1880s Architecture

Faulkner-Hayden House // 1881

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This unique house at 29 Brimmer Street in Boston’s Beacon Hill, was completed in 1881 is architecturally distinctive compared to the early 19th century homes that the neighborhood is known for. The five-story residence has a raised entrance up a flight of steps set within an arched opening. To the side, an arched window frames the facade and has an ornate terracotta panel as a base. More terracotta ornament can be found at the second floor and under the cornice as a thick band frieze with a copper-clad mansard roof above. The single-family residence was built in 1881 for Charles Faulkner (1811-1885), a commission merchant, for his daughter, Ann Ruth Faulkner the year of her marriage to Charles Rowley Hayden. Mr. Hayden was a musician and vocalist. For the new wedding gift, Faulkner hired the esteemed architectural firm of Bradlee & Winslow prepare the designs. The former Faulkner-Hayden House today contains five condominiums.



Eliot C. Clarke Townhouse // 1884

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One of the many great townhouses on Brimmer Street in Boston’s Beacon Hill neighborhood is this residence designed as a unique interpretation of Queen Anne and Romanesque Revival styles. Original owner, Eliot Channing Clarke (1845-1921), an MIT-educated civil engineer. His uncle, Thomas Curtis Clarke, was a noted civil engineer, a member of the firm of Clarke, Reeves & Co., Bridge Builders in Pennsylvania, and served later as President of the American Society of Civil Engineers. When Thomas Clarke’s firm was designing and building a new bridge over the Mississippi River in Quincy, Illinois, he had his nephew lead in the design. In 1876, Eliot was appointed engineer in charge of a survey for a main drainage system for Boston. The project was adopted and construction began a year later, taking years to complete. In 1885, Clarke published the work that he oversaw, modernizing a rapidly growing Boston water and plumbing system. He became one of the leading sanitary engineers of the United States. In 1884, Clarke hired architect, S. Edwin Tobey, who designed this townhouse with a unique gable containing a ocular window and panel brick parapet as an interpretation of a Flemish gable. A traditional arched entry in brick is a nod to the Romanesque Revival style, which surged in popularity in Boston following the completion of H. H. Richardson’s Trinity Church. In 1969, the Clarke house’s interior was connected with its neighbor as the Advent School, a private K-6 school associated with the Church of the Advent across the street.

Peter Bent Brigham Building // 1888

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Located at the corner of Causeway and Portland streets in the Bulfinch Triangle Historic District of Boston, you will find the Peter Bent Brigham Building, one of the best examples of the Richardsonian Romanesque architecture style in the city. The building was built by the estate of Peter Bent Brigham (1807-1877), an interesting character in Boston’s history. Peter B. Brigham was born in Vermont and eventually moved to Boston and began his career selling fish and oysters in Boston. A self-made, hardworking man, Peter would eventually own a restaurant in the city and began making connections with the movers and shakers of town. With his success, he began investing in real estate and would become a founding director of the Fitchburg Railroad. Peter died in 1877, he never married nor had children. His estate valued in the millions and was to be spent 25 years after his death, for a hospital “for the care of sick persons in indigent circumstances”. The money appreciated to $2,000,000 by 1902 and was used to establish the Peter Bent Brigham Hospital, now Brigham and Women’s Hospital. His family, who also received a substantial amount of money in the will, built this building, hiring the firm of Hartwell & Richardson to design the 1888 corner and the later, larger 1891 addition. The commercial building was rented to stores and professionals and even retains Peter B. Brigham’s name in the facade carved in terra cotta.

Sunnyside // 1886

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Photo from recent real estate listing

During the height of the Shingle and Queen Anne styles’ popularity, architect Stanford White of McKim, Mead & White completed plans for one of the earliest Colonial Revival style residences, “Sunnyside” in Newport, Rhode Island. The residence was built in 1886 for “Commodore” William Edgar (1810-1887) and his wife, Eliza Lucille Rhinelander (1832-1916). William was a co-founder of the New York Yacht Club in 1844 and heir to a New York fortune. Eliza was an aunt of Edith Wharton and a grand-daughter of William Rhinelander, co-founder of the Rhinelander Sugar Refinery. The property remained in the Edgar Family as Lucille Rhinelander Edgar (1858-1948), an unmarried daughter of the couple, would live here year-round with servants. The house is built of buff-Roman-brick with a large central block flanked by L-plan wings under a hipped roof punctuated by massive chimneys. Of special note on the facade are the rounded bays, entry portico with Palladian window above, and side porch.