Alta Vista Terrace Historic District - Chicago, IL
Posted by: adgorn
N 41° 57.071 W 087° 39.391
16T E 445587 N 4644564
Sometimes called "A Street of Forty Doors," Alta Vista Terrace displays a lively variety of architectural styles and detail, yet every townhouse on one side is duplicated with only minor variations at the diagonally opposite end of the block.
Waymark Code: WM6GZ6
Location: Illinois, United States
Date Posted: 06/03/2009
Views: 9
from Wikipedia and City of Chicago landmarks site:
Built in 1904, it was one of the last real estate developments of Samuel Eberly Gross, a highly colorful realtor responsible for the construction of thousands of houses in the Chicago area. He was inspired to build Alta Vista Terrace after a trip to Europe, in which he looked at the rowhouses of London.
The street is one block long and contains 40 small, single-family rowhouses, each on a lot about 24 feet wide and 40 feet deep. There were 20 different exterior styles based on various adaptations of architectural styles. Some of the features included Doric and Ionic wood pilasters, Gothic arches, Palladian windows, stained and leaded-glass fanlights, bay and bow windows, and various decorative woodwork. The distinctly human scale creates a unity and harmony rarely found elsewhere in the city.
Address: 3800-block of North Alta Vista Terrace (1050 west)
Year Built: 1900-04
Architect: J.C. Brompton
Date Designated a Chicago Landmark: September 15, 1971
Learn more at (
visit link)