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Widely read by home designers and the public alike, his influential book set off a wave of <br />Italianate homebuilding around the country. It is safe to assume that Richard Harrison Knight <br />was aware of Downing's books on Italianate architectural style when he began to design and <br />build his new stone mansion on Porter Road between the years 1850 and 1860. <br />The typical Italianate design was a two story building, but examples survive of many variations <br />from three-story detached homes with towers and cupolas to urban townhouses. There were six <br />basic categories: box with hip roof, box with a centered gable, L or U plan and L plan with a <br />tower and a front gable. The Knight house most resembles the box design with a hip roof. <br />The Italianate town houses are identifiable by their wide projecting cornices with heavy brackets <br />and their richly ornamented windows, porches and doorways. Most American examples of <br />Italianate homes mix details derived from both rural models and formal renaissance townhouses. <br />This description fits the Knight house well. The house has a wide projecting cornice with heavy <br />brackets and some ornamental treatment of the main doorway. <br />Doors occurred in as much variety as windows. Paired and single doors were both common in <br />Italianate homes, often announcing themselves with a large, elaborate hood supported by <br />brackets. Italianate doors were the first to have large panes of glass in the door itself in lieu of <br />side lights with small panes. The Knight house has a pair of entrance doors in a heavy frame. <br />Italianate window sashes typically had one-over-one or two-over-two glazing. Window trim had <br />exuberant variations including U-shaped crowns with brackets or pedimented crowns with <br />decorated hoods. The windows in the Knight house are beautifully placed in a formal pattern in <br />the farade. They are tall rectangular windows. However, they are not the arched and curved <br />windows which were popularized in America by the Italianate trend. <br />Brick and wood clapboard were the most common building materials for Italianate homes with <br />brick being more expensive. The ornamentation was typically wood and occasionally the brick <br />homes had elaborate, durable cast iron window and door hoods. The Knight house is built with a <br />stone finish on the exterior, a clear step above clapboard, less formal than brick. The exterior <br />ornamentation is wood. <br />Italianate roofs were low pitched, often with a square cupola on top. Projecting eaves with large <br />brackets in a variety of shapes and spacing dominated the comice. Arranged singly or in pairs, <br />the brackets were usually underscored with wide decorative bands and sometimes further <br />elaborated with panel moldings. This description fits the Knight house well for the cornice and <br />roof, although there is no cupola on the roof. <br />Based on the description of the Italianate Style given above, we have used the term "Moderate <br />Italianate" to describe the Richard H. Knight - William Biddulph house. <br />Note: The information contained herein on Italianate Style was adapted from descriptions written <br />by architect Bruce Wentworth AIA.