Henry Street Houses, Utica, NY

These four houses, located on Henry Street in Utica, are typical of the high quality of craftsmanship, carpentry, and design that pervades all of Utica's homes. Utica is the city that I have found the most architectural potential in; not only does it have hundreds of high quality houses, but most of those homes because of widespread neglect, still have their original details unmarred by siding and additions so common in other cities. Although it is a rough town, Utica could be one of the most beautiful cities in the country if its showcase of Victorian design were restored. There is definite tourist potential here, and I would recommend any fan of 19th century design make the trip. The houses pictured here all stylistically date from the 1860s.

The house pictured above and that below are of the side hall plan, and they both bear a strong similarity in their taste for elaborate ornament. The first house above has open pedimented hood moldings that echo the elaborate front door, and the cornice is of the fillet type, with large filleted windows intersecting the moldings and emphasized by brackets.

This house is similar to the first, although it bears the distinctive feature of the side-hall plan in upstate New York. Instead of terminating at three bays, the house has an added fourth bay that is recessed, which usually contains, as here, a bay window.

I would call this house roughly symmetrical in plan. It differs from the clapboard houses by being brick and slightly more reserved ornamentally. Interesting are the stone Eastlake window hoods as well as the taking up of a full bay by a large two storied bay window.

This final house belongs to the side hall plan, but instead of three bays, it has a bay with a two storied bay window. All articulated in brick, the house deemphasizes the cornice in favor of focusing on the cast iron hood moldings.

As you can see, just one street in Utica features some impressive Italianates, all built around the same time, but all distinctive and playful with the plan and pattern of an Italianate in their own way. It is this architectural variety and experimentation that makes Utica one of my favorite architectural ensembles in the country.

The Charles Yates House, Utica, NY

The Charles Yates House, Utica, NY. 1863-7 Photo: mrsmecomber

Photo: Carol

The Charles Yates house was built in 1863 or 1867 for Charles Yates, a clothing merchant, on Genesee Street in Utica, by Azel Lathrop, a local architect. For me, it is a house I am particularly drawn to in the city, because of its historically appropriate paint scheme (which is endemic to Utica houses) and its combination of Italianate with a nascent Second-Empire mansard. The house, I think, veers more toward Italianate because, although the roof is raised enough to provide for dormers, it does not constitute a full story like a proper mansard. As seen in my last post on the Millar-Wheeler house, the home displays the penchant in Utica for fine carpentry and includes a bay window over the porch.

The house broadly follows the symmetrical plan, but suggests the pavilion plan of Fountain Elms by having the facade project on the flanking bays. The facade is painted to look like stucco, and the details are done in brown to simulate stonework. The flanking bays have simple round headed windows with drip moldings. The real fun of the house comes in the central bay, like the Millar-Wheeler house, which creates on an essentially horizontal form a vertical emphasis. The porch, with all the elaboration expected in Utica, has paneled columns and heavy brackets, and the five bay, bay window (with a brief mansard) echoes this ornament. The cornice, interestingly is broken in the center by a dormer window that sort of suggests a tower or cupola, with a heavy cornice and arched window. The dormers as well have full bracketed cornices that reflect the complexity of the main, paneled cornice.

The Knights of Columbus moved in in 1913, but left in 2006 after a fire. The building, although owned, seems abandoned but cared for. It's a fine house that deserves a good plan for reuse, particularly because it makes such a statement on Utica's main street.

The Millar-Wheeler House, Utica, NY

The Millar-Wheeler House, Utica, NY. 1866

Photo: Wikimedia

The Millar-Wheeler house is a spectacular Italianate on Genesee Street in Utica built in 1866. Following the increasing trend for elaboration found in the 1860s and 1870s, the house displays an interesting combination of complex ornament and simplicity in wall treatment. The house is a symmetrical plan Italianate, but it verges on the central tower plan because the cupola has been pushed to the front of the house and simulates a tower because the central bay slightly projects. The treatment of the windows is simple, with plain window molding surrounds topped by pediments.

