NATIONAL REGISTER HISTORIC DISTRICT DESIGNATION APPROVED AT STATE LEVEL - WILL NOW GO TO WASHINGTON
At a public meeting in Albany on December 5, the New York State Historic Review Board unanimously approved the designation of the Westcott-University Neighborhood as a National Register Historic District, joining other Eastside NR Districts such as (the tonier) Berkeley Park and Scottholm. The new district will be the largest National Register-listed historic district in Syracuse with close to 2,000 properties. These include many Arts & Crafts-influenced architect-designed houses as well as scores of Craftsman style "kit houses."
This small cottage at 307 Clarendon Street was erected ca. 1910 by architect-developer Clarence S. Congdon, who had built his own house next door.
Unlike nearby previously National Register designated garden suburbs, such as nearby Berkeley Park and Scottholm, developers marketed the Westcott-University neighborhood for homebuyers of moderate means, with only small sections intended for more wealthy individuals and families. The area included small lots arranged near each other to maximize affordability for the new working- and middle-class homeowners seeking financial and social stability. Lots were mostly sold individually, and then the buyers would build the houses themselves, or engage local contractors.
Constructed mostly over a 60-plus year period, with the most intense period of building between 1900 and 1930, the architecture of the Westcott-University Neighborhood provides a textbook of American urban residential styles of the late nineteenth to early twentieth centuries. The district features a mixture of architectural styles, from simple vernacular gable-front forms to larger residences executed in popular architectural styles of the period such as Queen Anne, Craftsman, Prairie, and Colonial Revival styles.
This fine house at the corner of Allen Street and Concord place is attributed to architect LaMont Warner who at the time of it erection (ca. 1902) was working for Gustav Stickley.
Builders constructed most houses using common patterns from pattern books, lumber companies, or building contractors. Yet, there are many architect-designed houses in the district too, including superb examples of the work of Albert Brockway, Clarence Congdon, Paul Hueber, Edward Howard, Harry Phoenix, Justus Moak Scrafford, Alfred T. Taylor, LaMont Warner, and Wright. The Gustav Stickley house which was first designed by Wellington Taber, is in the northern part of the District. There are many Ward Wellington Ward houses scattered throughout the new historic district, too. The ACSCNY is planning some walking tours when the weather warms to highlight many of these houses.
The J. S. Kelly House at 758 Euclid Avenue is an early work (1911) by Arts & Crafts master architect Ward Wellington Ward.
Comentários