Home Styles!! What exactly is Neoclassical architecture?

Hey guys, Brent Old Build Show talking today about architectural styles and kind of some confusing terminology and how to help frame those things for your clients so you can be the expert. Come join me today in the Build Show. So there's this whole concept of neoclassical, right? It's confusing and it confused me, but we don't want to talk about it in regards to Thistle Hill. Okay, now Thistle Hill is this historic building that we're redoing and fixing up and everything else. In the brochure, okay, or in their literature, they talked about it being neo-Georgian, okay? It's not neo-Georgian. Why did someone say it was neo-Georgian? Because most people don't know, right? And most people don't understand the nuances of architectural style. And look, it's taken me a long time to kind of put it together and try to figure it out. One of the very first things we did in North Benes Street was read, you know, Field Guide to American Houses by Virginia McAllister because she breaks out all the architectural styles. And that was really just a start. This house, built in 1904, had Victorian roots, okay? Late Victorian roots. Some of the ornamentation and detail inside is late Victorian. The house is neoclassical. Now, if you're dialing into that, there's a neoclassical era in the late 1700s, early 1800s. And as Robert Adam, when he went and viewed Pompeii and saw the differences between the exterior of Roman buildings and the interior of Roman homes and did this whole book and decoration changed and everything else changed, as it became neoclassical, that's what it's called. So fast forward, why do we call, you know, Thistle Hill, 1904, neoclassical? Why would I call it that? What happens is if you look at architectural styles, you go from Georgian to federal, okay? Federal to Greek revival. And then the Industrial Revolution really hits home building and home building changes quite a bit. The Romantic era going on, the cottages enamored with the Romantic ideals, Gothic revival things are going on, right? And then you get into the heavy Victorian. The heavy Victorian, kind of the mansions of the 1800s are done because they've got all these, you know, wild, different materials that they've never been able to use before, like hardwood moldings, the turnings and the ornamentation that they're able to do because of the machine and housings change quite a bit. I mean, to try to organize the look of a Victorian house, like McFarland House, with the columns and the details and where's the entablature and where's the column and how did they organize this space? It's very confusing. Fast forward about 10 years into the early 1900s. And really, if you look at the career of McKean, Mead & White, okay, the architects in New York, from 1890 to 1910, when they were doing their great work, most of their stuff is classical, okay? So we would call that era neoclassical because they've gone back to studying and doing those Roman buildings. I mean, McKean & White did three or four pantheons on college campuses. I think there's one at MIT. I think there's one at Columbia, you know, and you look at SMU's campus and their pantheon type building right there, all done because of UVA. You're seeing all these, I'm jumping around, right? I'm moving around. That revival of the classical movement, we call, again, neoclassical. So the reason I'm calling Thistle Hill neoclassical is because of that temple front without a pediment, right? Those columns that boldly stick out, they've got a porch above. But if that had had a pediment on it, that'd be almost a Palladian type detail that he put the temple on the front of those buildings, right, so it's strongly neoclassical. Now, if you go inside and you look at the inside of all those different rooms, there's some arts and crafts influences and things like that. But we know from the story, built in 1904, remodeled in 1910, there was a bunch of changes taking place. And so you don't go through the whole inside and go, oh, it's neoclassical. It's been changed, but the outside is neoclassical. So you have neoclassical at a couple different periods, Georgian to federal, and then later in the early 1900s. I mean, another example is the Kell House we did up in Wichita Falls. It has that temple front as well and those columns that come out. What about the balustrade and what about the columns that go around down the side? I think those are kind of a late Victorian view of the classicism. The Victorians would have been very attracted to ornamentation. And you almost see two forms there. You see that very strong temple front piece that comes out and then very playful things that are going around the side with all the columns and the frilly ornamentation and everything else. But I look at that as being very original, very appropriate for that time period, using classicism in the language of the late Victorian style, what would have been available in the pattern books, what would have been available for them to build with. And so it still works for me, right? I call that neoclassical. If I did that today, it wouldn't have that kind of playful Victorian twist. So realize that when you're playing around with neoclassical, okay, because we've used the word classical, everything's going back to the Greeks and Romans, okay? Everybody's going back to those classical traditions that we found there. And so realize because there's changes in iteration, okay, as we organize and do those things today, there's a playbook, okay? Keep talking about a playbook, but there is a way to organize and put those things together and play around with different parts and pieces and still make it interesting. So that neoclassical today, right? Or the is, can be a little bit federal, be a little bit Georgian, be a little bit Greek revival, have a mix of those things so that they work together. Maybe your stair newel is a Greek revival stair newel, but your stair parts are more federal. Maybe your entry is Greek revival, but the inside's Georgian or the inside's colonial. So there is a lot of leeway once you understand all of those traditions, Greek revival, federal, and Georgian, we're all leaning on and looking to the past. So when we bring all those things forward, we're able to use those full playbooks and really play around with some fun details so that we can get better moldings, better looking doors, better looking things, and still be neoclassical, a new classicism for today. Because if you look at the classical system, it is a fluid moldable system. I mean, none of those temples look the same, right? The different Greek Romans and temples all have a little twist or a little thing that makes them different. And so there is movability in this thing. It's not static. It's not, well, a column, I just did that column. There's a ton of different ways to do it, ton of opportunity, really can make your projects better. Realize, guys, that part of your repertoire, part of your understanding should be architectural styles and the understanding of how architectural styles change. Because just like if you had someone come and tell you they wanna build a Tudor home or someone that wants to build a traditional home, I want you to be able to dive into those conversations and say, well, tell me what you mean by traditional. Does that mean Georgian? Does that mean federal? Does that mean Greek revival? Because all of those things are traditional. It could also be colonial, right? Pre-Georgian, that when we were colonies and some of the interesting vernacular things that were happening there, right? Well, which one is it? And so by you asking those questions, by you chasing those things down and have an understanding of it, you become an expert that becomes a valuable asset on your jobs. I was told yesterday by a client that we were talking about moldings and I said, I'm sorry, I'm geeking out to all this stuff. And they go, no, no, no, no, you need to tell us that's the reason we hired you, okay? So it was that understanding of this stuff that was the reason why they wanted me on the job. I want you to be that expert as well. And an easy way to do that is to learn about architectural styles in America so you know the difference between Second Empire and Queen Anne. You know the difference between Greek Revival and Federal. You know the difference between those things and you can talk about them. Now, how long should it take you to learn all that? Anyone, anyone? I'm thinking it's gonna take you two years, maybe five years, okay? Depending on how much travel you do and how hard you study it. It took me at least five years, but now 30 years into my career, I finally feel like I can talk about these things knowledgeably because I've also said, oh, that's Queen Anne. And no, no, no, that's not Queen Anne. You know, so you make mistakes and things like that and that's okay, but at least you identified it as Victorian and not, you know, arts and crafts. So I believe that if you wanna be a master builder, you have to understand architectural styles in America. You can't, and even some in Europe. I don't think you can be a master builder without understanding some design, some style, and maybe this is the first step of understanding that. I don't want you to be that builder who's like, well, give me the plans, I'll build it. I want you to be the builder who says, well, you know, those really aren't Georgian moldings that you did. If we did it this way, we could do this. Then you become a real valuable member to the build team. Then you really become and work towards being that master builder.