Recent Articles From The Craftsman Bungalow
Whenever I’m out-and-about and see a sign saying there’s an estate sale going on nearby, I almost always do a drive-by to check out the house and take a peek inside. A few weeks ago, that same scenario played out, and when I pulled up to the house where the sale was (below), my jaw...
My latest two articles for American Bungalow magazine are in the current Summer 2014 issue! The first article, entitled A Tale of Two Owners, chronicles the decade-long restoration by Steve and Deb Moskowitz of a grand 1909 craftsman home (below) in Portland’s historic Irvington neighborhood, and the subsequent passing of the torch to the home’s...
I was recently contacted by Allie Drinkward, a writer at Redfin.com, to provide a quote for an article she was writing for the Redfin website. You check it out below, or at the Redfin site here: A Guide to Types of Historic Homes and Preserving Their Original Character This article was written by Allie Drinkward,...
Looking back on the inaugural year of The Craftsman Bungalow, I thought it would be fun to countdown our Top 5 most popular articles from 2012. This year I was able to travel quite a bit and visit architectural landmarks in many history-rich areas of the country like: Upstate New York, Southern California, the San...
I just wanted to take a moment to reflect on the year and wish all of you Happy Holidays and a very Merry Christmas! The Craftsman Bungalow was launched back in 2011, and hopefully all of you have been enjoying reading it as much as I’ve enjoyed writing it. Every new year promises to be...
Most people don’t typically associate pianos with the Arts & Crafts Movement, and for good reason. Established piano makers of the late 1800s didn’t really see the Movement coming, and by the time they did, it wasn’t economical for them to go through the rigors and cost of designing and marketing this “new” style of...
William Randolph Hearst was a wealthy businessman who inherited a family fortune as a young man and expanded it into a vast newspaper and magazine publishing empire during his adult life. In 1919, he inherited his family’s 250,000 acre retreat property in San Simeon on the Central California Coast and aspired to build a vast...
This post is part of our “Peek Inside” series where we showcase Arts & Crafts homes from across the country that have been listed for sale, or were recently sold. Some may be fixers that are just begging to be restored, others may be fully restored and move-in ready, and still others may be somewhere...
This past week we traveled cross-country to spend Thanksgiving with family, friends and neighbors in the rural New Jersey town I grew up in. One of the many highlights of the week (in addition to celebrating my parents’ birthdays and their anniversary) was to spend some quality time with Carol Wilbur who lives in the...
On a recent business trip to Cleveland, I had some free time one afternoon to check out the city’s rich history of Arts & Crafts homes. I recalled a great article in the Spring 2012 issue of American Bungalow that featured the Cleveland Heights neighborhood situated just a few miles east of downtown. Armed with...
On a recent business trip to the San Francisco Bay Area, I opted to stay at a hotel that’s steeped in history and in a little less than two years will celebrate its 100th year in operation. The Claremont Hotel, located on the border of Berkeley and Oakland, is one of the most picturesque hotels...
From the late 1800’s until the mid-1940’s, Pabst Brewery in Milwaukee, Wisconsin was the largest brewer in America, and at times, the world. Originally established in 1844 as the Best Brewery – named after its founder, Jacob Best – the name changed to Pabst in 1889 when Best’s son-in-law, Frederick Pabst, became majority stockholder in...
Everyone remembers the heart-wrenching and tragic photos of Hurricane Katrina’s cataclysmic effect on New Orleans in 2005. In the eight years since that calamitous storm, you may have moved on with your life and forgotten just how devastating the damage was, but the people of New Orleans, and especially those who live in the 9th...
Brick. It’s been around – in one form or another – since the dawn of human civilization, and the virtues of its appeal and versatility are still very much appreciated today. It was no different in the early part of the 20th Century. In cities across the country, brick had been widely used in the...
I’ve written about our previous home in Portland a few times – I bought it in 2004 and painstakingly restored it over the next 5 years that we lived there. In 2010, when we moved to our current home in Laurelhurst, we kept our previous home as a rental and were fortunate to find wonderful...
