| Historic Name: |
Rosina Court |
Common Name: |
Rosina Court |
| Style: |
Tudor |
Neighborhood: |
Central Area |
| Built By: |
|
Year Built: |
1928 |
| |
| Significance |
|
In the opinion of the survey, this property appears to meet the criteria of the Seattle Landmarks Preservation Ordinance. |
|
|
Rosina Court is a good example of a courtyard apartment, a popular Seattle housing form during the 1920s. They provided attractive living accommodations at modest cost, with individual entrances at ground level. This building is relatively late; this type of housing was more common in the early 1920s, and housing pressure at the end of the decade encouraged developers to build more dense block apartments. The Tudor style seen here was very common in local courtyard apartments--probably more common than the Craftsman style seen in California. This version is essentially similar to one-story townhouses, with the fronts doors opening toward the street and the courtyard in the rear.
Rosina Court was designed in 1928 by William H. Whiteley, who was city's most active apartment designers during the 1920s. He is best known for the Mediterranean Revival style courts he designed for Frederick Anhalt and other developers in 1929-30, but he also did works like this one in the more common Tudor style. He continued to design courtyard apartments after World War II, using more modern materials and stylistic influences.
The city's population had increased dramatically in previous decades, and prosperity encouraged developers to meet the pent-up demand for housing. Apartments, ranging from basic housing to luxury units, were a significant factor in meeting this need, and became a major element of the streetscape in many Seattle neighborhoods. This is a fine example of the design attention paid to many of these buildings, where detailing and materials were used to reduce the impact of density on residential neighborhoods. This area, known as Renton Hill, had been the site of many fine homes early in the century. By the late 1920s many of those houses were becoming multifamily, and apartment buildings were being built. The area was especially attractive for its views and the convenient Madison Street car line to both downtown and Lake Washington.
|
|
| |
| Appearance |
| This courtyard apartment building contains nine units, averaging 567 square feet. It is of wood frame construction with red wirecut brick cladding. Rows of soldier bricks run along the top of the concrete foundation and below the gable ends. Some of the gable ends are clad with stucco. The building is L-shaped in plan, with the main entries facing the outside, partially enclosing an interior courtyard. The composition is a mass of gables of varying sizes, with the two main gabled volumes and each unit marked by a large gable, with smaller gables (or paired gables) over the individual entries. For variation, some of the stoops have round arched hoods over them. Windows are in twos or threes, with 8-over-1 leaded sash. |
|
|
