1 of 3: Bungalow Loved and Lost: Was it by Leila Ross Wilburn?

Tax records say it was built in 1914. If that's right, this Virginia-Highland bungalow lived to be 99, torn down on March 20, 2013. Given its age and condition and considering the market, it wasn't a surprise or entirely sad. But I fell in love with it. I can't tell you why but I'll try to show you. It's going to take 3 posts.

2 of 3: Bungalow Loved and Lost: The Exterior and Windows.
3 of 3: Bungalow Loved and Lost: Interiors in Ruin 

 
To tell the truth: I never paid attention until they put the sign up. There are prettier things to see and in leafy season the overgrowth smothered it. The south side (on the side street) was overgrown and covered in a tarp.

But the for sale sign got me to look and to blog: "It preserved more of its original "1914" appearance."


Virginia Highland has plenty of bungalows but this one seemed original. Nobody'd "messed with it." Somehow a fresh coat of paint would have diminished it, like dyeing my hard-earned (but interesting) gray hair.


The more I looked the more there was to see.


Our bungalow is the blue lot above. They say you can't trust build dates on Fulton County property tax Records. They seem batched by prewar,  postwar, and pre-depression.

In any case the majority of  pre-1930 houses were craftsman style.

I wondered if our teardown was in one of Leila Ross Wiburn's pattern books which you can find here courtesy of Decatur's MAK Historic District.


What do you know? This is Plan 521 in "Southern Homes and Bungalows" (1914) by Leila Ross Wilburn.

I am not attributing this house Leila Ross Wilburn, but it's seems to be in her book.

"Craftsman houses were inspired primarily by the work of two California brother - Charles Sumner Greene and Henry Mather Greene - who practiced...from 1893 to 1914...by 1909 they had...executed several exceptional landmark examples...these and similar...were given extensive publicity.... As a result, a flood of pattern books appeared...the one-story Craftsman...quickly became the most popular and fashionable smaller house in the country."  A Field Guide to American Houses, p.454


"It has been built many times with various changes and never fails to please."


I'll show you exteriors in Part 2... (See 2 of 3: Bungalow Loved and Lost: The Exterior and Windows.)


...and interiors in Part 3.

2 of 3: Bungalow Loved and Lost: The Exterior and Windows.
3 of 3: Bungalow Loved and Lost: Interiors in Ruin