Just off Volunteer Park in the Seattle neighborhood of Capitol Hill, this funny little Tudor cottage has charmed passerby with its whimsy since 1926. Deemed a “rather entertaining house” by the Seattle Department of Neighborhoods, it is described as an “unusual expression of the English Cottage variant of the Tudor style.” Recognizable by their steeply pitched roofs with multiple gables, often accompanied by decorative half-timbering of the facade, Tudors are the epitome of storybook architecture.
Based off the timber-framed styles of fifteenth and sixteenth century England and Germany, the Tudor (technically Tudor Revival) became popular in the U.S. from the 1910s through the 1940s. A similar style, the English Cottage, was also popular across the states around the same period and was essentially a scaled down version of the Tudor. Its cozy, asymmetrical form is topped by a medium to steeply pitched roof, sometimes with clipped gables and over-sized chimneys with decorative brick or stone work.
The Hamback house, so-named for its original owners, combines many of the elements of the Tudor and English Cottage with a variety of colors and materials. A pale yellow stucco on the upper levels and multicolored brick on the lower story are united by a muted viridian green trim. The red clay tile roof forms a clipped side-gable at the south end and a steep gable over an enclosed vestibule at the front entrance. The arched oak door in nutmeg brown is carved with three floral panels and has a round art glass window with a design that’s repeated in the transom over the triple sash window. A thicket of framing trees and laissez-faire approach to landscaping complete the fanciful fairy tale charm.