintels and simple decoration. The porch is quite attractive, with a lattice railing and ogee spandrel brackets. A cupola tops the whole almost entirely glass with a pointed roof. The house has no brackets, but instead uniquely features very strange thick gothic finials hanging down from the large eave at the corners of the house and cupola. This is a highly individualistic feature that rarely appears. It currently sits in the middle of a large park on a dramatic bluff overlooking a valley and is a museum and event facility (more images there).

'Tivoli' the Enoch Pratt House, Baltimore, MD

The Enoch Pratt House, Baltimore, MD. 1855 Photo: Wikimedia

'Tivoli' was constructed as the summer house of Enoch Pratt, one of Baltimore's major philanthropists and businessmen, in 1855. The house is a hulking mass, a three story, five bay plan of fieldstone and wood. The house has a string course that separates the second from the third floor. The window treatment is standard on the house, with a simple wooden surround and a molding above. Oddly, the house doesn't have an entrance porch, which I suspect was once there and similar to the back Tuscan porch, but has an entablature resting on brackets. The main entablature has c scroll brackets and is simple, akin to other country houses like 'The Mount'. It's here the house is particularly interesting. While on the front, an angular engaged pediment and arched window emphasize the center of the house, the side takes a different tack, dividing the façade into two main bays with stacked box windows with triple arched windows and panels above. These are topped by two engaged round pediments framing arched windows, contrasting with the angular front. A side service wing to the left offers a different scale, emphasizing its subordination to the main block. It is now the administration building of a mental hospital, finding new life like many of Baltimore's country houses, as an institution.

'The Mount' the James Carey Jr. House, Baltimore, MD

The James Carey Jr. House, Baltimore, MD. 1858 Photo: Doug Copeland

Baltimore had some impressive country estates surrounding it, such as 'The Mount' built for a Quaker businessman and philanthropist, John Carey Jr in 1858 by William H. Reasin, a local architect. The house is supposed to be renovated soon, but seems to have caught on fire. Fortunately it was saved from destruction but remains vulnerable. The house is beautifully proportioned, with a five bay plan and a fieldstone façade with quoins; the windows have simple stone lintels. The central bay projects from the façade grandly, with an thick arch at the base a stone stringcourse and two arched windows above; basically there are three arches each diminishing with each floor. A row of bricks diagonally set into the sides of the projection where the stringcourse ends, indicates there was a porch once, now gone. The simple entablature has double s scroll brackets (with very shallow curves) and the whole is topped by a fine centered cupola with a broad eave and nicely framed triple arched windows. The house's massing and simple design makes it a beautifully simple villa. Hopefully, the house will be restored soon!

'Clifton' the Johns Hopkins House, Baltimore, MD

'Clifton' the Johns Hopkins House, Baltimore, MD. 1858 

Photo: Doug Copeland

Photo: Wikimedia

'Clifton' is another remodel of an earlier house, a five bay home built in the Federal style in 1803 for Henry Thompson. In 1838, it was bought by Johns Hopkins, the same university benefactor, and was remodeled in 1858 to its current Anglo-Italianate design by Niernsee and Neilson, a firm whose Baltimore work I have previously explored. The house has a five bay plan inherited from its previous incarnation, but the wings and tower placement are very unprecedented. Unlike Locust Grove, Niernsee did not disguise the original house, seen as the tall central block here, but rather expanded it drastically, making it the centerpiece of a much larger Italianate composition, adding Anglo-Italianate surrounds to the windows, a small entablature sequestering the third floor, and an entablature-less cornice with simple beam brackets. A broad porch was built linking the entire design and wing (an unexpectedly large porch!) with simple arches with bulls eyes in the spandrels resting on chamfered, paneled pillars. The bulkiness of the porch is relieved by a rather delicate railings with Roman-style crosses tied with bulls eyes. A simple beam bracket cornice completes the design with a pediment indicating the front entrance. The house gets very Italianate in its tower, connected by a wing with double tombstone windows with no surrounds. The tower covers a port cochere and seems to combine the full gamut of tower motifs with an arched window on the second stage, a Renaissance surround rectangular window on the third (with Renaissance balconies), a Romanesque series of drops that underlie a simple dentilled string course, an uncommon fourth stage with three deep panels and a window in the center, and on the fifth a triple arched window with an iron balcony surrounding the whole. This might be one of the tallest Italianate towers I have featured. The rear of the house has a polygonal bay and a very strange broad eave with c scroll brackets that fill almost the whole second floor, perhaps the most exaggerated brackets I have seen.

