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Forest Park, Ill., Stephen and Donna Flesch
Our 1925 “square-bay” Chicago bungalow has a crosshatch motif in the facade and fireplace bricks, and this same crosshatch design can also be found on the door escutcheons. We recently restored the leaded
stained-glass windows, and they turned out better than we had hoped. The basement is completely finished, including a vintage powder room and rumpus room with a yellow pine floor and wood trim.

Norwood, Mass., Bob Davidson
My wife and I purchased our first home in August 2006. After three years of looking at six-room ranches and Cape Cods, we saw this house and fell in love with it. We are in the process of both restoration
(Do you know how many coats of paint can be applied in 86 years?) and investigation (Who manufactured our house? etc.). We have seen nothing like it in the area or online.

St. Louis, Mo., Daniel and Rosalie Yezbick
We spent months searching for just the right home when relocating across the country in 2007, and the moment we stepped onto the porch of this home we knew we’d found it. Our 1922 bungalow has its original stained-glass windows, leaded-glass bookcases, quartersawn oak floors, marble-topped radiators and ceramic tile roof. The front porch provides a wonderful way to stay in touch with our neighbors; the
entire street is lined with other bungalows similar to ours. Talk about
a “rich lifestyle,” indeed!

Madison, Wis., Laura Schwendinger and Menzie Chinn
Our bungalow was built in 1927. It is in the wonderful Monroe area, situated a few blocks from Lake Wingra. It has all of its original oak moldings as well as a lovely, original mantel. When we repainted the exterior we wanted to evoke the colors used for Craftsman bungalows, while also turning up the brightness of hue just a notch.

Edmonton, Alberta, Carol and Bob Snyder
Summer or winter, we enjoy our 1927 clinker-brick home situated in the Highlands. It is one of nine bungalow-style homes built on 64th Street by William F. Brown. Clinker brick was rarely used here and is highly prized today. Distinct Craftsman design influences include the wide front veranda, gable roof with wide eaves and exposed rafters. For 27 years
we have been proud to call this our home.

Kincardine, Ontario, Catherine Macleod
Our bungalow was built on a foundation of local fieldstone, selected and chipped by the architect and builder himself, George Conoly, in 1924. The distinctive flayed pillars are also built of fieldstone, and the nogging is finished with very small pieces of stone and glass. Our garden features two dramatic bent cedar arches, a stone-lined pond, art objects and
other plants and elements inspired by Craftsman-era gardeners.

Pittsburgh, Pa., Jim and Carrie Zahniser
When we came across this 1915 bungalow we were not seriously considering moving to a new home—until we saw it and fell in love. The prior owner had painstakingly restored the original charm that
had been lost over the years. The entire upper floor is our master suite and the front porch is a favorite spot for enjoying sunny afternoons. We could not be happier that we found our own slice of bungalow heaven.

Sioux Falls, S.D., Molly Langley
Our neighborhood is the McKennan Park Historic District. Here, my home is considered a “big bungalow.” We are within walking distance of downtown Sioux Falls with its many quartzite buildings. My basement, in fact, is made from quartzite! I love the features you do on neighborhoods and while ours isn’t designated as a bungalow neighborhood, it still has many fine examples.

Burlingame, Calif., Betsy McGinn
When we bought our sweet 1916 bungalow in 2002, we could see
the potential beyond the bright red paint on the dining room built-in. We soon replaced the front concrete patio and walk with brick, built a low picket fence and planted an eclectic garden. As we tackle endless projects—including a kitchen, bedroom and bathroom renovation—we refurbish the original windows, adding double-pane glass. Next project: those front porch aluminum windows from the ’50s!

Huntington, N.Y., Emanuele and Jessica Spagnoletti
For us, it was love at first sight. The “Rock House,” as it’s known to locals, was constructed from the foundation up with glacier rocks that were deposited on the shores of the state park and preserve. The house was built around 1910 as a vacation home with a maid and butler’s room off the kitchen. For four years we have extensively worked on the home, keeping with its period and integrity.

