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Modern Thinking: Part I - The Victorians

© Michael Morrissey

“A Victorian lives in a house which is chock full of details. No where can you find a blank space to simply sit and reflect.”

The term Victorian is usually defined as; a time period – mid 1800’s to early 1900’s, a prudish state of behavior, or an elegant, ornate manner of construction. I believe there is one more apt definition, a willingness to embrace modern technology.

Victorians built their houses using the latest advances the industrial revolution had to offer. The Victorian, more so than any other people or building style incorporated new technology into the home. Even the construction methods for Victorian homes differed from earlier homes. Balloon construction was the preferred framing method, eight to nine foot ceilings were the preferred heights and plaster over wood lathe made up the interior walls. These changes were due in part to a response to previous homes with low ceilings and wood interiors, but they were also due in part to advances in technology. Victorians were on the cutting edge and were proud of it.

The Victorian home builder was also someone who was willing to embellish. Traditions are difficult things to change, and the Victorian era was a difficult time to try and change them. So instead they were enhanced. The façade of a house no longer had to be symmetrical. Bay windows and turrets might be built on one side of a house while a porch or gable might appear on the other. A house could display different styles of shingles, different colors of paint, different patterns on the windows.

One of the best examples of the Victorian mindset is the introduction of central heating. For the first time in history houses did not need a fireplace in every room. They did however need a radiator. The Victorians boldly placed their cast iron multi-finned embossed radiators in plain view in every room and often ran the pipes on the outside of the walls. In most cases the pipes could just have easily been run inside the walls, but the spirit of the times, the industrial revolution, called for the display of industry or of its synonym at the time, progress.

Progress was displayed more subtly as well. Throughout the house one could find the results of the newly christened industrial world. Apparent in the Victorian home – inside and out - was the use of paint, a relative new comer to the mass market. The abundant use of embossed hardware, from door hinges to estcheons to window locks. Industrial design showed up in weighted double hung windows and pocket doors and the civilizing evolution from outhouse to water closet to bathroom. Ceiling medallions, plaster corbels, seven inch window and door molding, elaborate balustrades on stairways and porches. All of these details suggested progress, manufacturing, industrialization!

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