Brookline MA Victorian

Edward Stanwood House // 1880

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The Edward Stanwood House at 76 High Street in Brookline, Massachusetts, is one of the finest and exuberant examples of the English Victorian Queen Anne style, notable for its varied wall textures and materials, unique form, and applied ornament. The house was built in 1879-1880 for Edward Stanwood, who was for many years the editor of the Boston Daily Advertiser, and a children’s magazine, The Youth’s Companion. The ornate residence was designed by Clarence Sumner Luce, with interiors by Thomas Dewing. The Stanwood House features a well-preserved exterior and period-appropriate paint scheme, highlighting the bas-relief sunflower ornament and gargoyles. Of particular note is the use of hung tile siding, overlaid to give the appearance of fish scales and the roof cresting.

Charles Storrow Rental House // c.1884

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This charming and quirky Queen Anne style house on Edgehill Road in Brookline was built as a rental property on the estate of Charles Storrow (1841-1927), a wealthy businessman who lived in his home next door (see last post). Like his own home, the residence was designed by Edward Clarke Cabot, his wife, Martha’s father, who utilized varied materials, forms, and roof shapes to create a unique composition unlike anything else in the neighborhood. The bulbous central tower and eyebrow and wall dormers also add intrigue to the design.

Charles Storrow House // 1884

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Facade

This shingle and brick Queen Anne style house at 112 High Street in Brookline, Massachusetts, was built in 1884 for Charles Storrow and his wife, Martha Cabot Storrow from plans by architect, Edward C. Cabot, Martha’s father. The lot here is said to have been gifted to Charles from his father, Charles Storer Storrow, a prominent civil engineer and industrialist, who is known for designing and building the dam and textile mill complex in Lawrence, Massachusetts. Besides the Victorian main house, the property included a historic stable and a detached house on an adjacent lot, which appears to have been rented by Mr. and Mrs. Storrow. The property was designed by Frederick Law Olmsted’s firm, with rustic rock walls, natural topography, and large, mature plantings. The Storrow House originally had stained glass windows designed by John LaFarge, which were sold in the 1970s. 

Side elevation.

Charles Torrey House // 1889

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The Charles Torrey House at 36 Edgehill Road in Brookline, Massachusetts, is a great example of a Queen Anne style residence in the Boston suburbs. The stately home was constructed in 1889 for Charles Torrey, an artist who specialized in nautical scenes. The house is unique for its brick first floor, shingled second and stucco with half-timbering in the gable, a feature that suggests the renewed interest in English medieval motifs. The architect for the Queen Anne style home could not be located, but it appears to be from a more prominent Boston-area firm of the late-19th century. The house is currently (2025) undergoing a renovation.

Moorfield Storey House // 1875

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The house at 44 Edgehill Road in Brookline, is a brick Queen Anne style residence built for Moorfield Storey (1845-1929) by architect and neighbor, Robert Swain Peabody, who was Moorfield’s friend and college roommate. Both Peabody and Storey would later move in the early 20th century to the Fenway in neighboring houses, also designed by Robert S. Peabody. Moorfield Storey was a president of the American Bar Association and the president, for most of its existence, of the Anti-Imperialist League, an organization founded to oppose the annexation of the Philippines as a colony and to support free trade and the gold standard. Storey consistently and aggressively championed civil rights, not only for African Americans, but also for Native Americans and immigrants. He opposed immigration restrictions, and supported racial equality and self-determination. He would become the first president of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), from its founding in 1909 until his death in 1929. The Storey House in Brookline is a well-preserved and early example of the Queen Anne style, that would dominate architectural tastes for the following decades.

Low-Rock House // 1888

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This handsome shingled Queen Anne style home on Allerton Street in Brookline, Massachusetts, is part of the reason why the “Pill Hill” neighborhood gets its name. The residence was built in 1888 for Mr. Sumner Flagg, likely as an investment property as the neighborhood developed into one of the finest in the Boston area. An early resident here was Judith Motley Low (1841-1933), founder of the Lowthorpe School of Landscape Architecture, which was the first school intended solely to prepare women as landscape professionals in a field dominated by men. In 1945, the Lowthorpe School merged into the Rhode Island School of Design and became the basis of RISD’s Landscape Architecture Department. Another prominent resident of the house in the 20th century was Dr. John Rock (1890-1984), a physician and scientist who worked nearby at the Massachusetts Hospital for Women. As a Catholic doctor, John Rock is best-known for two groundbreaking medical discoveries in women’s health: the birth control pill and in-vitro fertilization. Dr. John Rock and his lab technician, Miriam Menkin, were the first researchers to fertilize a human egg outside of a human body in February of 1944, this research was compounded and later led to in-vitro fertilization as we know it today. Additionally, while running his clinic, Dr. Rock encountered a number of women bearing unwanted children that they could neither afford financially nor handle physically. Rock observed numerous women who, after giving birth to multiple children, had prolapsed uteri, malfunctioning kidneys, and were prematurely aging. In 1952, Rock was recruited to investigate the clinical use of progesterone to prevent ovulation. Enovid, the brand name of the first pill, was approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and put on the market in 1957 as a menstrual regulator. In 1960, Enovid gained approval from the FDA for contraceptive use.

