Philadelphia Row Houses
By Don Letts and Lindsey
Kieffaber
Penn's Plan
• “Penn's initial design for his 'green country town' was
framed partly in response to his negative view of london”(pg. 10. Spaces, inside and outside in Eighteenth-Century
Philadelphia by Sharon V Salinger)
• Philadelphia was the first large-scale gridiron.
• He designed the town for large mansions per block
surrounded by gardens. A truly suburban setting
• Ironically, “...by 1750 the aspect of the toen bore a closer
resemblance to London than to Penn's vision of a
disciplined community.” (pg. 1. Houses and Early Life in
Philadelphia, by Grant Miles Simon)
Row House Comprimise
• Row Houses were “Philadelphia’s dominant building type
for 300 years…” (pg. 14, The Comparative Row House
Study: an Introduction to Architectural Design, by Paul
Hirsorn)
• Row House design is essentially a comprimise between
what Penn wanted, and what London was.
• The majority of the row houses did not have gardens in
front of them.
• However row houses allowed for individuals to own
property rather than the appartment style New York.
• Penn encouraged, and there still remains a psychology
within Philadelphia (especially the old Philadelphia area)
that the inhabitants are city people, but country people at
heart.
Half Timber Construction
A few examples of half-timber construction:
•Used in Germany and
London (before the great fire
of 1666)
•Relevance: the first row
houses were constructed in
half-timber construction
(Budd’s Row- “the earliest
recorded row in
Philadelphia… dating from
about 1691” (pg. 140, Robert
Mills and the Philadelphia
Row House, by Kenneth
Ames)
Elfreth's alley
- upper to middle
class inhabitants
- 1702-1755
- one side is primarily
Georgian architecture,
and the other federal.
South Side of Elfreth's Alley
Georgian architecture
- pediments
- paneled shutters
North Side of Elfreth’s Alley
Federal Architecture
-collumns around the door
-more aymewtrical and balanced.
-have elevated entrances more often
- pedimented gable
- three full stories
- roof pitch reduced
York Row:
•South side of walnut street
facing sansom row
•originally very grand
•Built by BHL in 1807-1808,
shortly before Mills created
Franklin row
Franklin Row:
•Built in 1810 by Robert Mills
•South 9th St, between
Chestnut and Walnut St.
Colonade Row
• Corner of Fifteenth and
Chestnut Streets
• residential four-storey
buildings
• 1830
• John Haviland
Sansom Row:
•Brown Stone Façade – (16 of 18…2 westward
have common Philadelphia brick)
Built in 1860’s
By Benjamin
Henry Latrobe
•Imbricated Shingles – overlapping edges
•Mansards - upper story formed by a slanted roof
•Paired Doorways
•Continuous bracketed cornices – molding
Elfreth's Alley
Franklin Row
Sansom Row
York Row
Budd's Long Row
Bibliography
•
Bridenbaugh, Carl. Cities in the Wilderness. New York: The Ronald Press Company.
•
Burt, Nathaniel. The Perennial Philadelphians. Philadelphia: University of Pennslyvania
Press, 1963.
•
Salinger, Sharon V. “Spaces, Inside and Outside in Eighteenth Century Philadelphia.”
Journal of Interdisciplinary History, Vol. 26, No. 1. 31. 1995.
•
Ames, Kenneth. “Robert Mills and the Philadelphia Row House”. The Journal of the
Society of Architectural Historians, Vol. 27, No. 2. May, 1968. 140-146
•
Schweitzer, Mary M. “The Spatial Organization of Federalist Philadelphia, 1790.”
Journal of Interdisciplinary History, Vol. 24, No. 1. 31. 1993.
•
The Octavia Hill Association. “Certain Aspects of the Housing Problem in Philadelphia.”
Annals of the American academy of Political and Social Science.Vol. 20. July 1902, 111120.
•
http://www.uchs.net/HistoricDistricts/sansomrow.html
•
http://www.brynmawr.edu/cities/courses/05-306/proj2/ab2/Developers.htm
Bibliography con’t
•
•
•
•
•
Simon, Grant Miles. “Houses and Early Life in Philadelphia.” Transactions of
the American Philosophical Society. New Ser, Vol. 43, No. 1. 1953.
Murtagh, William John. “The Philadelphia Row House.” The Journal of the
Society of Architectural Historians, Vol. 16 No. 4. December 1957.
Smith, Robert C. “Two Centuries of Philadelphia Architecture 1700-1800.”
Transations of the American Philosophical Society, New Ser, Vol 43, No. 1.
1953
http://www.philadelphiabuildings.org/pab/app/ho_display.cfm/781464
http://sacredheritage.com/normita/images/sloth-3.jpg
•
Hirshorn, Paul. “The Comparative Rowhouse Study: An Introduction to
Architectural Design.” JAE, Vol. 36, No. 1. 1982.
•
http://www.brynmawr.edu/iconog/evans/files/phs178.html