Period Revival Buildings: Spanish

by Michael Bridgeman

In November of 2022, I wrote about French-style houses in the Madison area. This month I turn my attention to Spanish-influenced buildings, a category which is at once narrower—examples are scarce in our area—and broader—there are more than houses to consider.

In the United States, architectural styles have tended to flow from east to west. It wasn’t until the late 19th century that American architects paid serious attention to the Hispanic heritage of a vast area stretching from San Francisco though Texas and into parts of Florida, as well as Mexico. Spanish-inspired architecture appeared in the West during the 1890s and made its way east, continuing in various guises, into the 1950s and beyond. Spanish revival buildings have never been numerous in our area. They also pale in comparison to the grandest examples found in the parts of the U.S. where the style originated. Still, there is considerable variety to be found close to home.

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The Mission style was the first of the Spanish revivals [a] to migrate from the American Southwest, and the Flora Keenan house at 7 E. Gilman St. (1904) is an early Madison example. The Thomas and Valeska Urdahl house at 211 N. Prospect Ave. (1915) in University Heights is another. Mission-style houses borrowed elements of Spanish Colonial missions for decorative touches, seen at the Keenan house in the shaped parapets over the third-floor dormer and porch, and at the Urdahl house in the large gable on the main façade and the curved opening of the prominent screen porch. Both houses integrate Craftsman elements popular at the same time such as the Foursquare form and exposed rafter tails (Keenan) and the vertical boards and a semicircular entry hood (Urdahl).

Spanish Colonial Revival in San Diego [1]

By World War I the Mission style was fading, hastened by the impact of the Panama-California Exposition in San Diego. Planners of the 1915-1916 world’s fair embraced the Spanish Colonial Revival style, a rich source of ideas borrowed from Spanish architecture and its Moorish, Byzantine, Renaissance, Baroque, and Indigenous influences. The Spanish Colonial Revival became immensely popular in the Southwest and Florida and soon appeared across the country.

 

St. William Catholic Church in Paoli

 

Dane County, some 2,000 miles from the epicenter of the Spanish revival, saw the construction of several important Spanish-style buildings in the 1920s. The first was St. William Catholic Church at 1371 County Road PB in Paoli (1925). It’s a straightforward adaptation of 18th-century mission designs, made especially notable by the square tower, with its three tiers and round-arched window openings. St. William’s Spanish Colonial pedigree is immediately apparent in the shaped parapet of the main gable. The brick walls are plain and decorative detail, though restrained, is centered on the main doorway. The entry is framed by brick pilasters topped with engaged urns that in turn anchor an elaborate stone niche. The leaded glass windows on either side of the entry have blind brick arches. Designed by an unknown architect, this church replaced a 1900 edifice that was severely damaged by fire.

 

The Capitol Theater tower [2]

 

When the Capitol Theater at 205 State Street in Madison (1927) held its grand opening on January 21, 1928, The Capital Times wrote that the architects, “... have designed the building to recall the gayety of Spanish fetes and celebrations of medieval times.” The article made much of the interior “designed in the spirit of the modern Spanish Renaissance. Floors in the lobby are all imported Spanish and domestic tiles in brilliant colors. All draperies are in Castilian red.” [b] The Capitol Theater was the work of Rapp & Rapp, premier creators of movie palaces at the time. [c] Their work made theaters a glorious part of the moviegoing experience, emphasizing opulence over stylistic purity.

 

Capitol Theater entry tower

 

The Capitol Theater’s exterior, The Capital Times noted, “...is also of Spanish Renaissance design, and presents a commanding appearance with it tower effect on State St.” [b] In keeping with Spanish tradition, the brick walls are plain with elaborate ornamentation drawing the eye to prominent architectural elements: the five arched windows above the doorway, the niches on the upper part of the tower with floriated ornament within their recesses, the “shoulders” where the tower narrows, and the twisted columns at the corners of the tower. The decorative tower was retained when the Overture Center for the Arts opened in 2004, but no longer serves as the entry to the restored and updated Capitol Theater.

The Barrymore Theater

A second Spanish revival theater opened two years later at 2090 Atwood Avenue (1929) as the Eastwood Theater, now called the Barrymore Theatre. Though smaller than the downtown movie palaces, the Eastwood wasn’t diffident about its Spanish lineage. It was designed by Madison architect Harry Alford and Peoria theater designer F.C. Klein with an octagonal tower topped by a bell-shaped dome. A small square tower to the east has a tile roof, a Spanish/Mediterranean touch repeated above the shop windows. The large window above the marquee is set between three-part columns that start as square bases, then become inverted obelisks, and finally rise as twisted columns to support an elaborate cornice. The glory of the original Eastwood was the auditorium, a classic atmospheric theater that transported filmgoers to an outdoor Spanish courtyard under twinkling lights. Check out Cinema Treasures to see historic photographs, including the original interior.