Kensington, Md., Judy Whalley
My husband and I found a beautiful half-acre lot in the D.C. suburb of Kensington and commenced building in February 1999. Construction took sixteen months. While spacious and open, the home feels warm and comfortable. Our greatest satisfaction comes when guests ask us,  as they often do, when the house was built originally or when we undertook the renovation. We love having a house that looks like it  has been here for decades!

Parma, Ohio, Sally Brown
I was looking to downsize when I came across this 1927 Craftsman style cottage. It was originally built as a cottage in the country, but is now part of a large suburb of Cleveland. It was advertised as a fixer-upper ranch! Even the realtor thought it was an obvious tear-down; I saw loads of potential. For the next 6½ years, my brother, a finish carpenter, and I worked restoring and un-remuddling inside and out. The work was hard, but the result is even more spectacular than I had imagined.

Redding, Conn., Dan Bonis and Terry Karpen
When we purchased this 1968 Ward log home 22 years ago, we were the second owners. We replaced a rotted, tiny side entrance stairway with a deck and pergola that we designed. The cedar logs were shipped from northern Michigan, and a local furniture maker was the only  candidate to take on this out-of-the-ordinary project. It is the perfect low-maintenance house in which to live by the Arts and Crafts  principles of honesty, simplicity and beauty.

Canton, Mass., John and Jeannine Lowe
My wife started reading your magazine in 2003. She spent hours putting sticky notes on everything she liked, from appliances to stonework to interiors to wood and colors. We started to build in June of 2005 and finished in August of 2006. The best part for me is our beautiful, fifty-foot-long farm porch with beadboard ceiling. It’s great after a long day. Thanks for a great magazine and all the ideas.

Atascadero, Calif., Yvonne Smith

Long Beach, Calif., Lisa and Paul Harris
We’ve always had in our minds the phrase “reduce, reuse, recycle,” and what better way than bringing life back to these wonderful homes? This house went into foreclosure in February 2010; we bought it in August and moved in after three months of restoration. We knew this house was special when the front door floated open. Even though it had been remuddled, our fantastic contractor worked with us to restore it. The original casement windows still gently swing shut with a gust of wind. Our quest is to find the architect of this house.

Seattle, Wash., Bruce Parker and Vinita Sidhu
My wife and I bought this, our first house, in 2003. We chose it in no small part because it sits high above the street with lots of south facing windows. Even on cloudy days it is full of natural light that makes it seem much larger than it is. We are the second family to live here and the house had mercifully been spared the remuddles of many of the houses that we looked at. With great trepidation we began our own remodel of the kitchen, building traditional cabinetry from reclaimed fir and using recycled materials and finishes throughout. Our new kitchen is the heart of the house.

Chicago, Ill., Patrick Falso and Matthew Mika
We looked at about 20 bungalows in Chicago before we landed on this one in the Jefferson Park neighborhood of Chicago. It had all the original parts (windows, trim) that just needed restoring to make them shine. There have been only four owners since it was built in 1913, and each one took very good care of it. Since we have owned it, we’ve restored the downstairs bath and original French casement windows with unique diamond muntins. Future plans include a period kitchen redo and adding copper half-round gutters and downspouts.

Chicago, Ill., Peggy and John Bradley
My husband purchased this 1923 home in the heart of Chicago’s
bungalow belt in 1988. He saw the inherent beauty of the house through paint on the stairs, upper floor, baseboards and front door (all of which he stripped and restored). We expanded not by building out on the small lot, but by building from the basement, adding a family room, guest suite and workroom. The stout construction, beautiful natural wood and stained glass were incorporated into the new living area in a way that we, and homeowners yet unknown, will enjoy through the next century.

