The Hutchinson House 1903 (rear view) Ypsilanti, MI I love the "Queen Anne" style homes and one of my friends on facebook loves the "Victorians". I thought Queen Anne homes were Victorians and indeed they are from Queen Victoria's time. But they have much more history and I thought I'd share some of that with you today.. The Hutchinson House is in Ypsilanti Michigan and has quite a story behind that building as well. I once worked there and I actually held a candle party in it! The party was quite successful as the invitees bought candles just so they could visit the home. Good idea. 1899 Queen Anne Asheville NC What is the Difference between Queen Anne and Victorian houses? A Queen Anne home -- one of many styles classified under the broad heading of Victorian -- was built primarily during the latter part of Queen Victoria's reign from 1870 to 1910. As the last Presbyterian Stuart who held the throne, Queen Anne reigned 135 years before Queen Victoria. Even though a well-known furniture style that developed during her reign has her name, it would be more than 150 years before she had an architectural style named after her. The decor style is specifically known for its complex, ornamental curvilinear turrets and towers, and steeply pitched roofs. Eureka California The home most people think of when they imagine or see a Victorian home is actually a Queen Anne home. Typically outfitted with a turret or tower, the home often has wrap-around porches and is made from brick, wood or stone, many with clapboard siding. The Queen Anne style is known for its graceful curves and paneled insets. Look for angled bay windows, steeply pitched roofs with finials, stained glass, and handcrafted chimneys. Asymmetry. Towers, turrets, bays, porches, and roofline break the box. Roofs and massing are often complex. Texture. Surfaces are broken by a switch from stone or clapboard to shingles, often with fancy-cut butts. Belt courses, gable ornament, turnings, brackets, balustrades, and sawn-wood “gingerbread” keep it interesting. (Polychrome painting plays up surface texture even more.) Wood trim. Sawn, chamfered, carved, lathe-turned, and applied ornament is used on porches, gables, cornices, and story breaks. Other features include patterned shingles, decorative trim, and intricate spindles, banisters and staircases. Queen Anne homes have a storybook quality to them. Choosing Queen Anne/Victorian paint colors The History of Queen Anne, Victorian-Architecture Style Despite roots in the English “Queen Anne Movement”—a return to early, vernacular architecture—it is here a peculiarly American style in its mass-produced ornamentation (including “gingerbread”) and lavish use of wood. The Northeast, already heavily populated in the 1880s, has comparatively fewer examples that you might expect. Go south and west, however, and the style becomes more popular and more fanciful. The West Coast and resurgent areas of the New South have the most dizzying examples.