The National Register nomination for Shorewood Hills classifies the Frank and Evelyn Horner House at 3515 Blackhawk Drive (1926) as Mediterranean Revival, but I’m including it for its Spanish revival elements. Regardless of categorical precision, it happens to be a very good design. [d] The architects were Law, Law & Potter, Madison masters of period revival styles in the 1920s and 1930s and here they hit a lot of high notes, some of which are more evident in the black-and-white photo. The house has a red tile roof, subtly carved fascia boards supported by plain wooden brackets, an oculus behind a metal grille below the gable peak, French doors on the second story that open to a balconet with an iron railing, arched openings on most first-floor windows and doors, tiled panels flanking the French doors to the right of the entrance, and a small chimney cap with a tiled roof.

 

The Haugner Apartment building

 

Madison also has less finely fashioned residences by anonymous designers that are appealing in their own ways. Spanish mission roots are as clear as the bell in the open arch of the shaped parapet of the C.A. Haugner Apartments at 2104 University Ave. (1930). The five-unit building has other touches that echo Spanish Revival styling including the brick piers on either side of the main entry, each topped with a handful of curved roof tiles, and the round arches filled with plain tiles above the first-floor windows.

 

A Spanish-style “bungalow” on Dayton Street

 

There are three small houses on Madison’s east side with just enough Spanish (or Mediterranean) flair to give them character. They are clad in stucco and all three are two-bedroom houses measuring between 825 and 838 square feet. The “bungalow” at 920 E. Dayton St. (circa 1930) has only a pair of steel casement windows on the street side, where attention is directed to the recessed entry. The pent roof over the opening mimics the roof-tiled strip across the top of the facade. The nicest touch, whether original or contemporary, are the decorative tiles on the risers of the front steps.

 

Two houses on Dickinson Street

 

Side-by-side houses on Dickinson Street in Madison are fraternal twins. Their facades mirror each other, with steps on opposite ends that lead to recessed entryways. The arched portals are balanced by three narrow windows set into shallow arched slots; the steel windows have balconets with metal railings. The house to the left in the photo, at 614 S. Dickinson St. (1926), was built by Matthew William and Eileen Rosensteel. It has a strip of roof tiles at the top of the façade, like the Dayton Street house, and a decorative stucco “keystone” over the entry arch. The light-colored house at 612 S. Dickinson St. (circa 1926) has ornamental diamonds in the stucco above the windows, but displays no roof tiles.

 

Spanish touches at 1206 Regent Street

 

This is an incomplete overview of buildings in Dane County that show characteristics of Spanish design. I’ve not dealt with the Monterey style nor Pueblo Revival architecture, both of which are exceedingly rare in our area. Nevertheless, there is plenty to discover, and I encourage you to look for traces of Spanish revival design on houses, storefronts, and other buildings. The evidence may be scanty, only which makes finding specimens even more rewarding.

. . .

Notes

[a] “Spanish/Mediterranean Styles” is the category used in the online Architecture and History Index of the Wisconsin Historical Society. Cultural Resource Management in Wisconsin notes that they “are discussed together because in Wisconsin both are relatively rare and sometimes confused.” They share similarities in style and materials, though Spanish revival buildings “may appear less restrained than Mediterranean Revival examples – gaily shaped gables often replace neat tile roofs.” I focus on buildings with more conspicuous Spanish features.

[b] “Use Spanish Design to Enliven Theater.” The Capital Times, January 20, 1928. p. 8.

[c] Rapp & Rapp also designed the New Orpheum Theater (1925) across the street from the Capitol Theater with an art Deco façade and French Renaissance interior. Their Al. Ringling Theater (1915) in Baraboo used Neoclassical styling.

[d] The nomination notes that the Horner house is clad in stone not plaster or stucco, which is more typical of Spanish Colonial Revival buildings. Nonetheless, McAlester includes stone- and brick-faced examples in her summary of Spanish Revival houses. There’s also the matter of whether the Horner house has a more formal (Mediterranean) or informal (Spanish) appearance. To my eye it is informal.

Sources

Architecture and History Inventory (AHI). Wisconsin Historical Society. https://www.wisconsinhistory.org/Records/Article/CS15309

McAlester, Virginia Savage. A Field Guide to American Houses (revised). Alfred A. Knopf, New York. 2015. pp. 510-540. McAlester includes Mediterranean and Spanish styles among “Eclectic Houses.”

Wyatt, Barbara (ed.). Cultural Resource Management in Wisconsin: Vols. 1-3, A Manual for Historic Properties. Madison: State Historical Society of Wisconsin, 1987. Vol. 2, (Architecture), p. 2-32.

Image Credits

[1] Postcard, Panama-California Exposition. 1914.

[2] Wisconsin Historical Society Architecture & History Index. AHI #88359. 2006.

[3] Wisconsin Historical Society Architecture & History Index. AHI #5762. 2001.

All other photos by Michael Bridgeman.

Madison Trust