Murrysville, Pa., Steve and Vicky Richards
In 2009, we completed construction on our Craftsman home. We wanted the charm of an old house complete with oak hardwood floors and built-in bookcases with stained glass doors along with modern energy-saving technology. It took a year to build, but now we enjoy the view of the woods on our property from our front porch. We paid a great deal of attention to the interior details like woodwork and tile. We spend our leisure time looking for Craftsman pottery and artwork to complete the finishing touches. Thank you for the inspiration.

Newton, Mass., Debbie Kurlansky-Winer
When I purchased this starter home in 1981, I was attracted to the great location and family neighborhood. I enjoy the many different living spaces the house offers even though it’s small. A screened-in porch is well-used, a pleasant office space offers lots of windows, and there are charming built-ins. We morphed a small bedroom into a terrific walk-in closet/room. We are very fortunate to have over-sized windows in our living and dining rooms and wonderfully textured stucco walls. What started out as a starter home has been my home for more than 30 years.

Uxbridge, Ontario, Rebecca Gower and Craig McLean
The moment we saw this Arts and Crafts home, we fell in love with it. Our 1910 bungalow boasts three pairs of original stained-glass windows, two bay windows, pocket doors and solid oak woodwork throughout. The welcoming design utilizes the space beautifully, and the light coming in from all sides provides a bright living environment all day long. Our wedding was the third to be held in this outstanding home.

CULTURAL PROGRESSIVES

The diversity of Cleveland Heights’s architecture was soon reflected in the diversity of its population. Several of the early developers envisaged an English-style garden city, with residences for the elite and the upper middle class. Presumably they had the city’s Anglo and ethnic-German elites primarily in mind when the first houses started going up. But by the teens and twenties, Jews were moving into the Heights in substantial numbers, and Jewish cultural and religious institutions soon followed.

In 1927, B’nai Jeshurun, one of Cleveland’s oldest Jewish congregations, built a million-dollar Moorish-Byzantine structure, designed by Charles Greco of Boston and widely known as the Temple on the Heights, becoming the first Jewish congregation to relocate from the city to the suburbs. Others followed; Anshe Emeth Beth Tefilo, or the Park Synagogue, was completed in 1950 on Mayfield Rd., by renowned German modernist architect and émigré Erich Mendelson.

Cleveland Heights’s success in integrating Jews earlier in the century may have eased its acceptance of African Americans in the 1960s. In 1963, during an era in which racial tensions were growing in the city and white flight was accelerating, a group of Heights residents began to meet informally to discuss integration. In 1964 they formalized their organization as the Heights Citizens for Human Rights. They began an outreach program that included informal coffees and evening meetings. The goal was to encourage racial integration, a superior school system, quality housing and friendly relations. In 1972 this group dissolved itself into the Heights Community Congress, with professional staffing.

Together with neighboring Shaker Heights, Cleveland Heights became one of a group of inner suburbs across the U.S. that successfully integrated in the 1960s and ’70s. In 1977 Cleveland Heights became a founding member of the Oak Park Exchange Congress, a federation of inner-ring suburbs dedicated to stabilizing racial diversity. (The federation was named after the Chicago suburb and fellow founding-member municipality, also known for its progressive architecture.) Cleveland Heights remains a center of Jewish life in the Cleveland area today, but it is a telling sign of the community’s changing identity that in 2001 the Temple on the Heights, which had been the first Jewish synagogue in a Cleveland suburb, became the New Spirit Revival Center, serving a non-denominational African-American congregation.

AN URBAN BOHEMIA
In the 1970s, Cleveland Heights developed a countercultural vibe, and it continues to attract artists, musicians, academics and theater people today. One of the Cleveland area’s most important venues for contemporary music, the Grog Shop, is located in the Heights. Nighttown, another music venue, has been named repeatedly by Downbeat magazine one of the world’s top jazz clubs and figured in its 2011 list of the world’s top 150 clubs. In general the restaurant and bar scene in the Coventry area of the Heights rivals Cleveland’s more successful reviving neighborhoods.