The real treat on this house is the carpentry. The porch construction is particularly eye-catching. The porch itself around the arched door features not only paneled columns, but an elaborate dentilled and bracketed cornice, and an interesting open arch spanning the interior of the porch arches. Above is a five bay, half octagonal, sengmental arched window that shows the same elaborate ornament. In all cases, the design features turnings and cut out designs (fleur de lys, cartouches, quatrefoils) that create the built-up, carved look seen on a lot of houses in the 60s. The cupola itself continues the elaborate design with tombstone windows, Corinthian pilasters, and thick brackets. Small embedded pediments are on each side of the tower cornice. The main cornice of the house, which has s curve brackets, is of the horizontal type but there is an interesting feature where the third floor windows that are in the entablature are flanked by brackets and have a free floating fringe hanging over them, like a truncated wooden awning. There is also a simple side porch on the left hand facade. The house is currently a bed and breakfast called Rosemont Inn, and pictures of some of the interior can be found here.

'Fountain Elms' the James and Helen Williams House, Utica, NY

'Fountain Elms', Utica, NY. 1852 Photo: Wikimedia

Following Photos: mrsmecomber

'Fountain Elms' is a fine house on Utica's Genesee Street, a major thoroughfare. Built for Helen and James Williams in 1852 by architect William Woollett it is currently a museum space for the Munson Williams Proctor Art Institute. Because the Williams planned to make the house a museum space, the interiors (created in a much higher style than the house featured originally) and exterior are well preserved and feature an exceptional collection of mid-19th century furniture and artwork. As with the other houses of the 1850s I have been exploring, it is severe in its design, but it employs an uncommon plan, the pavilioned plan with two symmetrical projecting pavilions connecting a central entrance bay. The pavilion design seems to be reflected on the right side of the house as well, where two bays strongly project at the ends (pictured below).

Interesting features of the house include thick brownstone moldings around the windows, fine rafter brackets typical of early Italianates, and blind arches (even in the chimneys). The thickness of the moldings on the second floor round headed windows gives the house a top-heavy appearance because of the simplicity of the bracket and cornices on the first floor windows. The Palladian window in the center is uncommon, but particularly unique is the Palladian configuration of the door with detached side lights. The porch and balustrades are dignified and Renaissance-inspired. Finally, the color scheme of this house is particularly historical and well conceived. Here, the stucco is painted yellow, while the trim is all a uniform brown to simulate the brownstone of the moldings. This house allows us to consider the effect of using simple and historically correct colors for an Italianate house.

Photo: Mike Christoferson

The Egbert Bagg House, Utica, NY

The Bagg House, 4 Rutger Park, Utica, NY. 1854

Continuing my focus on Rutger Park and its homes, I turn move a couple plots down to the Bagg house. This house was built by Egbert Bagg in 1854. Apparently Bagg designed the house himself, which is not a surprise given he was an engineer and land surveyor. The plan may surprise you because it is missing an important element. It is a side towered villa like the Sloan house in Oswego and New Haven's Norton house. You might ask, where did the tower go? The house seems not to have been built with one. It is often the case that Davis and Downing's plans were used but elements were omitted whether because of cost or taste. It's very common to see even irregular villas constructed without their towers. Italianate is an adaptable style, and it is always up to the builder to construct a house that suits their client's aesthetic and pocketbook.

The house has other eccentricities besides its missing tower. To tell you the truth, I am not completely sure how much it differed from its current state when it was completed. The elements of the side tower plan are there: the thin tower base, the long recessed center, and the projecting end pavilion. The center section, however, features instead of a loggia a bay window. This bay window does look like it might be original to the house a might have been included to accommodate a parlor or library offering a scenic view of the park. The expected loggia has been translated to a tent roof verandah on the end pavilion and a wooden awning over a double window on the tower base. The current entrance is on the right side at the end of a long verandah, the style of which seems to be later to me; perhaps it is an addition of the 1860s or 70s. The entrance could have been moved there at that time. The original entrance way have been from the verandah to the left into the room with the bay window. I'm really not sure, but it's always fun to play architectural detective. I certainly think the open loggia on the third story above the center is later. Its form suggests the Colonial Revival of the 1880s or 90s. What really makes me think it is a later addition is the way the center section's roof and walls are sagging, perhaps from supporting the balcony's weight on a part of the structure that wasn't built to bear that load. The placement of a chimney as well directly in the center of the façade seems unlike other Italianate precedents.

