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Cherry Creek Gothic - Victorian Architecture in Denver (Paperback, First Edition, Reissue Ed.)
Loot Price: R772
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Cherry Creek Gothic - Victorian Architecture in Denver (Paperback, First Edition, Reissue Ed.)
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"Almost every citizen is laudably ambitious to build a house unlike
that of his neighbor," wrote an observer in early Denver, "and is
more desirous that it shall have some novel feature than that it
shall be surpassingly beautiful." This history of early Denver has
over two hundred illustrations of buildings designed by nouveaux
riches miners and frontier businessmen who had more money and
fanciful imagination than taste. There is also a picture map of the
business district in 1892 that shows where many of these
extraordinary structures stood. Victoriana was in bloom, and
architectural purity was scorned. Greek revivals had mansard roofs,
Gothic castles had Italian tops, turrets and minarets sprouted in
unlikely places, and everything was trimmed or fenced with castiron
lace. Gingerbread store fronts, crenelated church towers, plushy
lavish hotels, pompous homes, and glittering gambling houses and
brothels gave the "Queen City of the Plains" an outlandish,
distinct style that came to be known as Cherry Creek Gothic, from
the creek that bisects the area. Denver residents were as gaudy and
unpredictable as the buildings they erected. The unsinkable Mrs. J.
J. (Molly) Brown built the fantastic House of Lions, an architect's
nightmare guarded by two Sphinx-headed lions, in order to break
into Denver society. Madam Jennie Rogers and Madam Mattie Silks,
rivals for the title of queen of the demimonde, each had her turn
reigning over the famous House of Mirrors. H. A. W. Tabor, the
bonanza king whose scandalous love affair with Baby Doe cost him a
political career, gave Denver a business block and an opera house
that attracted such performers as Oscar Wilde and Sarah Bernhardt.
This companion volume to the author's earlier work on Colorado
hotels, No More Than Five in a Bed, is written with humor and
understanding for the famous and the infamous who saw their dreams
of wealth and splendor fulfilled in their city. It will appeal not
only to students of architecture but to every one interested in the
flamboyant personalities of the times. Sandra Dallas, a reporter
for Business Week for twenty-five years, is the author of Colorado
Ghost Towns and Mining Camps, No More Than Five in a Bed (also
published by the University of Oklahoma Press), Gaslights and
Gingerbread, many other books and articles on Colorado and the
West, and several best-selling novels.
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