The Heights also continues to be renowned for the strength of its voluntary organizations. Heights Community Congress organizes the annual Heights Heritage (home) Tours, which have taken place (almost) every year since 1973 on a Sunday in mid-September; very helpfully, the Cleveland Heights Historical Society keeps the tour information from past years available on its website at chhistory.org. Volunteers also help run the annual summertime Cain Park Arts Festival. Summer street fairs are common in the city’s commercial districts, including the Coventry Street Fair, the Cedar Lee Stroll, and the Cedar Fairmount and Noble Nella street festivals.

In the 1960s and ’70s, the University Circle institutions that have made Cleveland famous around the world—the Cleveland Orchestra, the Cleveland Museum of Art, the Cleveland Institute of Music, Case Western Reserve University and the Cleveland Clinic—stood out as glittering successes in a city whose historic residential neighborhoods were fading. Adjacent Cleveland Heights successfully managed racial integration during this era, and the residential luster and cultural vitality of the Arts and Crafts era still flourishes here, a valuable asset for the Cleveland metropolitan area today.

Douglas J. Forsyth is Associate Prof. of History at Bowling Green State University and lives in Toledo, Ohio. He would like to thank Ken Goldberg, Marian J. Morton, Kara Hamley O’Donnell, Franklin Piccirillo and Christopher Roy for assistance with this article. 

Back to Part 1

In the last decades of the 20th century, the rustbelt cities of the industrial Midwest and Northeast endured severe economic hardship, as plants closed and legions of middle-class workers lost their jobs, their homes and their futures. More recently, bearing the brunt of recurring recessions, including the Great Recession of 2008, whose impact is still being felt, the region has seemed to be suffering a death spiral. In the midst of this desperate landscape, while the indications of past decline are undeniable, signs of incipient recovery have become unmistakable. For those of us who work and live in the cities or inner-suburbs of Toledo, Detroit, Cleveland, and Buffalo—and thus have an existential stake in the outcome—it is a cautiously exhilarating moment: Are we, at long last, on the cusp of a sustained recovery?

Since mid-2010, employment in the Cleveland area has come roaring back from devastating losses, driven by what the New York Times has called “the new urban market trends of the 21st century—health care, higher education, entertainment, good food, new housing and expanded mass transportation.” Some city neighborhoods, including Tremont and Ohio City, on the west side of the Cuyahoga River, are clearly reviving, thanks in part to new restaurants, art galleries, and artisanal businesses. Even east side neighborhoods, long in the doldrums, are showing signs of recovery, buoyed by the growth of the cultural and medical institutions in University Circle.

THE STORY OF CLEVELAND HEIGHTS

If the Cleveland metropolitan area is going to turn around, the city of Cleveland Heights can be expected to be front-and-center in the revival process. It offers superb early-modernist residential architecture, a lively and diverse cultural scene, and dense formal and informal social networks. These elements have combined, over the rocky urban history of the 20th century, to create an enduring and resilient community that has held itself together in the equally challenging first decade of the 21st and could serve as one of the crucibles from which the recovery of the metropolitan area, if and when it comes, will flow.
Cleveland Heights lies to the south and east of Cleveland’s University Circle area, which is home to institutions like the Cleveland Orchestra and the Cleveland Clinic that brought the city worldwide fame, on a plateau atop the first substantial ridge south of Lake Erie and the lowest of a series of foothills that reach across eastern Ohio and western Pennsylvania to the summits of the Appalachian Mountains. The Heights was sparsely inhabited until, beginning in the 1870s, a handful of wealthy Clevelanders built summer houses there with views to the lake and to the city. The first streetcar lines were built up the hill from University Circle in the late 1890s, and at that point the area began to develop rapidly. In 1903 it became a village, with a population of about 1,500; in 1921 it became a city, with a population above 15,000. By 1930 the city of Cleveland Heights was largely built out. It had 51,000 people, somewhat more than the 46,000 it has today.

