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Brownstones and Townhouses Row house, town house, brownstoneConfused by what's what? Here's a primer on these buildings
It is a question that has vexed real estate brokers and lovers of
urban architecture for generations: What's the difference between a
town house, a row house, and a brownstone? Boston native Kevin D.
Murphy, whose book ''The American Townhouse" will be published in
November, defines each:
Town house: A multistory urban house, attached or detached, that is built close to the street and scaled similarly to surrounding houses. Row house: A multistory urban house built in a style that is consistent with, even replicating, that of adjoining houses; often built by the same architect and developer. Brownstone: Any of the above structures whose façades are sheathed in brown sandstone. So town house is an overall term, row house a subset of that, and brownstone a further subset of both. ''Town houses were often designed to be unique," said Murphy, who teaches art history at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York. ''But row houses strove for consistency. Sometimes sameness is boring, but sometimes it gives the streetscape a unity, instead of each building doing its own thing. And the term brownstone is simply about material, although in New York it's come to mean any row house built before 1910 as a single-family home." Classic bow-front or bay window row houses give Boston one of its most iconic images: a streetscape of perfectly proportioned red brick buildings receding into the distance, perhaps punctuated by a church steeple. The bow and bay windows are not unique to Boston, Murphy explained, but are more common in Boston than anywhere else. He credits British architect Robert Adam's influence and the fact that the idea of a ''house on a park," originally developed in London, found an especially eager following in Boston, encouraging windows that allowed for better views. Further, city fire codes actually encouraged such subtle ''projections" from a building's main façade. But beyond the shape and configuration of the front windows, there are many other architectural elements that mark the town house/row house/brownstone triumvirate: oriel windows, which project out from the façade but do not touch the ground; copper accents that have weathered to a rich green hue; effusive ornamental ironwork, usually painted black; interior double parlors to bring light into a long and narrow space; and the Italian concept of piano nobile, the placing of the primary living space on the second level above what were the kitchen and other service areas. Licensed real estate Broker, Copyright New York
City Apartments 1999, NYC. All information deemed |
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