For some buyers, Georgian homes offer lasting appeal

If you ask some classically trained architects about Georgian-style homes, they’ll find a good way to tell you it’s a safe investment, stylistically speaking.

They’ll just avoid the "t-word."

“I don’t want to use the cliché where it’s ‘timeless,’” said architect William Malmstedt. “If I had a dollar for every time I heard that word, I could take a day off. But well-done Georgian architecture ages really well. It’s not going to look silly in 10, 20 or 30 years.”

In its most literal sense, Georgian architecture was built during the reigns of the Georges — that’s George I through George IV — from about 1714 to 1830. Although English in background, Georgian style was heavily influenced by the work of Renaissance-era Italian architects, notably Andrea Palladio.

Fascinated by the rational forms and soothing proportions of classic Greek and Roman architecture, Palladio penned “I quattro libri dell'architettura” (or “The Four Books on Architecture”) in 1570, laying out his five orders of architecture, building techniques and more. Palladian architects adapted his work to English conditions, translating its golden ratios and order into expansive estates. Eventually, the aesthetic made its way to the then-English colonies in the late 17th century, hemming toward the southern colonies before migrating to what we now consider New England.

Often, these structures were more pared back than their expansive English forebearers.

“Georgian architecture in the United States does tend to be a little simpler than in England,” said Malmstedt, an associate partner at VanderHorn Architects. The Greenwich, Connecticut-based firm specializes in classical architecture, including Georgian homes. “Though you can find Georgian architecture in pretty much any scale, on the whole, Georgian buildings here tend to be a little smaller than those on the other side of the Atlantic.”

However, the homes still have many throughlines, he noted.

When many people think of Georgian architecture, they often envision a slightly elevated brick structure evenly divided by a central hall, and maybe a hip roof with its four sloping sides.

Many Georgians are also organized on a three- or five-part exterior symmetry, said Chuck Hilton, the owner of Charles Hilton Architects, also in Greenwich. Some had entry porticos and classical cornices undergirded with a delicate “dentil” trim.

A good amount of the time, those characteristics are true, he said, but “there is quite a bit of leeway, actually, in Georgian architecture.” The classical style isn’t as rigid as people tend to think.

Often, that leeway manifests in materials, which were “dictated by what was available locally,” Malmstedt said. Areas with rich clay might’ve built brick Georgians, areas near stone quarries, such as Philadelphia, might’ve had stone Georgians and timber-heavy regions had Georgians clad in slender clapboard siding or even shingles.

Georgians found in the United States also tend to have smaller windows than their English counterparts, Malmstedt noted. That’s because most glass was imported, carried across the ocean as either smaller panes or full window assemblies.

There are even stylistic variations across the East Coast, which holds most of the country’s original Georgians. In the South, the Georgians tend to be larger and more spread out, making the homes easier to cool in humid summer months. Georgians to the north, however, are tighter, reflecting the economic and climate conditions of the northern colonies. As Malmstedt put it, “a more compact house is easier to heat in the winter.”

In the United States, that initial flush of Georgian architecture faded as newly independent Americans bucked English traditions, but the style spread across the country thanks to later revivals.

Spurred by exhibitions in Philadelphia and Chicago, a Victorian-era Georgian Revival took hold in the 19th century amid a surging interest in classicism. Like other homes constructed amid industrialized building processes, the revival homes are “a lot more decorative in their exterior treatments than the original Georgian work," Malmstedt said.

That means more molding and heavier trim. Some of these revival-era homes also had more windows, often gathered into expansive arrangements.

By the late 20th century, the flourishing ornament had moderated. Finding architects specializing in classical style became rarer, resulting in some spec-built approximations and “a lot of bad examples that are just way out of proportion,” Malmstedt said. “Everything is overblown.”

In Malmstedt’s opinion, good Georgians require a certain design ego-check. “If you keep it simple, you’ve probably won half the battle.”

For all the stuffiness that buyers might associate with classical design, part of their appeal is that “they’re more pleasant places to be,” Malmstedt said. Their attention to symmetry and proportion engenders a kind of peace and regularity that “makes the occupants happier.”

When people come to Hilton’s firm with Georgians, the architect sees them responding to that simplicity in a practical sense, too. “You can have a box or a group of boxes with symmetrical fenestration on the outside,” he said. According to Hilton and William, this simplicity can make it easier to update for homeowners adapting older Georgians.

“If nothing else, the shapes that you find in Georgian architecture are very rational,” Malmstedt said. “And if a house has good bones, it’s easier to adapt, even if it’s a little dated here or there.”

The style itself doesn’t pose any specific issues, they said, but it can come with outdated elements common in other 18th-century homes. Modern energy codes might dictate a systems overhaul and outdated bathrooms might need an update. On a layout level, once formal spaces relax, kitchens grow, and areas once reserved for a home’s staff become family spaces for the modern homeowner.

“The details can be expensive,” Hilton said, “but the plans are kind of basic.”

For some homeowners, that work is justified by owning a home that’s “not subject to the whims of styles from year to year or decade to decade,” William said. It’s something that really lasts … and I think it’s a good investment to buy something that’s going to last a long time.”

But what about when it comes time to sell?

“The Georgian style ebbs and flows, but one thing I will say is you can always sell a well-designed Georgian,” William said.