In short, Cleveland Heights developed rapidly as a classic streetcar suburb during the heyday of the Arts and Crafts movement, and it has perhaps the finest patrimony of Arts and Crafts and Prairie-style houses in the Cleveland area. That makes it distinctive, especially because architecture in Cleveland generally was more conservative in the late 19th and early 20th centuries than it was in, say, Chicago.

In the early 20th century, Cleveland’s more daring architects produced some of their most innovative work in Cleveland Heights. William A. Bohnard and Raymond D. Parsson, for example, worked together in a successful partnership, building primarily residences, from 1905 to 1932. In 1905 they designed the George Holloway House, in suburban Ravenna, with outspoken Prairie features. This was too much for many of their Cleveland clients, and the duo learned to propose designs to them in a still modernist but somewhat less radical vein, influenced by English architects M. H. Baillie Scott and Charles Voysey. In 1909 in Cleveland Heights, however, they proposed a reworking of the radical features of the Holloway House in their design for the Charles H. and Marie R. Beardslee House, in the Ambler Heights Historic District, which represents perhaps their best work and is one of the finest Prairie houses in the Cleveland area.

Another Cleveland architect, George Kauffman, had built ornate houses in revival styles in the city and its suburbs in the first decade of the century. In the teens, however, he became entranced with the California bungalow and built a series of residences paying homage to it. One of the finest examples was built for A. C. Glasgow in Cleveland Heights in 1919.

Harlen Shimmin, another successful architect, built theaters, auditoriums, schools and apartments, in addition to homes. The extravagant 1916 Ambler Heights house for H. A. Adams, with its roof shingles that fold around the corners of the house and its theater-marquee eave above the front entry, suspended from steel cables, stands out from the tamer work he executed in Shaker Heights and elsewhere.

Finally, Frederick William Striebinger, who studied at Columbia and at the École de Beaux-Arts in Paris, is best known for his revivalist structures. But he, too, apparently became interested in the California bungalow before World War I. We infer that he is the architect of the striking bungalow built at 2927 Hampshire Rd. around 1911, in the Mayfield Heights neighborhood, because an ad in a local paper in December of that year promised the winner of a “Booklovers Contest” a similar bungalow, worth $6,000, to be built by Striebinger on nearby Somerton Rd.

A number of developers also joined in the local building boom, and their activities left Cleveland Heights with considerable diversity in the character of its neighborhoods and in the size and character of its residential structures. Some neighborhoods, including the Ambler Heights Historic District, consist of winding avenues with spacious lots and immense mansions. Others, including the Mayfield Heights neighborhood, contain more modestly sized houses, including bungalows and Arts and Craft foursquares.

Part Two

Q:

Drop-front desks would have to go on my list of most common forms of collected furniture. It’s a form whose design ancestry can be traced back to the 15th century. The popularity of drop-front desks grew in the mid-19th century because new manufacturing methods increased the ease of production. There are many variations to the drop-front during the Arts and Crafts period. Quickly going through the 1906 Limbert catalog I counted five very different models of drop-front desks being offered, including yours.

Unfortunately, Limbert did not include prices in their catalogs. I did look in a 1912 Gustav Stickley catalog that did include prices, and drop-fronts cost between $20-40 depending on the model.
One thing to note is that anytime you refinish, you’re stripping off the patina of the piece, and that affects the value. Also, due to the large number produced, this piece isn’t terribly rare, but it is handsome. And here’s some good news that should add to the enjoyment of your desk—the hardware does look original!

To lend perspective, I’ve included a photo (above) of another Limbert drop-front desk that would be considered rare. I found this image in The Grand Rapids Contribution, written by Don Marek for an exhibit at the Grand Rapids Art Museum in 1987. Don says of this desk, “The interplay of gentle tapers, arches and cutouts gives this Limbert dropfront a strong architectonic quality.” I would have to agree. I find it interesting how some manufacturers stepped away from the norm, creating unique designs while at the same time producing “safe” designs for the consumer. Just as it cost more to produce and to purchase when new, the desk featured in Marek’s publication would certainly fetch more than other Limbert models now.