A blog post shows detailed shots of the house and the interior during renovation, with great images of the stunning plasterwork, fine stenciled walls, and unique woodwork. The design of the tower, semi detached and connected by a low wing suggests strongly to me Osborne House, one of the UK's premier Italianate palaces:

Photo: Wikimedia

'Homewood Villa' the William Wyman House, Baltimore, MD

Homewood Villa, Baltimore, MD. 1853
Photo: Courtesy of Maryland Historical Society, [B330]

The house was built for William Wyman in 1853 and was probably designed by Upjohn himself. Wyman was a very wealthy Baltimore merchant who first lived in the Federal style house on the property until he constructed his own Italianate mansion, Homewood Villa (named after the Federal house). The house stayed in the family until 1949, when it was given to Johns Hopkins University which allowed the house to fall into disrepair. Despite a passionate grassroots response and attempted fundraising, the house was demolished in 1955 a little more than 100 years after it was built.

The house is a perfect example of the double tower plan and matches the King house in Newport very closely, even in the details. Not only does the house have almost the same fenestration pattern and variation, but even the wooden awnings, balconies, and open pediments were reproduced. It's the differences between the two houses that are most significant. First, the most noticeable difference (besides the reversal of the plan) is the taller tower is a full stage taller than in the King house, giving Homewood Villa a far more vertical thrust as well as creating even more drama in the profile. The added stage has been treated with a small round window with Gothic tracery on the front and tombstone windows on the sides. Another feature is the porches. The King house lacks porches, but here both the central bay is extended with a simple arched porch that repeats the triple arched Palladian design. Both sides as well are furnished with long porches that harmonize in design with simple arches, square Tuscan pillars, and rosettes. In this house, the shorter tower instead of paired rectangular windows has a bay window, although I am unsure if this is an addition from later remodeling. Finally, unlike the King house, the villa has the brickwork in the cornice extend to form an architrave to define the entablature, a subtle detail that adds an extra shadow that brings it closer in line with Renaissance formality. The fate of this house is quite a shame, as it would be a stunning addition to the country's examples of Upjohn's plan.

Below is an image of the Federal 'Homewood' built in 1808 that does survive.

Photo: Wikimedia

The Thomas-Jencks-Gladding House, Baltimore, MD

The Thomas-Jencks-Gladding House, Baltimore, MD. 1849-51

The impressive staircase. The dome is Tiffany. Photo: Meredith Kahn

It's fitting to end this look at Baltimore's Anglo-Italianate architecture with perhaps the city's most impressive house, the Thomas-Jencks-Gladding house at 1 Mount Vernon Place. One of the earliest houses constructed in the neighborhood, it anchors the area around the monument and provides, along with the Peabody Institute across the street, an impressive gateway from the monument to the downtown. The house was designed by Niernsee and Neilson, a firm we have encountered before, and was built in 1849-1851 for John Hanson Thomas, a politician. It was one of Rudolph Niernsee's very first designs. Later it was sold to the Jencks in 1892 who altered much of the interior and added a bay window on the east facade for the dining room. Despite these alterations, however, the house retains a great deal of mid-19th century design inside. Both the Thomases and the Jencks were part of Baltimore's high society, and the house served as an impressive showplace for the family to their notable list of guests. Abandoned in 1953 after the last of the Jencks died, the house was restored by Henry Gladding in 1962, an early example of preservation for a Victorian structure. Usually in the 1960s, people couldn't get rid of Victorian architecture fast enough. Perhaps the classicism of the design made Gladding want to preserve it. The house is currently called the Hackerman house and houses the Walter's Art Museum's Asian art collection.

The house is particularly noteworthy for its transitional blend of Greek Revival and Italianate elements. It follows the five bay plan and features on each side the recessed central bay common to other Baltimore five bay homes. The east side is only three bays wide, making it appear more like a symmetrical plan house. The house is faced with brick, which is probably correctly painted white to resemble stucco. Some of the elements could go either way stylistically, like the double Corinthian columned portico. The composition of the door with its transom and sidelights separated by pilasters is definitely Greek Revivial in form. So are the cast iron palmettes above the cornice. The house is Italianate in its elaborate hood moldings and bracketed cornice. Starting from the ground floor, the house sits on a rusticated stone basement. The windows are very tall and are connected in pairs by cast iron balconies. The hood moldings on these and the second floor windows are bracketed with a small frieze and dentils above. The moldings lack a strong cornice, which is replaced by Greek style vegetal carving. A strong, simple cornice separates the first and second floors in a highly Renaissance fashion we have seen before in Baltimore.

