Architecture Blog

Congregational Church of Westborough // 1834

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The Evangelical Congregational Church of Westborough, Massachusetts, has its roots in the first church in Westborough, established on Powder Hill in 1724 under Reverend Ebenezer Parkman. The Religious Freedom Act of 1811 and the official separation of church and state, encouraged a diversity of religious views in Westborough and a branching out from the First Church. As a result the church here split in 1834, with some members forming the Evangelical Society, and those who remained, became the First Congregational Unitarian Society. The newly formed Evangelical Congregation built this church at the corner of West Main and Church streets in 1834 and the building is a typical 1830s Greek Revival style religious building in the state. In 1869, the church was remodeled, where the first floor was jacked up to provide basement meeting rooms.

Westborough Town Hall // 1929

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Welcome to Westborough (sometimes spelled Westboro), Massachusetts, a suburban town in Worcester County that has a lot of history! Westborough was first settled by colonists in 1675, when a few families had settled on land in the “west borough” of Marlborough, which was settled decades earlier. Before this, the land was occupied by the Nipmuc Indians, who hunted and fished near Cedar Swamp and Lake Hoccomocco. The town grew as an agricultural center with turnpikes crossing through connecting Boston to Worcester and other points. Later connections from rail and later the Mass Pike, had allowed for rapid growth and commercialization of the current population of over 22,000 residents. After WWI, the town’s outdated wood-frame meetinghouse was deemed inadequate for the growing population and higher demand for quality services. The meetinghouse was demolished and soon-after replaced with this handsome Town Hall in 1929. Designed by Boston architectural firm, Kilham, Hopkins & Greeley, who specialized in thoughtful infill developments and were among the best to design in the Colonial Revival style. The building was highlighted in architectural publications in 1930 with one stating, “An ultra-modernistic building on the elm shaded street of this Massachusetts town would have been an intrusion and would have been felt as such by the citizens, but the designers felt that it was entirely possible to combine the new ideas with the well-known red brick and white cupola of the native idiom, and the result is a modern building harmonizing perfectly within its environment.” I couldn’t agree more!

Dr. Benjamin L. Noyes House and Vault // 1903

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Benjamin Lake Noyes (1870-1945) was born in Lisbon Falls, Maine, but grew up on Grand Manan, New Brunswick, Canada. He worked at his father’s hardware store before entering Bowdoin Medical College. After graduating, he moved to Stonington, Maine, to work as a physician. Here, he met his wife, Linnie Howard, and they married in 1899. In 1903, the couple had a large Queen Anne style house built on a bluff, overlooking the Stonington Harbor. Dr. Noyes was a physician, surgeon, occultist, inventor, surveyor and antiquarian, who took interest in genealogy and local history in his spare time. By the time of his death Dr. Noyes had completed 100 volumes of material on island history and genealogies of its people. To house his massive collection, he constructed a fire-proof vault of local granite at the base of his home opened his record collection to the public known as the Penobscot Bay Archives. After his death in 1945, much of the collection was sent to the local historical society for preservation. A fire in 1981 destroyed much of the house except the first floor and the granite, fire-proof building, and the upper floors of the Noyes house were rebuilt.

Stonington Opera House // 1912

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The Stonington Opera House in Stonington, Maine, is a historic early 20th century community center and theater in a vernacular style. The theater was built in 1912, on the site of an earlier hall built in 1886, that seated more than 1,000 people and hosted national touring shows that arrive via steamboat from Rockland. The original theater was destroyed by fire in 1910 and was soon-after rebuilt. It continued the practice of the earlier facility, hosting theatrical productions, lectures, and community events. Its floor was covered with removable folding chairs, so that the space could be used for dances and other social events. It was fitted for screening films around 1918, which came to dominate its uses in the mid-20th century. Unlike other early theaters, which were generally incorporated into municipal buildings, this one was specifically built as a profit-making venture, and was designed to accommodate elaborate theatrical productions, and is probably the oldest of this type in the state. After being vacated for much of the later half of the 20th century, the Stonington Opera House was restored and reopened by Opera House Arts, a local nonprofit, in 2000, and is once again used primarily for film screenings and theatrical productions.