This is a great article by Patricia Poore that defines the traditional hallmarks and characteristics of craftsman bungalow homes. It goes into specifics about interior and exterior design influences and the materials and construction details that distinguish the bungalow aesthetic from other architectural styles. I have re-posted the opening of the article – to read...
The Fall 2014 issue of American Bungalow magazine is out now, and my article about the restoration of the Bernard Maybeck-designed George H. Boke House (below) can be found on page 28. There are actually two articles about the house in the issue, one by Arts & Crafts historian and scholar, Robert Winter, who focuses...
For a time, the Ross House was known by everyone who lived near it as simply “The Purple House.” It had lilac trim on the windows, and there was an odd purple-ish addition that had been added to the front. It was an authentic Frank Lloyd Wright house, built in 1916, but its current state...
As you may recall, on a recent business trip to Hawaii I stayed at a lovely family-run bed & breakfast rather than one of the impersonal mega hotels in Waikiki. While staying there, I got into a routine of taking a walk around the neighborhood every day and was blown away by the concentration of...
To understand what we were dealing with when we initially bought the house, let’s go back to late 2009… This is what the exterior looked like when we first moved in (we have since painted it). I came to find out later that the house had been for sale earlier in 2009 through a realtor,...
With all of the basic stuff done at our new house, the focus has shifted to the big stuff. Our wishlist started with just remodeling the kitchen and bathrooms and building a new garage, but has quickly ballooned to include adding on a new master suite above the garage, as well as adding a second...
The William T. Bolton House in Pasadena, California is a prime example of Charles and Henry Greene’s early emerging California Arts & Crafts aesthetic. Taking its name from the prominent physician who commissioned it in 1906, the home predates Greene & Greene’s larger commissions – including the Gamble and Blacker houses – and introduces several more...
This article is the continuation of Timberline Lodge: The Quintessential American Alpine Lodge, Part One, in which I explored the lodge’s genesis and its historically fast construction which took place over the course of 15 months in 1936-37. Now I’ll take you inside this storied lodge on a personal tour through its hallowed halls… As...
If you’ve ever sought the perfect antique or architectural element for your home or business, then you probably know just how exhausting a search like that can be. On a recent trip to Western Pennsylvania, I stumbled upon one such place where all those hard-to-find items can be found – neatly organized, and all under...
This article is Part Two of a two part series highlighting the homes that Frank Lloyd Wright designed in Oak Park, Illinois during the years 1900 to 1913. Part One focused on his transition to the Prairie Style and the Oak Park homes he designed from 1889-1899. During the years of 1889 to 1899, Frank Lloyd...
In my previous post, The Ugly Hutch and The Beautiful Stairway That Hid Behind It: Part I, I told you how we removed the existing big ugly hutch and cut part of the wall to expose the staircase behind it. With the hutch and wall now gone, a new mystery emerged. On the floor underneath...
In light of the two recent great deals I’ve found on Craigslist (the oak desk and the Stickley nightstand), I thought I’d take the opportunity to show you some of the other Arts & Crafts items I’ve acquired through the site. It’s no secret that it can be very expensive to furnish your bungalow home...
When Sandy Evans and her husband Richard Herbold purchased this handsome 1915 bungalow in Delmar, New York, it was about to turn 100 years old. But on the inside, its previous owners had tried to re-imagine its interior as a contemporary, industrial space that more resembled a post-modern office building than a cozy, century-old residence. ...
The Mission Hills neighborhood of San Diego, California has long been a bastion of early 20th century homes, with nearly all of era’s requisite architectural styles well-represented. From compact single-story bungalows to expansive Spanish haciendas – and everything in between – Mission Hills exhibits the same architectural prowess today as it did when it was...
When photographer Jett Loe came to Los Angeles in 2012 in search of a home for he and his wife, he was amazed at what he found – hiding in plain sight. Almost by accident, Loe stumbled upon West Adams, a once forgotten central Los Angeles enclave located halfway between Downtown LA and Santa Monica,...