The second and third floors are not separated and feature on the second floor tallish windows with their signature hood moldings and small third floor windows directly under the cornice's architrave. The second floor windows have small iron grilles inset into the frame. The cornice features an architrave and alternating brackets and panels in the frieze, making it a panel cornice. The central bay is slightly different. Besides the presence of the Greek Revival door, the windows on the upper floors are tripartite to emphasize the central bay's greater width. The portico is also notable as one ascends it from the sides rather than directly from the front, a feature, which as I suggested before, lends the house a certain grandiose quality. The following images from HABS show some of the exterior details. You should definitely check out this site where the author exhaustively posted dozens of pictures of the house's mid-19th century interior architectural details.

This view shows the house with shutters, which may have been the original condition of the windows.

Thus, for now, we end this exploration of Baltimore's Anglo-Italianate architecture. The city is full of examples, some of which I will post later, but these give you a good idea of the city's characteristics. The adherence to English and Renaissance models so prominent in Baltimore's Italianate is not as staid as it sounds. The second floor bay windows, the play with the cornice, the recessed facades, all constitute the city's own interpretation of English design. Although the buildings have the elegant air of London terraces, the uniqueness of designs and the avoidance of monotony make these examples truly American and a unique collection of Italianate designs. 

The Mendes Cohen House, Baltimore, MD

The Mendes Cohen House, Baltimore, MD 1860s?

These two row houses at 825 and 827 North Charles Street offer a good example of houses in Mt. Vernon that are not part of the sober Anglo-Italianate vein. 825 is well known because Mendes Cohen, an important Jewish general, engineer, and philanthropist lived here. It is currently a law office. The architects for this house were Baldwin and Pennington. Since these architects worked on the house, it must have been built in the late 1860s or early 1870s. Both houses have been altered on their first floors, but enough survives to allow a good view of how they originally looked. They, as expected, follow the row house plan. The first floor has an elaborate rococo carved door surround, which is in the same vein as the Backus house. Here swags flare out and descend from the vegetal keystone. The first floor windows may have been segmental arched, since a bit of brick showing from behind the bay window of 827 suggests it. The second and third floor windows are distinguished by elaborate cast iron flat hood moldings with vegetal anthemia on top. Normally, this pattern would be a Greek Revival palmette, but here, like the door, it looks more rococo and free form. The architrave of the cornice is interestingly brick and wood, with the lower two bands expressed in brick. There are windows in the frieze with curved, chamfered corners that have stone insets in the corners. Overall, these homes are interesting examples of the rococo style that was also prominent alongside the Anglo-Italianate.

9-13 East Read Street, Baltimore, MD

9-13 E Read St. Baltimore, MD. Late 1860s?

I looked everywhere to see if I could find out about this row, one of my favorites in all of Baltimore; believe me searching 19th century city directories is arduous! Unfortunately, I found absolutely nothing except that the owner of number 9 received in the 1970s a preservation award for fixing the house and that a doctor lived in 13. This is perhaps the most English of the rows in Baltimore and would be completely at home in London, so I am guessing it might have been designed by one of the many English born architects floating around the city, perhaps E. G. Lind who designed the nearby Peabody Institute, one of the city's most stunning Anglo-Italianate buildings. One website says that number 13 was the work of Baldwin and Pennington, and that that unit was constructed for Jesse Hilles, a very prominent figure in Baltimore's financial community. If this is so (and I am not completely convinced), then the houses could be the product of the 1860s or 70s. But since it is so stylistically consonant with the designs of the late 50s and 60s, I am tempted to place it datewise in that region. More than any of the houses we have looked at, this row embraces the English Palladianism that exerts such a strong influence on Anglo-Italianate design.

