American Foursquare vs Colonial Revival
American Foursquare is the cross-discipline counterpart of Colonial Revival — frequently dressed in Colonial Revival trim; a relationship of shared early-1900s taste.
American Foursquare
A boxy, two-and-a-half-story house with a low hipped roof, central dormer, and full-width front porch — an efficient, democratic form sold widely through mail-order catalogs.
- Boxy, nearly cubic two-and-a-half-story massing
- Low hipped roof with wide overhanging eaves
- Single central roof dormer
- Full-width front porch on heavy piers
- Simple four-room-per-floor plan with restrained trim
Colonial Revival
An American revival of Georgian and Federal colonial-era building — symmetrical brick or clapboard façades, a centered classically framed entrance, and balanced rows of multi-paned, shuttered windows.
- Strictly symmetrical façade organized about a central axis
- Accentuated central entrance with pediment, fanlight, or portico
- Balanced rows of double-hung, multi-paned windows with shutters
- Side-gabled or hipped roof with classical cornice detailing (dentils)
- Brick or clapboard walls with white-painted classical trim
At a glance
| American Foursquare | Colonial Revival | |
|---|---|---|
| Era | 1895–1935 | 1876–1955 |
| Discipline | Architecture | Architecture |
| Region | United States, Midwest, Northeast | United States, Canada |
| Family | Vernacular | Revival |
| Formal traits | cubic, hipped-roof, central-dormer, full-porch | symmetrical, central-entry, shuttered, dentil-cornice |
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