Important Architecture Styles

From earthen mounds to Blobism, learn about important architectural styles and periods through the ages.

  • American Bungalow
    American Bungalow Style Houses, 1905 - 1930
  • grey-sided, two-story old house, second story hangs over first, front door off center
    Guide to Colonial American House Styles From 1600 to 1800
  • New England House with grey shingles, two small dormers without shutters, red shutters on four first-floor windows, dish antenna on roof
    A Photo Tour of Cape Cod Architecture
  • American flag outside Farmhouse
    The Architectural Evolution of an 18th Century Farmhouse
  • aging houses in the suburbs
    American Foursquare Home Kits From Catalogs
  • Large Romesque Revival home with red rusticated stone, turrets, gables, and arches
    Characteristics of Romanesque Revival Architecture
  • The Shaw's Supermarkets building in Windham, NH is an example of Neotraditional architecture. It has a complicated roofline with a decorative cupola and weather vane.
    What Is Neotraditional Architecture?
  • Green Architecture Uses Natural and Reclaimed Building Materials, Optimizes Natural Light, and Often Integrates Into the Insulating Earth Instead of Sitting on and Using the Resources of the Earth
    A Primer on Green Architecture and Green Design
  • Close up of muddy hands forming adobe bricks
    All About Adobe - Sustainable and Energy Efficient
  • Trevi Fountain in Front of Palazzo Poli, Rome, Italy
    An Introduction to Baroque Architecture
  • Tall, steep roof wooden house, wooden siding, small windows, high side gable, back roof goes almost down to the ground level
    About New England Colonial Architecture
  • A 1904 catalogue cover depicts a father greeting the mailman while enjoying a day on the porch with his son and the pet dog.
    Mail Order Homes and Stock Plans
  • Entrance to modern wood and brick one-story house set in a wooded lot
    What Is a Usonian House?
  • The rooftop cupola has doors so that residents can control the flow of air into the home
    All About Cupolas
  • large masonry home, multiple chimneys, opulent neo-Italian Renaissance in style
    Introduction to the Gilded Age
  • Two and a half story Italianate mansion with arched central tower protruding from a slightly sloped roof
    Picturesque Italianate Architecture in the U.S.
  • Vintage illustration of a bungalow-style home on a waterfront; screen print, 1913.
    Bungalow Homes by Mail
  • brown stone church, roundish with arched windows and center drum dome and Christian cross
    Introduction to Byzantine Architecture
  • man in foreground in large work gloves forming tan-colored balls, looking at light brown house with many windows, tatched roof, and stone foundation
    The Cob House — Sturdy Mud Architecture
  • Adobe Style Self-Sustainable Solar and Wind House Made From Recycled Materials
    Top 10 Adobe House Building Books
  • white stone building against a blue sky, with pediments, stairs, columns, and a big dome
    About Neoclassical Architecture
  • large, multi-gabled Queen Anne style home with turret
    A Picture Gallery of Queen Anne Architecture
  • two large multi-story homes in a suburban neighborhood
    About Colonial Revival Architecture and Neocolonial Homes
  • small white house with black shutters, large central portico with four columns and a pediment
    Is Your House Neoclassical?
  • one story flat roofed concrete home with shutters behind a short wall near a flowering bush
    Concrete Homes - What the Research Says
  • modern oval structure at dusk, reflected in a pool of water
    Modern Architecture? See It in Beijing, China
  • Exhaust vents are incorporated into the architectural design on the rooftop terrace.
    Loreto Bay, Mexico: New Villages, New Urbanism
  • wooded lot, house with large front windowed porch, side gable, stone chimney, wide shed dormer
    Exploring Stickley's Craftsman Farms
  • Large red building with large clock on side of traditional cupola, palm tree lined street
    Celebration, Florida - Disney's Plan for an Ideal Community
  • man stands on front porch of elevated shotgun-style house
    Katrina Cottages and Kernels
  • California factory manufacturing homes in 2005
    Manufactured, Modular, and Prefab Homes
  • Queen Anne Style Row houses with turrets in Georgetown, Washington DC
    Queen Anne Architecture in the USA
  • close-up of asymmetrical brown shingled home with many gables
    A Look at Shingle Style Architecture
  • Parametric Design of Hadid Residences, Milano, Italy
    House Style of the Future? Parametricism
  • Taos Pueblo in New Mexico
    Build a Better House - With Dirt
  • Looking like a quiet suburb, Celebration, Florida is mixed use, walk-friendly new urbanism
    House Styles in the Town of Celebration
  • two story house, flat roof with overhang, white trim, small columns on either side of white front door, four visible sides in the front with quoins at each angle. inlaid stone siding
    The American Cobblestone House
  • small white house with black shutters, large central portico with four columns and a pediment
    9 Books for Building Cozy, Affordable Cottages
  • Pink and green lights on the space age architecture of the Theme Building at LAX
    Googie and Tiki Architecture in America
  • The 1933 Art Deco Skyscraper by Raymond Hood at Rockefeller Center, NYC
    An Introduction to Art Deco Architecture
  • Black couple hugging in front of house
    America's Favorite House Styles
  • overly large house with multiple roof types under construction
    How to Tell a McMansion From a Big House
  • Spaceship Earth at Disney World, Orlando, Florida
    Spaceship Earth and Dreams of the Future
  • Small, white house with front gable on right and centered front door entrance under pediment overhang
    Selling the Minimal Traditional Style to 1940s America
  • A modest Second Empire home in Cape Cod, constructed for Captain Penniman in 1868
    Historic Second Empire Architecture in Photos
  • small home with front gable, front door set into cross gable
    12 Great Planbooks for One-Story Homes
  • Detail of rammed earth textured layers at the Sirewall-built China Pavilion
    What is Rammed Earth Construction?
  • The Gamble House in Pasadena, California, Inspired by the Arts & Crafts Movement
    Craftsman Houses, Inspired by an English Movement
  • LISI (Living Inspired by Sustainable Innovation) by Vienna University of Technology in Austria, First Place winner at the 2013 Solar Decathlon
    Build to Save Energy
  • stately homes in an old growth neighborhood
    Influences on American Home Styles, 1600 to Today
  • The Helblinghaus in Innsbruck, Austria
    An Introduction to the Rococo
  • The Stoa of Attalos or Attalus
    Greek Architecture - Buildings in the Classical Greek City
  • 4 Tuscan Columns rise to pediment over two front porches on a brick, 2-story building with black shutters
    Top 15 Books About Plantation Homes
  • Italian Renaissance Architect Giacomo Barozzi da Vignola, c. 1560
    Biography of Giacomo da Vignola
  • Cactus in foreground, modern experimental buildings dot the desert in the background
    Arcosanti in Arizona - The Vision of Paolo Soleri
  • Frameless Straw Bale House (straw bale walls carry the roof load)
    Build a House of Straw? Seriously?
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