The row has a first floor defined by a thick cornice. The doors are particularly striking to me, being deeply inset into the facade with their pilasters of rusticated stone, a feature that is definitely uncommon in the US, but very English. The low basement and stoop under the first floor and the lowered height of the entrance are in fact termed an "English basement". One of the houses has a classical entrance portico that appears to be old, while the others do not; it might have been that all of them once had porticoes, but since the moldings on the others look quite original, I am guessing the owner of this house might have wanted one. The second floor windows are much larger than the first, almost double the height, making the second floor a piano-nobile, giving it the appearance of the principal floor, another very European aspect. The alternating round and triangular pediments over the second and third floor windows are a particular feature of Renaissance and especially Palladian architecture. The second floor windows have small Greek Revival iron grills inset into the frame. The fourth floor windows are plain and much smaller than the others; an odd feature is that the second and third floor windows have a wide space between them while the third and fourth floor windows are almost crammed together. Perhaps this indicates the presence of some lost architectural feature. The cornice, as we expect in Anglo-Italianate, is simple with thickly spaced brackets. I do wonder if the houses were originally stuccoed; if they were, then the row would have looked even more English. The effect of the high-style design is one of elegance and European taste, a sentiment that would have been at home among Baltimore and Mt. Vernon's wealthy residents. If anyone has information about this row please send it to me! It certainly deserves to be better documented than it is.

The Decatur Miller House, Baltimore, MD

The Decatur Miller House, Baltimore, MD. 1853

Photo: Marc Szarkowski

The Decatur Miller house is at 700 Cathedral street in Baltimore at the corner of Cathedral and West Monument Street, only one lot south of the Mencken house. It was built in 1853 for Decatur Miller, a prominent merchant, investor, and politician, who hired Niernsee and Neilson as designers, a firm whose works are all over the Mount Vernon neighborhood. The house is an Anglo-Italianate row house with ornamentation different from much of what we have seen so far. Although Baltimore's Italianate houses in Mount Vernon were all constructed around the same time in the Anglo-Italianate idiom, they are all distinctive in their detailing and tend to avoid the repetitiveness of many of their English prototypes. This individuality is one reason I felt so drawn to looking at these houses as a group.

The house follows the typical design we have seen so far of four stories faced in brownstone. The brownstone cladding is only on the principal facade on Cathedral Street; the side facade on Monument has brick with brownstone detailing. The first floor is set apart visually with rusticated masonry, a particularly Renaissance feature; the door has flanking pilasters carved with a cable motif. The excellent ironwork balcony separates the first and second floors. Although ironwork is often associated with the south, it was once much more common on buildings in the north. The Monument St. facade features an exquisite cast-iron balcony with a tent roof, pictured above, designed by Hayward, Bartlett, & Co. Each floor features a different window treatment, much like the Albert house across Monument St; with each floor there is simplification of the ornament as well as the expected reduction in size. The second floor has round arched windows stopped with paneled spandrels and an entablature, while the segmentally arched windows of the third floor keep the rectangular surround but have rosettes in the spandrels and a cornice rather than a full entablature. The fourth floor segmental arched windows have a simple surround, but the way they intersect the architrave of the main cornice gives the cornice the appearance of undulating, an unusual feature. The cornice itself is horizontal with a course of brackets with a course of dentils underneath. I really wish I had a better picture of this interesting house, but alas I have to work with what I've got. If anyone has one, I would be grateful!

The Francis Bennett House, Baltimore, MD

The Francis Bennett House, Baltimore, MD. 1857

Continuing with other fine Anglo-Italianate homes around Mt. Vernon in Baltimore, I was struck by this seemingly dingy row house at 17 W. Mulberry. Built in 1857 for Francis W. Bennett, an auctioneer. It has recently been restored and is used as a hostel. The house follows the row house plan and is constructed out of what seems to be brownstone that is in desperate need of cleaning. Typical Anglo-Italianate features dominate the facade. We have the usual thick molding around the windows and door with a dentiled cornice and foliate brackets. The main door is arched with simple panels in the spandrels, and it is recessed with a paneled vestibule area. The cornice is irregularly large for a Baltimore house. Instead of having a row of small brackets between the frieze and the cornice, this house raises the cornice another level, inserting a second frieze that has a motif of panels surrounding a central bulls eye, a motif that is repeated over the windows. Thus the panel cornice with its thick, long brackets is superimposed upon a horizontal one, which is a particular eccentricity of this house. Some images of the interior, which balances period fixtures with inventive murals suitable to a hostel and music venue can be found here. The following images show some details.

