Queen Anne Architecture and Hardware
The Victorian architectural style can be broken down into several different subcategories, with the Queen Anne style being one of the most famous and popular ones in Great Britain. While the style gets its name from none other than the monarch herself, the Queen Anne style of architecture varies depending on which part of the world you are in. Britain, the United States and Australia all have their own version of this architectural design, as they were all influenced by the the time frame they were introduced, as well as by other cultural aspects in the area.
The Queen Anne style originated in Great Britain in the 1870's at the height of the Industrial Revolution in Europe. With all of the advancements going on, it made it much easier and more cost effective to create elaborate elements to adorn homes and buildings creating this style. Height is an important aspect of this style of Architecture - often with dramatic peaks and long extensions reaching far into the heavens.
Some typical features of this Queen Anne architectural style include sweeping staircases leading to carved stone doorframes, stone cornerstones, triangular pediments with dormers, and box-like floor plans. These design elements can be seen on buildings all over Great Britain like Severalls Hospital in Colchester and County Hall in Wakefield. Rounded and curved turret style corners of these homes often made them asymetric - a departure from most aspects of English architecture.
They also have the tendency to use warmer colors and soft finishes. It's not unusual to see terracotta panels, white woodwork, asymmetrical fronts and the like to help soften up an otherwise hard finish. The Queen Anne style is just a part of Victorian architecture that is a culmination of different architectural styles, and it is easy to pick out the Tudor elements, and you can easily see how the misnamed Old English style in the United States was influenced by it.
All of these elements come together in various pieces of hardware throughout the homes and buildings to help tie everything together and add the perfect finishing touch. The hardware used inside and outside of these pieces of history often provide an insight into what was to come - French Empire to Art Deco to Modernism.