Bungalow-Era Comebacks
Arts & Crafts motifs 1900–1930 — tiled fireplaces, built-ins, colonnades, nooks, tapered piers — are back in style.
It all started, in my opinion, with the restoration of houses from the Arts & Crafts or bungalow era. Quaint elements were rescued or reinstalled by smitten owners; others added period-correct features that may never have been in the house, as they undertook a general upgrade with the advantage of hindsight: It’s always the best of an era or a style that is revived.
Soon, bland builders’ boxes from the 1950s through 1980s were being made over as Craftsman Bungalows complete with big front gables and a colonnade inside. Builders of new houses, too, jumped on the bungalow bandwagon. A lot of the recent work will prove to be timeless.
Arts & Crafts Inspired
Why do so many components and motifs of the bungalow era speak to us today? It may be because elements of Arts & Crafts design are easy to identify and are adaptable. For example, they do not require high ceilings. Woodwork may be painted or executed in clear-finish hardwood or fir.
Such simple forms and unostentatious detailing make it a popular style. Such rectilinear elements as square columns and butt-jointed trim are relatively easy and inexpensive to duplicate.Furthermore, documentation is readily available in old millworks catalogs, many of them available online to view or download. All of this makes Craftsman a favorite vocabulary for new construction and home makeovers.
Albeit in a wide variety of expressions, several key elements of the era have made a comeback in the past 25 years. Chief among them are room-dividing colonnades, breakfast nooks, panel or skeleton batten wainscots, staircases with square spindles, painted kitchens, and fireplaces with art-tile surrounds. Clean, space-saving built-ins have found new favor in kitchens and baths, dining rooms, libraries, and bedrooms.
With Restraint, the Mania for Built-Ins RevivedThe bungalow was the “not so big” house of its time. Designers and builders sought to cram into these houses every space saver and built-in: benches, sideboards, china cupboards, bookcases, even fold-down ironing boards and tuckaway wall beds. Some of these lost favor and many originals were torn out long ago. Today the best ideas have seen a resurgence, with well-designed cabinetwork and nooks helping create easier-to-clean, clutter-free interiors. The pantry, for example, essentially a built-in closet of abundance, is a prized amenity.
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Perhaps surprisingly, authentic elements of bungalow kitchens have come into favor. While some prefer A&C Revival kitchens featuring the quarter-sawn oak and art glass borrowed from more public rooms, others embrace plain white cabinets, linoleum, and those cutout doors under the sink, which provided ventilation and deterred mice. Breakfast nooks and built-in banquettes may be more popular now than they were in 1920, when house- plan books offered these things as an add-on upgrade.
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In the dining room, a high wainscot capped by a plate rail once again gives instant antiquity and a place to display collectibles. Flanking benches at the hearth create a cozy inglenook suggesting the Old World.
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Decorative conventions have returned, too, including art glass, the period’s hardware and lighting fixtures, and wallpaper friezes. Motifs such as stylized roses, ginkgo leaves, dragonflies, owls, and many more have made their way onto revival art pottery and home textiles. Arts & Crafts continues to find new admirers—even if they don’t know what to call it.
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Inspired by the Gamble House, a stained-glass triptych elevates the entry of a late-20th-century house remodeled in a grand California Arts & Crafts idiom. Photo by Gridley + Graves.
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Wide archways between rooms create an early version of the open floor plan, making a small house feel spacious. In a tiny 1920s bungalow, an original stepped archway between the living room and dining room cued its reiteration in the opening to the renovated kitchen. The painted built-in buffet is original. Photo by Peter Eckert.
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Two major elements in houses of this period are the colonnade and the arched opening, both designed for flow between rooms that are neverthless defined—better than McMansion-era open plans. Art-glass windows, square and high in the bungalow mode, are the focal point in a view through the new oak colonnade. The glass pattern interprets the ginkgo motif in a set of 1913 china. Photo by Gridley + Graves.
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Part of an addition to a 1927 bungalow, this bathroom feels authentic with storage cabinets based on those in 1920s millworks catalogs. Upper doors flip down to create mini countertops for makeup and shaving supplies—an idea familiar from the fold-down doors in bungalow linen cabinets. Photo courtesy of Larny Mack Archive.
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In a 1918 house by Mountain Lakes (N.J.) developer Charles Hapgood, a new laptop corner based on existing trim resembles an early-20th-century telephone nook. Photo by Peter Sorantin.
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The little phone nook is an original restored and relo-cated to the living room of a 1940 house. Photo by William Wright.
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Painted or clear-finished, beadboard was a staple through the bungalow era. Here, a colorful, family-friendly kitchen has a high wainscot with a plate rail for display. Photo by Carolyn Bates.
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Breakfast Nooks: Built-in nooks were a darling of planbook designers. In a 1910 chalet–bungalow, the door to a service porch was widened to create a period-inspired nook. The big corbels and stained glass are salvage. Photo by Gridley + Graves.
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Flat-panel cabinetry and cutout “flipper” doors have visitors thinking the kitchen is original to the 1910 Foursquare; actually, the kitchen replaces a 1960s remodeling. Photo by Roger Turk.
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Garden Structure’s lattice fence with fancy-cut rafters would complement any house of the era, from Craftsman to Colonial Revival.
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The comeback of California/Hispano–Moresque tiles from the 1920s-30s is part of the art-tile revival. At a 1928 Spanish Colonial Revival house, the exterior fountain is by Native Tile. Photo by Jack Coble/Courtesy Native Tile.
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An unfinished stick porch on a 1980s house was reimagined as a bungalow porch with brick piers and tapered square columns. Photo by Gridley + Graves.
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A Storybook chimney laid with clinker bricks and river stones was inspired by Greene & Greene’s garden walls. Photo by Gridley + Graves.
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Photo by William Wright.