Boston Free Hospital for Women // 1895

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This handsome yellow brick building, designed by architects, Shaw and Hunnewell, was completed in 1895 as the Boston Free Hospital for Women. The hospital was organized in 1875 in a converted rowhouse in Boston’s South End, and after relocating once, it was decided that a purpose-built hospital was needed for the growing demands of the institution. A site in Brookline on the Muddy River, overlooking Frederick Law Olmsted’s Riverway and Olmsted Park, was purchased and the hospital was opened in 1895. The brick and limestone hospital building is somewhat Chateauesque in style and when opened, had no electricity and no telephone. The hospital is historically significant as the first teaching hospital for Harvard and as the first hospital in the country to apply radiation treatment for cancer, along with being a major research facility in fertility, especially the work of Dr. John Rock (who lived nearby) on the development of the birth control pill and research on in-vitro fertilization. The Free Hospital for Women merged with the Boston Lying In
Hospital (now part of Brigham & Women’s), which closed its Brookline Campus in the 1960s. In 1984, the firm of Childs, Bertman and Tseckares oversaw the conversion of the buildings to condominiums, called The Park, with sympathetic new construction.

Frederick Sears Cottage // 1851

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The Frederick Sears Cottage in the Cottage Farm neighborhood of Brookline, Massachusetts, is significant as one of the major surviving examples of Gothic Revival domestic architecture in the Boston area. In 1849, wealthy Bostonian, David Sears (1787-1871) laid out parks and squares in the Cottage Farm neighborhood, and built houses for himself and his children. His own house, erected in 1843, was the oldest, soon followed by houses for his four daughters, Ellen d’Hautville, Harriet Crowninshield, Anna Amory, Grace Rives, and son, Frederick. The Frederick Sears Cottage is the only surviving Sears residence in the Cottage Farm neighborhood. Frederick Sears‘ cottage was built in 1851, though he did not occupy the house long, as just three years after he and his wife married in 1852 to move into this home, Marian died. The house was inherited by Frederick Sears Jr. , and was acquired by Boston University in 1960, who began to expand into this neighborhood. They maintain the significant property very well. The Sears Cottage is an excellent example of the Gothic Revival style in stone with scalloped vergeboards, quatrefoil motifs, corner quoins, and projecting entry. The house is constructed of Roxbury Puddingstone and is said to have been designed by George Minot Dexter.

John Wales House // c.1885

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In the mid-1880s, John Wales, a wealthy hardware dealer with offices in Downtown Boston, purchased house lots in the Cottage Farm area of Brookline from Amos A. Lawrence, and set out develop the site with two stately Victorian homes. This lovely home was first occupied by John’s son, George Wales and his wife, Mabel, the year of their marriage in 1885. While the architect is unclear, it is probable that the design can be attributed to architect William Whitney Lewis, who was hired by John Wales the year prior to design a stable near his home in an adjacent neighborhood. The house was rented by Wales and subsequent owners for years. The elaborate Queen Anne style house exhibits an asymmetrical plan with recessed entrance set within an arched opening, shinged and brick walls with a prominent chimney at the facade containing a decorative terra cotta panel, and the most unique stucco gables containing what appear to be terracotta balls in geometric forms. This house is a perfect example of what is so special about the Queen Anne style!

Lawrence-Parker House // 1864

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Built in 1864 as one of the rental properties owned by Amos A. Lawrence as part of his exclusive Cottage Farm neighborhood in Brookline, this house has been extensively altered and even moved but retains significance as a surviving mid-19th century “cottage” in the neighborhood. The house was likely constructed as a one-story, stone cottage with a second floor contained within a mansard roof. In 1903, Mrs. Francis W. Lawrence hired the well-known architect and Brookline resident, Julius A. Schweinfurth, to make extensive alterations to the cottage, replacing the mansard roof with a new second floor with gable roof, along with a new porch. Schweinfurth’s design included wood shingle siding for the upper floors, which were replaced with stucco in 1970. The house was moved to its current site at the corner of Carlton and Mountfort streets in 1929 when the street was re-oriented to follow the old Boston & Albany Railroad tracks. When moved, the cottage was occupied by Philip Stanley Parker, a judge, and his wife, Eleanor. Today, the cottage is owned by Boston University and known as the Core House.