Can you design my house to look like its always been here?

This post is about a question that I get asked often and it seems to be asked more frequently as of late.

"Can you design my house to look like its always been here?"

Sure.

First we need to do a site visit and if you don't already have a site, then you need to get one. Duh.
Whether you hire an architect or a designer, that should be the first course of action. If you hire someone who never visited your site early on in the process, you probably hired the wrong person.

Second, we determine the vernacular architecture of your particular area of the country.

Vernacular Architecture

Wikipedia definition:

Vernacular architecture is a category of architecture based on localized needs and construction materials, and reflecting local traditions. Vernacular architecture tends to evolve over time to reflect the environmental, cultural, technological, and historical context in which it exists. It has often been dismissed as crude and unrefined, but also has proponents who highlight its importance in current design.

It can be contrasted against polite architecture which is characterized by stylistic elements of design intentionally incorporated for aesthetic purposes which go beyond a building's functional requirements.

I live and practice in Middle Tennessee, particularly the Clarksville and Nashville areas. I love it here.  My clients that are drawn to historic architecture have expressed interest in three styles:

Federal Style

Wikipedia definition:

Federal-style architecture is the name for the classisizing architecture built in North America between c. 1780 and 1830, and particularly from 1785 to 1815. This style shares its name with its era, the Federal Period. The name Federal style is also used in association with furniture design in the United States of the same time period. The style broadly corresponds to the middle-class classicism of Biedermeier style in the German-speaking lands, Regency style in Britain and to the French Empire style.

One example of Federal style architecture in Tennessee would be The James K. Polk House.

The Polk Home

Greek Revival Style

Wikipedia definition:

The Greek Revival was an architectural movement of the late 18th and early 19th centuries, predominantly in Northern Europe and the United States. A product of Hellenism, it may be looked upon as the last phase in the development of Neoclassical architecture. The term was first used by Charles Robert Cockerell in a lecture he gave as Professor of Architecture to the Royal Academy in 1842.^[1]

With a new found access to Greece, archaeologist-architects of the period studied the Doric and Ionic orders, examples of which can be found in Russia, Poland, Lithuania and Finland (where the assembly of Greek buildings in Helsinki city center is particularly notable). Yet in each country it touched, the style was looked on as the expression of local nationalism and civic virtue, especially in Germany and the United States, where the idiom was regarded as being free from ecclesiastical and aristocratic associations.

The taste for all things Greek in furniture and interior design was at its peak by the beginning of the 19th century, when the designs of Thomas Hope had influenced a number of decorative styles known variously as Neoclassical, Empire, Russian Empire, and Regency. Greek Revival architecture took a different course in a number of countries, lasting until the Civil War in America (1860s) and even later in Scotland. The style was also exported to Greece under the first two (German and Danish) kings of the newly independent nation.

One example of Greek Revival style architecture in Tennessee would be Elm Springs.

Elm Springs

Italianate Revival Style

Wikipedia definition:

The Italianate style of architecture was a distinct 19th-century phase in the history of Classical architecture. In the Italianate style, the models and architectural vocabulary of 16th-century Italian Renaissance architecture, which had served as inspiration for both Palladianism and Neoclassicism, were synthesized with picturesque aesthetics. The style of architecture that was thus created, though also characterized as "Neo-Renaissance", was essentially of its own time. "The backward look transforms its object," Siegfried Giedion wrote of historic architectural styles;^[2] "every spectator at every period—at every moment, indeed—inevitably transforms the past according to his own nature."

The Italianate style was first developed in Britain about 1802 by John Nash, with the construction of Cronkhill in Shropshire. This small country house is generally accepted to be the first Italianate villa in England, from which is derived the Italianate architecture of the late Regency and early Victorian eras.^[3] The Italianate style was further developed and popularised by the architect Sir Charles Barry in the 1830s.^[4] Barry's Italianate style (occasionally termed "Barryesque")^[1] drew heavily for its motifs on the buildings of the Italian Renaissance, though sometimes at odds with Nash's semi-rustic Italianate villas.

The style was not confined to England and was employed in varying forms, long after its decline in popularity in Britain, throughout Northern Europe and the British Empire. From the late 1840s to 1890 it achieved huge popularity in the United States,^[5] where it was promoted by the architect Alexander Jackson Davis.

One example Italianate Revival style architecture in Tennessee would be the Beach-Northington House.

(When I decided to start my own firm, my first office was located on the second floor.)

Beach-Northington House

A common thread with all three of these styles is that they were popular right before, during, and right after The Civil War.

These historic homes were designed and built on a grand scale however in some ways were designed to be environmentally friendly.

Third, We begin to conceptualize about the design and determine how best to design a historic looking house with modern amenities.

The three architectural styles listed above are the three that I am asked about the most when referring to historic architecture in Middle Tennessee. They are not my favorite but I don't dislike any of them.

Thanks for the time,

Joshua