See Your Home in Colonial Style

What Colonial Style Does to a Building

Colonial architecture refers to the building traditions that developed in European colonies in North America and the Caribbean from the 17th through the 18th centuries, later revived in many regional “Colonial Revival” forms. In its most familiar American form, it is defined by balanced facades, clapboard or brick walls, multi-pane sash windows, shuttered openings, steep or pitched roofs, central chimneys or stout end chimneys, and classically ordered porches or porticoes. Its visual identity comes from practicality as much as formality. Early colonial builders adapted English, Dutch, French, Spanish, and local vernacular traditions to available materials, climate, and craft methods, producing houses that feel restrained, sturdy, and legible. The style suggests inherited domestic stability: clear geometry, modest ornament, and a sense of settled rural or small-town dignity rather than display.