Aesthetic Exploration – Victorian Architecture

4 hours ago

Post 01-2025 Aesthetic Explorations

Victorian Architecture

The above image of London St Pancras Station is by Colin off of Wikimedia Creative Commons and showcases the Gothic Revival style.

The era that Queen Victoria reigned over Great Britain and Ireland, known as the Victorian era, spanned from 1837 to 1901. This era had a very distinct architecture style that can be seen on many buildings to this day. Victorian architecture originated in England, but versions of it exist all across the world. Several architectural styles are encompassed under the Victorian umbrella. These include Gothic Revival, Folk Victorian, Greek Revival, Italianate, Second Empire, Stick, Romanesque Revival, Shingle, Colonial Revival, and Queen Anne. My favorite of these styles is Stick because it reminds me of many of the train stations built by the Southern Pacific Railroad.

The above image of the Southern Pacific Benicia station is by Ron Reiring off of Wikimedia Creative Commons and seems to emulate Stick style Victorian architecture.

The Victorian era saw an increase in wealth and an expansion of the middle class, but there was still mass poverty across the British population. This diverse range of wealth created a need for housing that could accommodate many income levels. Middle class or wealthy families lived on the first two floor of these houses, while the upper floor was occupied by servants. Victorian houses were generally three stories, very compact, and close together. At the beginning of the Victorian era, these houses did not include amenities such as running water or sanitation, but these features were added toward the end of the era.

The above image by Knight Frank is off of House Beautiful and shows a Victorian house in London.

Victorian houses have many decorative, maximalist features, and do not stray away from detail. Exterior features of Victorian houses often include steeply pitched roofs, plain or colorfully painted brick, ornate gables, painted iron railings, churchlike roof finials, sliding sash and canted bay windows, octagonal or round towers, turrets, wraparound porches, small gardens, and asymmetry (Hohenadel 2024).

Some examples of Victorian architecture are slightly less extravagant while maintaining a fundamentally Victorian appearance. These include Victorian cottages, which have ornate trim along the rooves and but are a very basic shape. They also feature the same sharply angled rooves and porches that are visible on more stereotypical Victorian structures. Traditionally, these cottages feature wood cladding that is painted a pastel color, which “lends them a storybook charm” (Hohenadel 2024). They also sometimes feature the bay windows that are common on other Victorian houses.

The above image is by Fletcher6 off of Wikimedia Creative Commons and shows the Streeter Cottage which is a Victorian Cottage in Salem, Massachusetts.

In the United States, some of the most famous Victorian structures are the Victorian houses of San Francisco. While most of these houses were destroyed during the 1906 San Francisco earthquake, many still stand today. This city was one of the first in the US to emulate Victorian architecture. Between 1850 and 1900, “an estimated 40,000 Victorian homes” were built in San Francisco (Tooke 2020).

The above image is by King of Hearts off of Wikimedia Creative Commons and shows the Painted Ladies, which are a famous row of Victorian houses in San Francisco.

Queen Anne style architecture came towards the end of the Victorian era, lasting from 1880 to 2010. While Queen Anne style is the most commonly recognized form of Victorian architecture in the United States, it is “actually more closely related to the medieval forms of the preceding Elizabethan and Jacobean eras in England” (PHMC 2015). The Queen Anne style is uniquely American due to technological advances, such as spindlework and rail transport.

The above image is by LostDogPhotos off of Wikimedia Commons and shows the Carson Mansion in Eureka California, which is a very extreme example of Queen Anne style architecture.