California has a wide array of Craftsman style homes for the potential buyer to choose from, much more than any Canadian city on the Trent Severn waterway, and San Bernardino has its fair share. This is because many Californians were caught up in the Craftsman movement. But what is a Craftsman home? What features does it have? When your real estate agent offers to show you a Craftsman house, what should you be expecting? We have the answers to all these questions and more, so read on to learn more about the Craftsman architectural style.
The Craftsman movement was born as a response to the excesses of Victorian decoration and as an attempt to return to the era when craftsmen did most of the work on homes rather than factory machines. In the minds of Craftsman devotees, homes built by people were of higher quality than a factory built home on Armour Heights. To differentiate it from the British Arts and Crafts movement, homes in the Craftsmen style are referred to as American Craftsman.
Some of the biggest proponents of the style rank among America's most famous architects. The firm of Greene and Greene were responsible for a lot of California's Craftsmen homes, and Frank Lloyd Wright's Prairie style homes were built on Craftsman ideals. Scarborough Bluffs homes don't have that kind of history. Craftsman homes featured a return to simplicity and pride in one's work, so when your realtor offers to show you one you can expect it to be well built.
The many revivals in interest in the Craftsman style also mean that you can expect to pay more for that type of home than you would pay for a new home in Ontario. In terms of style, Craftsman homes tend to be two story rectangles with low pitched roofs that often feature gabled windows. There is usually a front porch tucked under the overhanging eaves, and the house will be made out of hand worked materials - usually wood. Many exteriors are left wood colored while others are painted. Variants known as California bungalows will have only one or 1.5 storeys.
Since the Craftsman movement began in the late 1800s and ended in the 1930s, you can expect any Craftsman home your realtor shows you to be older. Buying one would not be like buying Mississauga homes of similar age, however, since so much care went into their construction. Craftsman owners tend to take meticulous care of their properties. There have also been revivals of interest in the style since the 1930s so you may be able to find a newer one, though there's no guarantee the newer one will have the same construction quality rather than just the same outward appearance.
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