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Good podcast on this: https://99percentinvisible.org/episode/the-house-that-came-i...

The houses look fairly ordinary, here's an example: https://img.atlasobscura.com/w5ka7Nu51kS6w9gIH24ObDyeKBfhbkP....

I wonder if I've ever visited one unknowingly.



> fairly ordinary

I don't know if I'm just nostalgic for American homes, but that home looks striking to me. But I know what you mean.


Easy to do! I've known several in my hometown, even rented one for a while. Recently looking at properties for sale around the state, found a fancy house with a pillar'd porch and elaborate newel post, pillared doorways, sliding doors, screened summer kitchen in the back - and instantly recognized it as a Sears Roebuck house with added features!

If you enter into a 'parlor' with a switchback staircase on the right, fancy newel post, maybe a gabled landing then it's a good chance. To the left, a double doorway to a sitting room. Right from there, pillared fancy doorway (possibly sliding doors) to a dining room with bay window. Behind that a pantry and then a screened summer kitchen, often closed in in later years.

Straight from the entryway you get a sort of closet with the basement stairs on the right (and maybe another exterior door) and a shelving unit on the left. Through that to a play room or downstairs bedroom. If there's a bathroom it's behind that.

All lathe-and-plaster walls, wainscoting of various designs depending on the money they had to spend.

Upstairs a short hallway with four doors to four bedrooms. Maybe a sleeping porch behind the first bedroom on the right.

Anyway seen this design around here (midwest) many times, sometimes a little larger or smaller but always the same layout!


That’s so much nicer than I was expecting. I figured it was something like a trailer home.


I lived across from one (nowhere near as nice as that one though), and you definitely can't tell.




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