vernacular architecture

vernacular architecture

Common domestic architecture of a region, usually far simpler than what the technology of the time is capable of maintaining. In highly industrialized countries such as the U.S., for example, barns are still being built according to a design employed in Europe in the 1st millennium BC. Vernacular structures are characterized by inexpensive materials and straightforwardly utilitarian design.

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vernacular architecture

Architecture that makes use of common regional forms and materials at a particular place and time; sometimes includes strong ethnic influences of an immigrant population; usually modest, unassuming, and unpretentious, and often a mixture of traditional and more modern styles or a hybrid of several styles. Houses are often owner-built by people familiar with local materials, regional climatic conditions, and local building customs and techniques, as described under folk architecture.