I gotta say I really agree with the 12/28 poster ("How Will I Learn To Love Landmarks..."). It's obvious you're planning a quality renovation and one that -- to the best of your ability and budget -- will also be historical sensitive. So please Landmarks and then do your own thing. If there's a disparity, you'll no doubt be able to work it out. At the end of the day, you're doing the neighborhood a huge favor by taking on this wreck and your project is too small for Landmarks to spend much time on.

While I understand the sentiment of the 12/28 poster and the 1/9 poster, I know that the authority of LPC is not just an empty threat. If you get one thing approved and then build another they can do more than fine you. They can make you take it down and rebuild it. And at that point all bets are off. They can almost make you build anything they want, regardless of what compromises or agreements you arrived at in the inital approval process. I have seen it happen.

So while we are waiting for LPC process, why not tell us about the few tons of steel you have parked at the curb right now?

Hello

I am something of an amatuer architectural buff, and if I may be so bold, I think I can steer you toward a better understanding of what style your house is. What I believe you have is an early Victorian house (perhaps in a late greek revival mode) that had been remodeled in 1893 into a Shingle Style house.

The Shingle Style grew out of the broader Queen Anne/ Colonial Revival style ushered in by the great architect Henry Richardson beginning in the 1870's. The mature Shingle Style was extremely popular when your house was remodeled.

That was no doubt when the gambrel roof was added (a very popular colonial revival design) with its half-timbered decoration you refer to as Tudor. I do not believe it was ever a feature of the 1860's house. Also consistent with a vote for Shingle Style is the configuration of the upper windows and the pitch of the roof on the "turret". You will see this almost exact scheme on the architect Bruce Price's Van Buren House in Tuxedo Park, N.Y. (1885,) and on the porch of the McKim, Mead, and White designed house for Cyrus McCormick in Richfield Springs, N.Y. (1880). Also, note how in your vintage photo, the shingles elegantly wrap around the sides of the large dormer added to the roof of the earlier house. That too, was a common feature of the shingle style.
As for color schemes, I was not surprised to see your photo of the shingles unpainted. In Bret Morgan's "Shingle Styles, Innovation and tradition in American Architecture", almost every example has unpainted shingles. There are excellent photos of appropriate trim colors in the book particularly in Richardson's Stonehurst House and the Isaac Bell House in Newport, R.I.

Finally, I should point out a house that may particularly interest you. It is Kingscote in New port, R.I. and like yours is an earlier timber frame house that was given a later 19th century Shingle Style addition with a projecting bay and roof pitch just like yours.

Your house is great and I wish you all the best luck with your restoration.

George