The George Reuling House, Baltimore, MD

The George Reuling House, Baltimore, MD. 1860

I thought this house would provide a good foil for the Schumacher house with which it shares some characteristics. It is directly next door to the Albert house at 103 West Monument Street. According to this site, the architect was Louis Long, the designer of the neighboring Albert house, and the client was Dr. George Reuling, a German immigrant who was an eye and ear doctor (1896 directory). The house was also the home of a Mrs. William Reed (1902) and the Mt. Vernon Club (1920s). Long must have been inspired by the Schumacher house a few blocks away, since he adopted the same odd second floor balcony and bay window over a rusticated basement, though the Reuling house has a central entrance, windows on the sides of the bay, and a fourth full floor, making it a variant on the row house plan. The house starts with a rusticated first floor with a central door, whose placement helps integrate the bay window into the design better. The bay window itself seems to have been damaged, and is based on that of the Schumacher house is having a frame and light projection around the center bay. On closer view, there are panels on the left side above the cable molded surround which are missing on the right. No doubt, the stone base, which is probably brownstone, delaminated. The balustrade running into the wall without a post at the edge is also uncommon. The second story has a smaller bay window than the Schumacher house and a wider facade, which allows it to keep up the triple bay scheme of the facade.

The other floors proceed as expected. The facade might be stuccoed or painted; it is hard to tell. The window surrounds of the house are very spare, with plain moldings, brackets, and cornices, as is the main entablature and cornice. Considering it is next door to a rather exuberant house, it might be that Dr. Reuling preferred to create a contrast with restrained ornament. The door has an interesting vestibule, as it is arched and inset into the facade like many Baltimore doors. This image shows that there is a small saucer dome, pendantives, and arched panels in the entryway, a particularly elaborate feature. The glass also seems to be etched. I found an image on Flickr of the house's staircase and hallway that shows many of the architectural details may be intact. Again, Baltimore does not disappoint with a good example of Anglo-Italianate design, so significant to that city.

The Albert Schumacher (Asbury) House, Baltimore, MD

The A. Schumacher House, Baltimore, MD. 1855

Adjoining one of Baltimore's most impressive churches, the Mount Vernon Place Methodist Church, is the Schumacher/Asbury house. It is called the Asbury house because it is owned by the church and is named after the first American Methodist bishop, but it was originally built for Albert Schumacher, a merchant in 1855. It was designed by Niernsee and Neilson, a significant Baltimore architectural firm in the mid 19th century responsible for many homes in the Mt. Vernon neighborhood. The house, which follows the row house plan, was one of the most sumptuous constructed in the city. The Architecture of Baltimore: an Illustrated History (130) quotes a contemporary description of the house as of the 'Roman style' and 'costly'. The description discusses the impressive library on the front of the second floor, the mosaic finishes, octagonal parlors, and third floor dome. Another blogger relates how impressed he was on a tour of the home. The house is indeed a grand and eccentric specimen.

The house's first floor is entirely rusticated, resembling a traditional treatment of the first floors of Italian Renaissance palazzos, and is pierced by arches. It looks to me like the house is stuccoed and scored to resemble stone. The second floor is where things get strange. There is a large balcony separating the first and second floors resting on large brackets with a balustrade of ironwork set in a stone frame, a costly and uncommon treatment. Instead of having the usual three windows, there is only a central bay window intersecting the balcony, with arched windows, a paneled frieze, and a crowning balustrade. This is where the impressive library is. Flanking the arch are stone panels set into the facade with curved, chamfered corners. An almost awkwardly large belt course separates the second and third floors; on the third, there is a return to the three bay scheme. The surrounds are rich, featuring segmental arches, thick eared moldings with panels in the spandrels, and keystones. Above the windows, is again, an awkwardly large space before the cornice, which is of the expected Anglo-Italianate type, horizontal, dentiled, thickly bracketed. Small circular windows pierce the frieze of the cornice, which is in some ways a throwback to Greek Revival designs in which circular windows with wreaths are often found in the frieze. The whole features tall blank pilasters that frame the composition.

It is an odd house. The architects, although some of their spacing is a bit strange looking, accomplished a beautiful and eye-catching design. From the description, I would really like to see some plans and interiors; it sounds as if there are a lot of complex shapes at play inside.

