Atlanta House Tours - Spring 2010

This is the back of the first house on the tour - a Shutze house built in 1936.

Spring has sprung in Atlanta and so have the house tours. Last weekend we had Buckhead in Bloom. This coming weekend we have Only on Oakdale in Druid Hills (click the link on the right of our blog). And the Decorators' Showhouse on Tuxedo Road in Buckhead , benefiting the Atlanta Symphony, starts April 17 . A few weeks ago along with many events put on by the Phoenix Flies, we had a few Neel Reid walking house tours in Druid Hills.

This past Sunday afternoon I went on the Buckhead in Bloom house and garden tour put on by the Atlanta Preservation Center. There were six houses on the tour, two of which I had seen on other house tours. I was very interested to see the Shutze house on the tour (pictured above). The original house was built in 1936 and a large addition on the rear was designed by Harrison Design Associates. I am always most excited to see the original woodwork, moldings and details in these historic houses. For me, that's what sets them apart. The attention paid to detail by architects Reid, Shutze, Means and Crook is phenomenal. This house did not disappoint. I managed to take a couple of photos of the frieze below the crown molding and the medallion in the living room before they told me to stop.







Looking at this frieze made me wonder how hard it is to find craftmanship like that today. After a quick google search I came up with Capital Moulding out of Cork, England which specializes in plaster mouldings and friezes, and Wallpaper Plus which is a less expensive way to put up a frieze. (Moulding is the British spelling of molding.)

From Capital Mouldings -




And from Wallpaper Plus - a couple of Lincrusta Friezes, which are applied like wallpaper and then painted with oil based paint and look like plaster friezes.




Back to the house tour. At the second house I went to, I had the fortunate chance to run into an old friend and also meet designer Beth Webb, whose work was featured in the 2009 Christmas House. We all had a delightful visit.


House built in 1985, architect Clement Ford

The third house I visited turned out to be the home of a family friend of my grandparents. I had a marvelous chat with her discussing historic preservation. Her house was the playhouse for the Craigellachie estate, now Cherokee Town Club.


Craigellachie playhouse, now a residence.

The last two houses that I saw are pictured below:





It was a beautiful day to tour houses and I loved seeing lots of old friends and connecting with some new friends. Architecture Tourist has some more photos of the tour on his blog.

All photos taken by Helen Young, Whitehaven