The 400-year history of the American home in one gorgeous chart
The average American family may be getting smaller and smaller, but the houses have grown bigger than ever. In the 40 years, the single-family American house has expanded in area by 61%.
If four decades could make such a difference, imagine what the houses must have been like 400 years ago.
To do that, check out a new infographic put together by the Brooklyn-based design studio Pop Chart Lab. The graphic features 121 hand-drawn American houses of various eras, giving a glimpse of the history of American houses from 1600 to today:
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The houses fall under seven broad architectural categories, represented by color codes: Colonial, Vernacular, Romantic, Victorian, Eclectic, Modern, and Neo-Eclectic.
Those categories are further broken down into 40 groups ranging from 17th century Postmedieval English houses to 19th century Tudors, all the way to the McMansions of the 1990s.
It's interesting to notice the differences - both subtle and obvious - in the way the roofs, facades, and porches have been designed over the years. All those details say much about the influence of land availability, climate, family size, and resources on the way we built houses in different eras.