Circa 1870 – 1910
Folk Victorian architecture was a type of architecture that popped up around the country as the railroad spread. A home in the style was traditionally built in the vernacular style of the area and then embellished with Italianate, Queen Anne, or Gothic details that were often pre-cut and shipped in bulk by train. This meant that small and simple folk houses, like the Freedman‘s cottage in Charleston or the Creole cottage in New Orleans, could be embellished with Victorian elements. The basic Folk Victorian roofing subtypes were the front-gabled roof form, the front-gabled roof form that had an additional wing, the side-gable, single story form the two-story, side-gabled form, and the pyramid roof form. With the exception of the winged and gable-front form, the Folk Victorian style houses were symmetrical in their fenestration.
Most of these types of homes were very simple in their decoration when compared to their grander examples. The majority of these types of homes had a porch but the decoration on it was minimal; no more than simple turned spindles or gingerbread braces were used. Often brackets were used in the eaves and, with the exception of the winged form, all Folk Victorian homes were symmetrical in plan.
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