And I thought I would include a picture of the adjoining church (photo by Wally Gobetz).

The William H. Graham House, Baltimore, MD

The William H. Graham House, Baltimore, MD. 1850
Photo: Marc Szarkowski

These next week of posts will focus on Anglo-Italianate houses in Baltimore! In its Mount Vernon neighborhood, Baltimore developed a surprising collection of high style row houses in a sober and elegant Anglo-Italianate style. Partly, this might have been the influence of European-born architects on the city, partly the city's cosmopolitan nature, and partly the interest of its newly wealthy class and their relationship with Europe. The neighborhood, Mount Vernon, is one of the finest examples of aesthetic urban planning. It is marked by a series of four squares that radiate in a cross out from the central square containing a column that honors George Washington (1829). There was a building boom on the squares in 1850 that transformed a neighborhood of detached houses into a dense enclave of stately rows. At any rate, it is an important set of examples of highly European influenced design in the US.

The Graham house is a landmark at 704 Cathedral Avenue in the Mt. Vernon neighborhood. It was built in 1850. I did not know for whom it was constructed, but fortunately Oleg Panczenko filled me in, which I very much appreciate. He notes in the comments:

"The Graham House was constructed in the 1850s for William Hamilton Graham (1823-1885), director of Alexander Brown and Co. and son-in-law of George Brown (important names in Baltimore’s banking history). Mr Mencken occupied a third-floor apartment with his wife, Sara Haardt (1898-1935), from about August 1930 to March 1936.

After Sarah’s death on May 31, 1935, Mencken wrote to Joseph Hergesheimer (March 19, 1936): “It turned out to be completely unendurable, living in this apartment. It was too full of reminders, and too dreadfully empty and lonely. I am going back to Hollins street with my brother August, and taking Hester [Denby, cook and housekeeper] and Emma [Ball, cook and general domestic] along.”

I won’t recite the tedious chain of title but will make three notes: (1) The Monument Place Apartment Company owned the building from 1918 to 1937. (2) Lawrence d’A.M. Glass purchased the building in 1976. (3) In November 2011, Baltimore City took title to building by condemnation so that it could be used used as an annex to the School for the Arts."

Thank you, Oleg, for the correction!

The house bears a great deal of similarity to the Augustus H. Albert house not far away. Both follow the five bay plan, both are constructed of brownstone, and both draw from the Anglo-Italianate vocabulary for their ornamentation. One interesting thing I notice about both houses is that the central bay is slightly recessed. I have seen this in other row houses, such as the Wing-Williams house; however, it seems to be particularly popular in Baltimore's houses and is found in its Greek Revival architecture, such as that of the Mount Vernon Club (1842) as well as the early Italianate Thomas-Jencks-Gladding house (1851). The recessing of the central façade might have been a particularly popular method of handling a five bay façade in Baltimore. It definitely tries to present a pavilion effect.

The house is not as complex as the Albert house in its variations. Starting from the basement, we have a rusticated base with semi-circular windows covered by grills. These are topped by thick, heavily carved brackets and cornices that probably supported iron balconies, now gone. The window treatment is the same for all the windows; the sides of each molded surround feature inset panels with carved cable decoration, topped by foliated brackets and a cornice with dentil molding. The windows gradually decrease in height with each story, a common feature of row house design. The entablature is horizontal and follows Renaissance precedents in its accurate simplicity, its small thickly spaced brackets, and its deployment of dentils and egg and dart molding. One notable feature is that unlike the Albert house, the entablature on the Graham house does not recess with the façade but runs in an unbroken line. The central bay has doubled windows. The door of the house is particularly fine, copying the window surrounds with an arch in the center with elaborate carved foliage in the spandrels. Baltimore seems to have liked elaborate carving as demonstrated in the Backus house. The door is recessed and the portal has niches on either side. The following enlargements highlight some of the details.

The Augustus H. Albert House, Baltimore, MD

The Augustus H. Albert House, Baltimore, MD. 1859

I said that Baltimore was a great place for Anglo-Italianate row houses and this is a good example even though the house is slightly detached from the surrounding buildings. The Albert house was built in 1859 and was designed by Louis Long, a prolific mid 19th century Baltimore architect. The house was converted in 1867 to be the Mt. Vernon Hotel, a very early conversion of a private home, but it then reverted to a home again in 1902 when the interiors were dramatically redesigned. The house is currently occupied by offices and a club (the linked site also features an interior view). The house follows the five bay plan, a plan which does occur in urban settings but less frequently. The detailing is particularly careful about following Renaissance prototypes, so much so, that the house has an air of being a product of the 1880s rather than the 1860s. The only major flaws in conforming to Renaissance aesthetics are the cornice over the porch, which is far too small, the oddly divided triglyphs in the porch entablature (which project slightly almost like brackets), and the incised lines in the main frieze.

