The following is a photograph and article printed
in the Winter 1998 issue of American Bungalow

When you think of Charleston, S.C., Arts and Crafts-style architecture may not be what’s pictured in your mind. The 330-year-old city typically evokes images of the south, with grand antebellum mansions and white columned plantations. Tourists are drawn to Charleston because of its 18-th and 19-th century architecture, and residents value them as well, but until recently, little notice has been paid to historic 20-th century buildings. Charleston has now become a haven for architectural preservationists who appreciate other styles and smaller homes, and they are joining with residents to put bungalow neighborhoods on the list of desirable historic areas.

As a newly married couple in 1991, my husband Bill and I were house hunting, searching north of the city for affordable housing. I desperately wanted to live on the Peninsula, but the prices in the historic district were just not in our price range. Then we found the wonderful neighborhood of Hampton Park Terrace, a charming pocket of 1915- to 1930-era Arts and Crafts homes. Locals never thought of areas like Hampton Park Terrace as historic; my goodness it’s only 75 years old! At the time I knew little about this period or architecture, but we immediately fell in love with the neighborhood and the residents.

When it was first developed, Hampton Park Terrace was advertised as a "new, modern and attractive suburb upon virgin soil, 10 feet higher than the Boulevard and never overflowed by tides" If you’ve never visited Charleston during a heavy rain, combined with a high tide, you might not understand the importance of locating your home on high ground, but local residents did, and soon Hampton Park Terrace became a middle- to upper-class suburb, housing railroad and lumber company managers and executives.

By 1922, nearly 200 homes had been built, with 30 more erected by 1930. The house styles in the new suburb didn’t follow the architectural designs so evident throughout the rest of the city. Instead, Hampton Park Terrace was one of the first neighborhoods on the Charleston peninsula to follow national home-style trends, instead of local conventions. In lieu of classical revival styles, most of the homes found throughout the neighborhood are simple Prairie, Foursquare, Colonial Revival and Craftsman bungalows.

Although it began as an exclusive all-white suburb, Hampton Park Terrace grew with the times and now the neighborhood is pleasant mix of black and white, old and young; a middle class neighborhood. In the past 10 years, more young couples have purchased houses and begun the long adventure of restoring their homes. Many houses have not been renovated since the 1960s or earlier, so the task of installing efficient heating and cooling systems and updated kitchens and baths become a challenge to each new homeowner.

In 1992, in addition to my full-time work as an architect, I became the newly elected president of Hampton Park Terrace neighborhood association and began a long four-and-a-half-year process of fund-raising and grant writing to have the neighborhood placed on the National Register as a Historic District. We ran into many pitfalls at the beginning. The State Historic Preservation Office decided our grant request did not qualify for funding because we were completing some of project with volunteer help. The city of Charleston and the privately funded Preservation Society were also unable to provide us with any assistance. So we decided the best way to proceed was to raise the money ourselves.

Charleston is well known for its historic house tours, but our neighborhood was the first to hold a 20^th century home tour. I admit we did not have much experience in the tour business, and thank goodness for friends, or no one would have shown up for that first tour in 1994. The following spring we used what we learned and raised $1,500 toward our project. Six homes, including ours, were on the tour.

The successful 1995 home tour made the National Register project a reality. With the start-up funding behind us, we won a generous $1,000 donation from the Historic Charleston Foundation to further our cause. Now we could actually hire a consultant and begin documentation of the neighborhood. We chose Preservation Consultants Inc., a respected firm that specializes in documenting historic homes and districts. In March 1997, we sent the completed documentation to the state for their review.

Architectural historians, city officials and our neighborhood homeowners are excitedly talking about becoming the very first 20^th-century Historic District in Charleston. On July 25,1997, a neighbor and I made the two-hour drive to the South Carolina State Board of Review who was considering Hampton Park Terrace for a listing in the National Register. The group unanimously approved the nomination, so now it’s on to Washington, D.C. We have all come along way since 1992 when the project began: it just shows you what volunteers and working hard can accomplish.  The neighborhood officially became an Historic District in September 1997.