Q. We recently purchased a set of four old chairs at an antique store. They are in pretty good shape, but need to be cleaned and spruced up a bit. Do we use Murphy’s Oil Soap to clean the wood? Then a paste wax to restore the wood? How can we clean and treat the leather? It smells like they have been set somewhere for years. Also, should we purchase new tacks (these looked black originally) or should we leave them as is? We love your magazine and would appreciate any comments on the care of these chairs.
Thank you,
Dana Wright
Meriden, Kans.

Dana, this design would be typical of what general-line furniture manufacturers were producing in response to the growing popularity of the Mission Style. I have seen similar designs without the back-splat upholstered. (I wonder if this was done post production. The photo is not sharp enough to determine.) You may want to take a chair to a certified dealer or appraiser to determine that.

I try not to involve water when cleaning wood. This has a tendency to raise the grain, especially on oak because of the open pore structure. I would use a good-quality paste wax applied carefully with super-fine (0000) steel wool. This will clean and protect at the same time. Try not to rub too vigorously—you’ll want to leave as much of the finish and patina intact as possible. Be sure to use the wax as directed, which will advise using sparingly since you will be wiping all but a very thin layer away. The idea behind wax is to offer a protective coating—it will wear off with use instead of the finish. Areas on furniture that get more use should be waxed more often. Remember to use a wax product that is reversible. Mineral spirits will remove wax and not an original shellac finish.

As for the leather, that can be tricky. I would do as little as possible. I’ve used a slightly dampened cotton cloth to first clean dirt and dust away and then use a micro-crystalline wax as a protective coating. Leather showing varying degrees of deterioration should be addressed in different ways. I’ve reviewed quite a number of YouTube videos about leather care and have found some of them very helpful.

I would leave the tacks alone. I agree they were probably a dark color to begin with but replacing them is not recommended. Removing the old could cause irreparable damage to the leather surrounding the tacks. As an alternative, there are blackening agents or antiquing oxidizers that will turn the steel, brass or copper dark; search these terms on the Internet to research a solution that works for you.

Q: I recently purchased an L. & J.G. Stickley No. 394 footstool from an antiques dealer near Buffalo, N.Y. The dealer said he had just bought it from an estate sale in the same area. As you can see, it has a “Work of L. & J.G. Stickley” metal tag attached. I have never seen one of these metal tags before, nor have I seen mention of them in any of the literature. Have you encountered these metal tags? In what timeframe would they have been used?
James Bargar
Strongsville, Ohio

This metal tag, while not the best-known way, was a legitimate way that the L. & J.G. Stickley Company marked their furniture. As has been written and seen in numerous books on Arts and Crafts furniture, “The Work of L. &. J.G. Stickley” decal came into use in 1912. Sometime later in that decade this “Work of” mark was transformed into a brand. From the furniture I’ve seen that bears the branded mark, I would guess that happened in the mid-to-late teens. Sometime after the brand was introduced, and probably prior to 1920, the metal tag made its debut. I have seen this metal tag on their oak furniture as well as their next period of institutional maple furniture produced into the 1920s. These are not exact dates, but I’ve come to these conclusions by what I have seen surface in the market.

By the way, your stool is cataloged as No. 311 in the first Onondaga Shops catalog, no. 394 in the Handcraft Furniture catalog and The Work of L. & J.G. Stickley catalog as well as a rocking stool No. 389 in The Work of L. & J.G. Stickley catalog. A very close example of this stool was also produced by the J.M. Young Furniture Company between 1911 and 1927. According to the research done by Jill Thomas-Clark and Michael Clark, 358 of these were sold.