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House Styles Guide
Explore house styles and housing types through history. In this house style guide, you'll find links to facts, photos, diagrams, and building plans for the most popular house styles in North America and other parts of the world.

House Style Picture Dictionary
What style is your house? Browse our photo gallery for the most popular housing styles in North America. Click on the pictures below for larger images along with facts, diagrams, and building plans, and other helpful resources.

Bungalow House Pictures
From our photo gallery, pictures of bungalow houses, including Craftsman Bungalows and other popular bungaloid types.

Cape Cod House Pictures
Small, economical, and practical Cape Cod houses were built all across America during the 1930s, 1940s, and 1950s. But the Cape Cod style began centuries before in colonial New England. This photo gallery shows a variety of Cape Cod houses, from simple colonial Cape Cods to modern-day Cape Cods with dormers and shutters.

Cobblestone Houses
Stone houses can be found in many parts of the world, but New York's cobblestone houses are unique. Learn more about these interesting and original buildings

Colonial and Federal House Styles
When North America was colonized, European settlers brought building traditions from their home countries. Houses built along the northeastern coast, where the British settled, are quite different from those built by Spanish and French colonists in the American Southwest. Between 1500 and 1800, European styles combined with Native American building techniques to develop not one, but many, uniquely American styles.

Favorite House Styles - Architecture Survey
Tudor, Craftsman, and Prairie styles ranked above Victorians in this "Dream House" survey. Here are descriptions of the most popular styles, with links to more information about each.

French Creole Architecture
French Creole buildings borrow traditions from France, the Caribbean, and many other parts of the world. Join us for a photo tour of French Creole architecture

French Inspired House Styles
Use this handy guide to see if your house has characteristics of charming styles borrowed from France. See photos of French style houses and find building plans and other resources for French architectural styles.

House Helpline: Ask Us
Curious about the style of your house? Send us your questions!

Know the Style, Sell the House
Every house, no matter how plain, has a style. This guide from Realtor Magazine Online provides easy tips to help Real Estate Professionals identify and describe architectural styles.

McMansion
McMansion is a derogatory term for a large, showy Neoeclectic home, usually built without the guidance of an architect. The word was coined in the 1980s by architects and architecture critics in response to the many over-sized, poorly designed homes being built in American suburbs.

Modern and Postmodern Houses
The Modern and Postmodern houses in these pictures illustrate bold new ideas in home design. Browse the photos to find out innovative approaches by famous architects.

Queen Anne Houses
From charming cottages to towered mansions, these photographs show the beauty and variety of Victorian Queen Anne style houses.

Top House Style Books
With black and white photos and pictorial glossaries, these portable paperbacks will help you spot a Queen Anne, tell the difference between a Bungalow and a Tudor, and name the decorative features that make your own home special.

Victorian Architecture
The Victorian era dates from about 1840 to 1900. During this time, industrialization brought many innovations in architecture. There are a variety of Victorian styles, each with its own distinctive features.

Victorian Gothic House Styles: History and Pictures
Join us for a step-by-step tour of Gothic Revival architecture in England and the United States, with photos showing the evolution of the style and definitions of important terms and key features.

Victorian House Styles
Picture dictionary of Victorian House styles, with photos of Queen Anne, Second Empire, Italianate, Gothic, Romanesque, Stick, Shingle, and other popular Victorian house styles.

What Style Is It?
Georgian Revival? Queen Anne? Italianate? Naming an architectural style isn't always easy. Here's why.

A Field Guide to American Houses
This enormously helpful book describes American housing styles from the 17th century to the present. Virginia and Lee McAlester, authors.