Painted Floors in the Victorian Home

Late 19th century card of sample
floor colors from the New England
Paint Company

For more information about historic paint colors for your Victorian or Arts and Crafts era home or business, please visit the Historic Design Consulting webpage today.

Painted floors were common in American homes throughout the 19th century. Durable paints would seal soft pine flooring making them less liable to stain and easier to clean.  An 1850 edition of Miss Leslie's Lady's House Book recommends cleaning heavily soiled, common pine floors using:
        

   "an old tin pan with some gray sand in it; and after soaping the brush, rub on it some sand also."

Abrasive sand or pumice could remove stains but would also erode the soft, unpainted floor boards. Since painted and sealed floors would not absorb grease or stains, they could be easily cleaned by wiping or gently brushing with warm soapy water. 

Commercial, ready-made floor paints were made durable and glossy by the addition of resins that were otherwise used to make varnishes. These resins, including copal and colophony, were soluble in boiled linseed oil and turpentine and were added to oil paint to provided the hard, glossy coat.  Painters and homeowners also used regular, home-mixed oil paint and then applied a protective topcoat of varnish.  Alvin Wood Chase's 1890 receipt book (or recipe book as we say today) Dr. Chase's third, last and complete receipt book and household physician suggests: 

"Paint the whole floor with a mixture of much boiled oil and little ochre for the first coat: then after it is well dried, give two more coats of much ochre and little oil; and finally finish with a coat of first-rate copal varnish.  It is extremely durable for floors, windows, or outside, such as verandas, porticoes and the like." 

Painted bedroom floors from the 1855
Folsom House, Taylor's Falls, MN.

The Folsom House, an 1855 Greek Revival home in Taylor's Falls, MN, an early Minnesota lumbering town, features floors painted in a common, blue-gray and  a yellow ochre like that mentioned in Chase's recipe above.   

Close-up of Folsom House floor
stenciling.

Stenciling was a popular way to decorate painted floors to make them resemble expensive carpets or marble. Stenciled patterns often featured repeating floral or geometric patterns and sometimes included contrasting borders around walls which mimicked carpet borders. Stencils were made from tin sheets which had designs cut out with punches or shears. The stencils were laid on the floor and the paint brushed on leaving the painted pattern on the floor. The process was repeated until the floor was covered with the pattern.   The Folsom House has a few remnants of a repeating, bottle green floral design at the top of the stairway. Examples of  floor stenciling are rather uncommon today as they were often obliterated by foot traffic, removed when painted floors went out of fashion or destroyed when linoleum or carpet was installed. 

For questions or help with your own home's interior paint colors, ornament and period decorating, please visit the Historic Design Consulting Home Page for more information.

The Folsom House is located in Taylor's Falls, MN (about 40 minutes northeast of the Twin Cities Metro) and can be visited between Memorial Day weekend and September, Friday through Sunday between 1 and 4 and on holidays between 1 and 4.

The Greek Revival: America's First National Building Style

The Greek Revival has always been my favorite American building style.  I find its simplicity appealing while its strength and solidity remind me of the growing confidence and wealth of the new republic.  The Greek Revival was significant because it was America's first national style.  Although based on a European precedents, the American expression was unique and was found coast-to-coast during the first half of the 19th century.  This popularity was due principally to the widespread use of several pattern books, including Minard Lafever's The Modern Builder's Guide (New York, 1833) and Asher Benjamin's Practical House Carpenter: Being a Complete Development of the Grecian Orders of Architecture (Boston, 1830).  These pattern books were written for carpenters and house joiners who used the books' descriptions and lithographic plates as models for their own designs.

The Greek Revival was a favorite with the burgeoning East Coast merchant class.  The Whipple House of Salem, MA was built in 1843 and is a classic example of the new style.  Jonathan Whipple prospered after he established a factory in Salem around 1835 which sorted and processed copal,  an African resin which was used to make furniture and maritime varnish.

The house has several features typical of the Greek Revival, including Doric pilasters at the corners, a recessed doorway with rectangular sidelights and transom, and a wide entablature running the length of the front.  The trim around the front door is particularly striking and closely resembles a plate from Asher Benjamin's book Practical House Carpenter.

Jonathan Whipple House, Salem, MA, 1843

The Ard Godfrey House was built in 1849 and is the oldest remaining frame building in Minneapolis, MN.  Godfrey was a millwright who moved with his family from Maine after  Franklin Steele, a prosperous speculator and mill owner,  asked him to construct a sawmill in the small community of Saint Anthony.  Godfrey was one of the earliest settlers around Minneapolis and is notable for being the first to bring dandelions seeds to the area.

The proportions and  shape of the Godfrey House resemble those of  the Whipple.   The house is symmetrical with a  similarly pitched roof.  However, its ornament is less bold.  The Godfrey House has Doric pilasters like the Whipple, but they are narrower and molding on the capitals is simpler.  The front door is not recessed but has rectangular sidelights and is framed by a temple-like door surround with two pilasters and a simple but strong entablature.  The Godfrey has a simple frieze board along the top of the wall rather than the Whipple's more elaborate entablature.

Ard Godfrey House, Minneapolis, MN, 1849.

Although these houses were built over a 1000 miles apart, they share many characteristic features of the Greek Revival.  As such, the Godfrey and Whipple houses are excellent examples which show the national character of the building style.

For question about your own home's building style or information about how to restore, maintain or paint it, visit the Historic Design Consulting Home Page.