Cape Cod Style Houses Characteristics, Pros Cons, and Their Types
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According to Wright, it’s the “cultural knowledge” of what the homes represent that keep them so popular. “The style is so warm and comfortable, and it just says summer,” Wright says. “It just screams summer.” Seen in movies and TV shows, the style is further embedded into pop culture as emblematic of warm weather and easy living. Though the style gets its name from the region where it’s most popular, a home doesn’t need to be in Cape Cod to be considered within the architectural vernacular.
Cape Cod House Plans
Some of the Cape Cod homes are also large enough to accommodate garages and extended master bedrooms and baths for a larger family. Meanwhile, if there is a bedroom on the upper floor, adding dormers for natural lighting is a good way to enhance the charming beauty of a Cape Cod house. Writer Elizabeth Finkelstein is a self-proclaimed old house addict on a lifelong hunt for her perfect historic home.
Cape Cod House Floor Plan
Cape Cod homes have a lot of similarities to the more traditional American Colonial homes being built at the same time in colonies farther south. According to Peter, 17th-century Cape Cod structures were modest, one-room deep, wood-framed houses with clapboard or shingle exteriors (which, when weathered over time, turned that quintessential light gray color). "I love the pure geometries of this style, which are almost austere at times," Peter says, "and its connection to the history of early New England." Like many historic residential architecture styles, the original Cape Cod homes were practical structures built with available materials suited to the local climate. The appeal of a Cape Cod cottage is in its simplicity and unassuming design—which makes it a great style of home for anyone still refining their personal aesthetic. Unlike a true Colonial, which may suggest a traditional interior design style to match, Cape Cods are highly versatile because of their clean geometric look.
Plan: #196-1235
Cape Cod house plans are designed as protection from the regional climate that brought frigid temperatures; the home's centrally located fireplace provides warmth and comfort for the occupants. The steep-pitched roof was necessary to avoid the accumulation of excessive snow piles and water drainage, which could result in the subsequent ruin of the home's exterior and interior. A Cape Cod house is typically single- or two-story, wide and rectangular-shaped, and features symmetrical windows on either side of the central front door. Cape Cods are often defined by their practical gabled roofs with dorm windows, which are composed of two sloping sections that meet in a roof ridge at the top. Despite the common characteristic of a central door with two parallel aligned windows, these Cape Cod style homes vary in designs and features that mix-match and complement each other.
Materials Used in Cape Cod Architecture
Similar to half-cape homes, the three-quarter style capes feature an entry door on the one side with two multi-paned windows as well as one multi-paned window on the other side. The three-quarter was the most popular style cape in the late 18th and 19th centuries. Cape Cod houses originate in New England from the late 17th century to the end of the 19th century. These homes were built with complete practicality, affordability, and efficiency in mind.
Where can you typically find Cape Cod style houses?
In the 1920s, people began inserting dormer windows into the roofs to increase light and ventilation and create extra bedrooms. Cape Cod revival houses from the mid-20th century are often more embellished than the austere early models. Still, simplicity remains a visual hallmark of this somewhat minimalist but undeniably cozy home style. A traditional Cape Cod layout includes one main living space with the common room also used as the family or living room.
Cape Cod homes are still popular to this day as simple and efficient starter homes for small families or veterans. Cape Cod house plans are characterized by their clean lines and straightforward appearance, including a single or 1.5-story rectangular shape, prominent and steep roof line, central entry door, and large chimney. Historically small, the Cape Cod house design is one of the most recognizable home architectural styles in the U.S..
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Full Capes
Generally, Cape Cod homes have a steep roof, shingled exterior, symmetrical façade, and large chimney in the middle. While Cape Cod houses can have multiple floors, most residences are single-storied. Additionally, Cape Cod house style is notoriously free of any superfluous ornamentation, making them versatile enough for a variety of homeowners. The height of two-story Cape Cod house floor plans will vary depending on the home's design, but at a very minimum, it will be 16 feet.
Plan: #198-1060
Multi-paned wooden shutter-clad windows flank a central door with simple surrounds. The windows on a Cape Cod play a critical role in creating the charm and curb appeal of this home style. Originally, Cape Cod homes were often built to maximize available sunlight, with the largest and tallest windows facing south. This positioning helped minimize heating costs while taking advantage of natural light.
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When kids are asked to draw a picture of a house in elementary school, they invariably respond with a rectangular shape that features a door in the center, with a window on each side. This simple – but timeless and charming – architectural depiction is a quintessential “Cape Cod” home. Simple and functional, Saltbox homes are primarily found in the Northeast, where their distinctive rooflines help melt snow to fall off of roofs during cold winters. This style has been updated for more contemporary-looking homes found in beach towns, where simple designs allow the environment to take center stage.
For a Cape Cod style home, feeling cozy is key — and when it comes to feeling comfortable in a home, one of the best places to start is the lighting. A Cape house may start to feel closed off with harsh lights or grandiose fixtures because of its smaller, boxed rooms and low ceilings, so lighting is key to complimenting the space. The distressed siding lends a hand to the beachside feel, but other common features in Cape Cod homes are shiplap and cedar accents, says Homenish. It's unlikely that you'd find gaudy or ornate decor in one of these homes, aside from a column or two touching upon the traditional theme. Overall, the calmness and coziness of these homes draw innumerable homeowners each year. The distinctive character of these homes marks as an important style of design in the history that continues to lead for the generations to come.
You’ll typically see double-hung windows with shutters on the main floor, and dormers on the second to increase light and air circulation. The Cape Cod-style home is architecturally iconic and one of the most popular house styles in the U.S., along with the colonial-style, Tudor-style, and the row house. Learn more about the long history of this quaint architectural style, the defining characteristics that set it apart, and the different types of Cape Cod-style homes. In reality, the history of what we call the Cape Cod style is not a pure and simple revival story, but more of a survival story. European immigrants to the New World brought building skills with them, but their first dwellings were more Primitive Hut than bold, new architectural style. The first houses in the New World, like in the settlement at Plimoth, were simple post-and-beam shelters with one opening—a door.
A chimney is also often right in the middle, dividing the two, and centering the angled attic. The rest of the windows on the house's exterior also mirror one another, adding to the general curb appeal of Cape Cod style. Defining the authentic English style of architecture, these homes became native to New England’s harsh winters. The Cape Cod Houses are designed around a large, open living plan with a symmetrical patterned design. However, you can easily personalize this home style by adding window boxes for flowers, painting your chimney a bold color, putting up a picket fence in color other than white, or adding colored shutters. These small changes can update and modernize your Cape Cod from traditional to contemporary.
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