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Hello Everyone, I posted this over on breaktime and someone suggested I post it here as well. I am new to this board and have been reading a lot of posts lately but this is my first post. My husband and I are breaking ground today on a major remodel of our 1100 sq. ft. bungalow. We are adding on 1500 sq. ft and pretty much gutting the existing home to rework it. We are acting as our own general contractor with the help of UBuildit as our building consultant. So far we have attempted (along with our architect) to give our new home a Greek Revival farmhouse look on the outside. It will be a 2 story gable front house with a 1 – 1/2 story wing. So now that we have the outside coming along with a simple Greek revival theme, we’d like to get some ideas for the inside without overdoing it. We’d like to stick with traditional old farmhouse feel with simple Greek revival accents here and there. Our current dilemma is picking out the type and style of interior trim (doors, windows, baseboard) and also what style of doors to pick. Our first guess on the trim was just to stick with simple 1×4’s for the door and window trim and 1×6’s for the base trim. All of our trim and doors will be painted white so we could always do something other than wood, i.e. MDF. But our real concern is whether or not 1×4’s and such would be the right style for our home. As for the doors, we want to get the heavier solid core or MDF doors. Is there a typical style we should go with? Flat panel (shaker style) with 3 Panels, 4 panels, 5 panels, etc? We were thinking as long as we stick with straight lines without arches and fancy flourishes and such we should be fine. Any thoughts? Also, do any of you know of any books out there that could help us with this or do any of you have specific knowledge of Greek Revival or even just simple traditional farmhouse styles? Most of the books I’ve found have maybe 1 example of a Greek revival house (Creating a New Old House) which doesn’t help us much in the way of options. It also showed very limited interior pictures. Any pictures you had of your ideas would also be very helpful! Thanks in advance! – Kacy |
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I grew up during the 50s in a Greek Revival farmhouse in New England, built c. 1830. It had two stories over a full fieldstone cellar with a 1 1/2 story shed ell and a full walkup attic. Windows were floor-to-ceiling on the first floor and about one foot shorter on the upper floor. Interior trim was very simple -- 1 x 5 plain(or 1 x 6, I forget which, but definitely wider than 4") around doors and windows, painted white with corner bull's-eye blocks in deep mahogany throughout the first floor, same but with plain white solid corner blocks on the second floor. Windows were six-over-six double-hung, large panes (approx. 12" x 10"??). Baseboards were 8-inch with a simple ogee top. Doors were four panelled simple ogee with brown porcelain knobs. Exterior was clapboard (white) with rounded corner boards. Louvered shutters in darkest green. Front door six panels with sidelights to floor and transom, simple rectangular panes.
For Greek Revival style trim, check out the WindsorOne moldings collection. They have whole room collections - from crown molding to baseboard and everything in between - in four historical styles: Classical Colonial, Greek Revival, Classical Craftsman, Colonial Revival.
Their collections may help you take the guesswork out of choosing moldings. Check them out at http://www.windsorone.com/moldings
Good luck!
- Anne
Hi Kacy.
There was quite a bit of variety of interior woodowork within the Greek Revival period ... from very simple to quite ornate. I live in an 1830s Greek Revival farmhouse in Western New York state, and even within my house there is a lot of variety. The doors are all two panel (vertical panels) with molding around each panel. The trim upstairs is very simple ... the baseboard is flat, 6 inches tall, with a simple 3/8-inch bead along the top edge. The two parlors downstairs have much more elaborate baseboards and window surrounds (and different from one parlor to the next).
I've replicated a lot of the moulding for my restoration work. Not too difficult.
You'll definitely want 6-over-6 windows (six panes in the top sash, and six panes in the bottom sash), and the muntins (the strips between the panes) should be relatively thin (like 1/2-inch, not the monster sizes you see in colonial and colonial revival homes).
Here is a great resource if you have a high-speed connection and want some authentic Greek Revival details. It's the on-line collection of the Historic American Building Survey ... many photos and measured drawings, most of which were done during the 1930s.
http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/collections/habs_haer/hhquery.html
If you type in your county and state name in the search window, you may indeed find measured drawings and/or photos of historic homes in your area. Some examples have many photos (interior and exterior), some have photos and lots of exact drawings, some just have one photo and a fact sheet. So be patient and try a few variations on your search parameters.
A couple years ago, I searched for Federal and Greek Revival examples in all of New York State and Ohio (I organized my searches county by county, and weeded through the results), and saved all the high-resolution photos and drawings on dozens of CDs for my own reference. What a great resource to have!
Allen