The house appears to have been well restored by its owners. The original porches and awnings seem intact, and the color choice is very period appropriate. The window surrounds are suitably simple for a house of the 1850s as are the brackets which echo the treatment in the Munn house. The façade appears to be painted brick, though stucco would have been more period appropriate; the effect however is not lessened by the visible brick at all. All in all the Bagg house is a fascinating puzzle.

Munn's 'Castle', Utica, NY

Photo from New York Traveller.

The so-called "Munn's Castle", 1 Rutger Park, Utica. 1852 or 1854

The Munn House in Utica is one of upstate New York's greatest Italianate monuments. The house was designed directly by Alexander Jackson Davis c. 1852 or 1854, and is reminiscent of another of his designs, that for Litchfield Villa in Brooklyn, built in 1854 as well (the Baughman House in Detroit was also a related design). The house is part of a 19th century development in Utica, Rutger Park. Originally part of the rural Miller estate until 1850 when it was divided into lots for building, Rutger Park formed as a 19th century street of mansions (akin to Hillhouse Avenue in New Haven or Cleveland's Euclid Avenue) that fronted onto a large park. The park and site attracted wealthy and influential Utica families who built a row of mansions, mostly Italianate homes, along the park's western side. The Munn house in the 1950s was converted into a nursing facility and subsequently abandoned. The interiors are in particularly rough shape, and from the images you can see, there are missing balusters and damaged verandahs. Although the house has gone through some rough times, the Utica Landmarks Society has purchased the house and plans to restore it as a house museum (kudos to them!). Utica itself, although it seems a little decayed, is home to a fantastic collection of Italianate buildings of which the Munn house is a particular gem.

Despite its 'castle' moniker that suggests Gothic architecture, the house is a particularly sober Italianate irregular villa. The design departs somewhat from the expected irregular plan, but considering Davis popularized the irregular plan in the first place, it's his prerogative to futz with it. Unlike the plan published by Davis, the house has a large wing to the left of the projecting pavilion, which dramatically increases its mass and horizontality. The projecting pavilion itself is chamfered (has angled corners) rather than 90 degree corners, which do give it a somewhat castle-like appearance, or make it seem like some overgrown bay window. The chamfered shape of the pavilion is elegantly echoed by the bay window on its first floor whose tripartite division is repeated up the façade. The tower is spare, unlike Austin's tower at the Norton house, with just a few round-headed windows. The brackets are small but frequently deployed without an entablature, again giving the effect of jutting roof beams, as Davis did in his design for the Apthorp house. The finish is scored stucco, an effect we have seen in many houses of the 1850s. Originally the façade was graced by a wooden porch on the right and a delicate cast iron porch on the left. Fortunately for us, Davis' plans and elevations for the house have been preserved and are in the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

 The north elevation.

 

The principal western elevation.

Both of these drawings can be found on the Metropolitan Museum's website (drawing 1 and 2). Looking at the plan, we can see that Davis took full advantage of his chamfered pavilion by incorporating chamfered rooms into most of the first floor. Where a lesser architect might have been forced to create thick and oddly shaped halls and closets, Davis beautifully combined the rooms into a carefully composed jigsaw puzzle that snugly fits these oddly shaped rooms together. From these elevations one can also get a good idea of the original finish of the house. In looking at these drawings, however, you should notice some discrepancies. The house seems to have been 'flipped' by the architect since the elevations show the tower on the left of the projecting pavilion whereas the house as completed has the tower on the right; also one of the porches is missing. A later drawing also in the Met, shows the house closer to its appearance as it was completed (credit).

The Munn house is an impressive example of an Italianate villa by a master designer. The careful balance of heights and widths betray the work of a great architect. I personally love how the tall, thin tower is contrasted with the thick projecting pavilion, how 90 degree angles contrast with chamfered corners, and how a 2 bay wing is balanced by a single bay wing. The house almost has a pyramidal shape as the various rooflines culminate in the tower with its urns. I am excited to see how the Landmarks Society restores this impressive monument.