by Architectural Observer | Mar 4, 2018 | Blog, Mail Order and Kit Houses
This Sears Langston caught my eye while searching for an entirely different house on Zillow. The distinctive and memorable porch posts remain to proclaim their Sears heritage despite a rather clumsy addition on the side of the house. Images from the 1918 Sears...
by Architectural Observer | Mar 1, 2018 | Blog, Observations
Long before it became fashionable and trendy, living on a small scale was quite common. In most towns and cities, the earliest houses were built on a modest and utilitarian scale. Many such structures, particularly those of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries,...
by Architectural Observer | Feb 26, 2018 | Blog, Observations
Old buildings can be subversive? “Just how, exactly?” you may ask somewhat incredulously. Well, quite simply, old buildings (if examined closely enough) have the very real ability to reveal the shortcomings of our present age – and...
by Architectural Observer | Feb 26, 2018 | Blog, Mail Order and Kit Houses, Observations
Of the hundreds of house plans offered by the William A. Radford Company of Chicago, their design number 1517 appears to have been one of their most popular – at least in the nation’s mid-section. Numerous examples of this house survive today. The design...
by Architectural Observer | Feb 20, 2018 | Blog, Observations
There is no doubt that television has had a huge impact on shaping consumer activity; it is a primary function of the medium. Like virtually everything, television can be used for good or bad. TV’s power to shape our culture could have been harnessed to...
by Architectural Observer | Feb 1, 2018 | Blog, Observations
How is it possible that a house could be lived in for well over a century without ever getting a real bathroom?! That is just one example of how intact and relatively unaltered this amazing house is! On Wednesday I was surprised to learn that a house in Russell,...
