Bohnsen Cottages (Portland, Oregon)

Title: Bohnsen Cottages (Portland, Oregon)
LC Subject: Architecture, American Architecture--United States
Photographer: Heritage Consulting Group
Description: National Register of Historic Places (Listed,2008 )
View: interior: Looking East at the Window from the West in 1922 Elm Street – typical living room
Provenance: University of Oregon Libraries
Temporal: 1920-1929
Style Period: Spanish Colonial Revival
Work Type: architecture (object genre) built works views (visual works) interior views dwellings houses living architectural element windows
Latitude: 45.508323
Longitude: -122.493337
Location: Portland >> Multnomah County >> Oregon >> United States Multnomah County >> Oregon >> United States Oregon >> United States United States
Street Address: 1922 Elm Street
Date: 1926
View Date: 2008-02
Identifier: OR_MultnomahCounty_Bohnsen13.jpg
Rights: In Copyright - Educational Use Permitted
Rights Holder: Oregon State Historic Preservation Office
Source: Oregon State Historic Preservation Office, http://www.oregon.gov/OPRD/HCD/SHPO/
Type: Image
Format: image/jpeg
Material: concrete; stucco; terra cotta; metal
Set: Building Oregon
Primary Set: Building Oregon
Institution: University of Oregon
Citation: National Register of Historic Places Registration Form National Register of Historic Places, http://www.nps.gov/nr
Note: From the National Register form, Conclusion: The Bohnsen Cottages represent an attempt to blend both the single-family detached home with rental property during a time of domestic architectural experimentation. As such, the cottages feature many elements of a single-family detached home that would appeal to the tastes of the middle-class for affordable homes, such as a unique addresses, separate entries, rear or service doors, individual garages and basements. They also blend apartment features. At 31 by 18 feet, their 550 square feet of living space compares with a studio size apartment. Entry is directly into the living room, much as an apartment is accessed, and kitchens are, by comparison, Pullman-size while the “yard” is communal. Yet, despite the compact size, each structure has the luxury of a garage, an asset that might make the units more attractive but would not appreciably add to the rent. As a building type, the cottages are a unique form in the Portland Heights neighborhood and as rental housing rare in the city at large. They are indicative of the multi-family housing development trend of the 1920s and represent a very specific response to the market for middle-income housing, one that is economical but with the trappings of being independent and upscale, efficient, and auto-friendly. In this the Bohnsen Cottages stand apart from the multitude of duplexes and four-plexes, court apartments, garden apartments, flats, and residential hotels in Portland. This image was included in the documentation to support a nomination to the National Register of Historic Places, a program of the National Park Service. The image is provided here by the Oregon State Historic Preservation Office and the University of Oregon Libraries to facilitate scholarship, research, and teaching. For other uses, such as publication, contact the State Historic Preservation Office. Please credit the Oregon State Historic Preservation Office when using this image.