Product Details
Wardway Homes, Bungalows, and Cottages, 1925

Wardway Homes, Bungalows, and Cottages, 1925
By Montgomery Ward & Co.

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Product Description

Meticulous reproduction of a rare catalog includes floor plans as well as exterior and interior views of 80 American homes, among them a handsome, three-story frame residence with six bedrooms and a cozy, three-room cottage measuring 18 feet by 22 feet. 94 black-and-white illustrations depict handsome stairways, French doors, and other amenities.

Product Details

  • Amazon Sales Rank: #687800 in Books
  • Published on: 2004-02-18
  • Original language: English
  • Number of items: 1
  • Binding: Paperback
  • 112 pages

Customer Reviews

You say Montgomery Wards, I say Gordon Van Tine...5
I'm a bit surprised to see that Dover chose the 1925 Montgomery Ward catalog to reprint, as they also did the 1923 Gordon Van Tine catalog and these companies were closely linked.

In fact, unlike Sears, Montgomery Ward did not have their own mills, lumber yards, architectural staff, designers, etc., so they turned to Gordon Van Tine (based in Davenport, Iowa) to supply their homes. In other words, when you placed an order for a cute little kit home from Montgomery Ward, they placed the order with Gordon Van Tine.

When your house arrived (in about 30,000 pieces, via boxcar), the shipping labels would read "Montgomery Ward" and the kit would have (probably) shipped from the GVT mill in Davenport.

If you have both catalogs (GVT and MW) compare them side by side and you'll see that they're virtually identical, with names and identifying marks changed in all the right places.

That being said, this is a dandy little catalog and if you suspect you have a kit home from Montgomery Ward, you may also want to invest in the GVT (1923) catalog that Dover offers.

Rose
author, The Houses That Sears Built
co-author, California's Kit Homes

Not Stickley, but popular for a reason5
Yes, I'm partial to Stickley's designs, but these are the four-squares and bungalows I see more of on both coasts.
If you own a bungalow, four-square, Colonial, or cottage of this period and would like to restore some of its original character, this is a good reference book.
The exterior views include details such as landscaping.
Interior photos, meant to highlight the choices in millwork and such, give a taste of the fashions in decorating.
Toward the end of the book are plans for beach cottages and garages that might inspire a humble retreat or workshop, or perhaps a playhouse or doghouse.
The final pages are ads for the kinds of light fixtures and plumbing fixtures your grandparents likely got rid of in past updates of their houses, and furnaces such as the hulking monster that remained in the basement of a house I rented in Bristol.
Whether you get practical use from this book or not, you will probably enjoy it.