Oceanview House // 1883

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At the tail-end of the 19th century, the active fishing town of Stonington, Maine, like many other coastal communities Down East, began to see growing seasonal tourism and summer residents escaping the woes of city life for the cool sea breezes. Although there were neighborhoods of summer cottages built and occupied in the 1890s on Deer Isle, no summer colonies formed in Stonington in the late 19th century, likely due to its industrial nature with fishermen and quarry-workers living in the village. There were however, visitors, and the 1883 Oceanview House was built to house “people from away” every summer. The Oceanview House property also included its own water tank and windmill along with a meeting room for local groups. The late Italianate style building has been lovingly maintained by later owners and most recently, housed an antique store!

Thurlow Building – Stonington Public Library // 1897

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This historic building on Main Street in the working harbor village of Stonington, Maine, was built in 1897 as a commercial block for Mr. Thurlow. John Leman Thurlow (1842-1928) was born on Deer Isle and was engaged in business in town. Mr. Thurlow had this commercial building constructed to house a local grocery store with residences above. Just before its completion, the Deer Isle Gazette wrote, “J. L. Thurlow’s new store is up and the side finish is being put on. It will be a fine commodious two story and a half building, an ornament to the place.” The building later was occupied as a millinery shop, a dress shop, and was purchased in 1959 by a newly established library association. The all-volunteer operation to establish a library in town began in 1955, and a collection of donated books was eventually housed in a rented space until this building was purchased as the home of the village library.

Central Hall // c.1885

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Located next door to the former High School (now the Town Hall) of Stonington, this mansard-roofed commercial building on Main Street is a prototypical example of late 19th century mixed-use architecture seen all over Maine. This building was constructed in the 1880s and known as Central Hall. The building contained retail spaces at the ground floor and tenement housing in the upper floors for workers at local granite quarries. The building is well-preserved and an important contributing building to the working village of Stonington.

Stonington Town Hall // 1885

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Overlooking an archipelago of over sixty islands, the working port town of Stonington, Maine, is one of the more vibrant and active ports in the Pine Tree State. With a population of just over 1,000 residents, the town is consistently ranked among the top lobster ports in the country and is the largest lobster port in Maine. In 2011, 14,854,989 pounds of lobster were landed by Stonington fishermen! The town was originally a part of Deer Isle, with the main village known as Green’s Landing, until 1897 when it incorporated as its own municipality in 1897, choosing the name Stonington after the area’s granite quarries. This handsome mansard building was constructed in 1885 as the village’s school. Named Rockbound School, the building features an intact belltower at the rear. The school would eventually close in the second half of the 20th century, and became the Town Hall of Stonington after a fire destroyed the previous building in the 1970s.

Prospect Hill Tower // 1903

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Originally part of the town of Charlestown, Massachusetts, Prospect Hill is now located in the nearby town of Somerville, established in 1842. As one of the hills closest to the city of Boston, the hill played a pivotal role in the line of defensive works constructed after the Battle of Bunker Hill. The area developed slowly, with old farms around Prospect Hill, largely subdivided in the late 19th century for residential development. Around this time, in 1886, the Prospect Hill Park Association was formed, and in 1898, land here was purchased for a public park. The focal point of the iconic neighborhood park is the stone castle structure at the top. Completed in 1903 to commemorate soldiers of the Revolutionary and Civil wars, the rusticated granite tower was designed by Ernest W. Bailey, the City Engineer of Somerville, who also worked to landscape the surrounding park. The granite blocks were shipped in from Deer Isle, Maine. By the 1960s, the structure began to suffer from deferred maintenance. The City of Somerville added the concrete retaining walls to shore up the landscape, which worked for some time. Decades later in the early 2000s, the structure was at risk of further deterioration. Through Community Preservation Act funds, the tower and surrounding landscape were restored and made safer, making this important memorial accessible and enhanced for all to enjoy. 

Louville V. Niles House // 1887

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Louville Varanus Niles (1839-1928) was born in Maine and came to Boston in 1860 for the chance to make his fortune. In 1870, he formed a partnership with his two brothers in the provisions business under the name Niles Brothers. The company would later merge with the Boston Packing and Provision Company. Niles moved from Boston to Somerville in 1882, purchasing the Bradshaw estate on Walnut Street. He remained in the house until he decided to redevelop the property, building a number of dwellings on the former estate bounded by Walnut, Boston and Munroe streets. For his own residence, Louville hired the firm of T. B. Blaikie and Son, who designed this beautiful example of a Queen Anne style house in 1887. The building has irregular massing, with numerous gables and rooflines. There is a prominent two-story, rounded tower at the corner, capped with a conical roof, and applied ornament in the gable ends, all common features in this style in the Victorian period. The owners have painted the house to accent the many unique details found here.