The house is faced in brownstone, or more probably imitation brownstone, because brownstone soon after its popularity spread was found to delaminate or flake over time. Imitations were sought after to prevent this damage to the fabric of a façade. The house is set over a tall, rusticated basement and a slightly recessed central bay divides the house into three sections. The first floor arched windows have thick hood moldings and balconies connecting each pair, while the second floor windows have thinner eared moldings that conform to the segmented arch of the windows with blind balconies (a balustrade placed against a wall). The use of only four balusters seems odd to me, since one usually sees five on such blind balconies. They are also unusually squat and widely spaced and the thickness of the supporting molding and brackets is also very strange but very Italianate. The third floor has simple square, eared moldings. The façade is given unity by the belt courses that divide each floor at the sill as well as the increasing diminution in the height of each window. The porch is a grand affair hovering over the stoop with its paired Tuscan columns, arched doorway, and tall frieze of triglyphs and metopes. Although the house proclaims its Renaissance inspiration and does give somewhat an appearance of a Renaissance palazzo, the individual eccentricities I pointed out make it truly an American Italianate.

The John Backus House, Baltimore, MD

The John Backus House, Baltimore, MD. 1855-56

Baltimore has one of this country's best collections of early and Anglo-Italianate row-houses that I've seen. However, one of its more interesting and florid examples is the less-typical John Backus house. The house was built in 1855-1856 for Dr. John Backus, the pastor of First Presbyterian Church which adjoins it. After his death, it was bought by the church for use as its rectory. The architect was Norris G. Starkweather, an important Baltimore and Philadelphia 19th century designer. The house features a bevy of unique features. It follows the symmetrical plan, although it is a row house, with a tripartite façade, central door, and central gable emphasizing the small projecting center bay. The walls are finished in stone. It is the detailing of this house, however, that catches the eye. The best descriptor for this detail is probably rococo revival. The lush bouquets of deeply and intricately carved foliage that top the window moldings, cornice over the door, and even the pediment recall the wood carving on contemporary rococo revival furniture and mirror frames. Although such carving was commonly employed on furniture, this style of it on a house exterior is something I have never seen and certainly makes this a unique specimen.

The windows as well are surprisingly varied. The first floor has paired arched windows with Austin-like surrounds and carved bosses in the center divider. The second floor on the flanking sections has tripartite windows with a tall center section and surrounds surmounted by carvings. The center section features paired arched windows that differ from the first floor in the depth of the molding and the center pilaster on the divider. The third floor on the sides has deeply recessed plain windows, while the center section in the gable features tripartite round headed windows that lack the surrounding molding but include the bosses and carved toppers. All this makes for a façade that has a dizzying array of irregularity, but nonetheless harmonizes in the careful deployment of different forms on different windows. The door surround is yet another variation, with an ogee arch that extends from the defining belt-course broken by an explosion of elaborate vegetal carving. The door itself is entirely surrounded by side lights. Supported by Corinthian columns, the pendantives feature yet more carving. The amount of vegetation on this house almost makes it seem like the trees that surround it.

The cornice as well displays unique variations. While the parts flanking the gable are relatively simple bracketed cornices, where they engage the gable, which is raised several feet from the cornice, there are odd carvings that look like upside-down tulips. The gable has no bracketing but features a series of thickly spaced Romanesque style drops under a simple cornice. As one might expect in this house, there are further vegetable anthemia (carved floral pieces that top a gable) on top and to the sides of the gable. I provide some detail shots below.

The following pictures from the Historic American Buildings Survey (HABS) show the house without trees obscuring it and some of the interior.

The interior features a beautiful curved staircase, which seems to run around a curved wall.

The parlor displays interesting paneled doors.

The Backus house is one of my favorite buildings in Baltimore. It is a unique piece of architecture that seems to take the indoor world of pier mirrors and rococo furniture outdoors in its beautiful carving.