GRAHAM-HUGHES HOUSE

Baltimore, MD

This home is a Châteauesque residence in the Mount Vernon Place Historic District of Baltimore, Maryland. The house was designed by Baltimore architect George Archer and completed in 1888. It had been attributed to architect Charles E. Cassell and mistakenly thought to have been built in 1895 until discovery of an article in the March 12, 1888, edition of the Baltimore Sun crediting Archer as the architect and Baltimore jail warden John Waters as the builder. The house is named for original owners George and Sarah Graham. Their daughter, Isabella, married Thomas Hughes and lived in the house until her death in 1977.

I’ve often wondered what was special about the late 1880’s, a period when so many great buildings were built in the US. Of my 100 plus sketches to date, 20 were built in this brief period of time. A little CHAT research led to the following reason: a booming post-civil war economy, the introduction of steel as a building material and the urbanization of America.