Last year, I spent several hours driving around in Charlotte, NC searching for Sears Homes, and found only a handful.
And then a few days ago, Sears House Hunter Andrew Mutch sent me a link to a Sears Corona that was for sale in Charlotte. My oh my, that was a beautiful house. You can read all about it here.
In fact, I am geographically challenged and there’s a fair chance that I spent most of my time in one neighborhood (reflected by the photos below). I’d love to know where the rest of the Sears Homes are!
What did I miss?
Further, I found two “reproduction” Sears Homes, and that’s a puzzler as well. Someone in Charlotte loves Sears Homes enough to create MODERN versions of these old bungalows and foursquares!
Who are they? And why haven’t they contacted me? 🙂
If you know who built these reproduction Sears Homes, please leave a comment below.
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There are two Sears Crescents in Charlotte.
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A perfect Sears Crescent in Charlotte. I circled the block about 4,873 times waiting for the woman on the cell phone to hang up and go back in the house. Eventually, I gave up and just tried to get a photo of her not facing the camera. The things we do for love. Sigh.
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It's a lovely Sears Crescent in good condition, and it's not too far from its sister Crescent (above). The American flag is a lovely touch but not so much the upholstered furniture. At this point, I was just grateful there wasn't someone sitting in the upholstered furniture, talking on the cell phone.
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The Sears Corona was a beautiful, classic bungalow, and I was so surprised to find that there is one in Charlotte! Notice how the dormer is centered on the roof, and the offset front porch (1918 catalog).
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Wow, wow, WOW! What a house!
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The Maywood was a beautiful, spacious kit home offered by Sears in the late 1920s.
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Is this a Maywood in Charlotte? It might be, or it may be a plan book house. Plan book homes were similar to kit homes, in that potential buyers browsed the pages, picked out a house they liked and sent in their payment. With a plan book, they'd receive a list of building materials needed to build their dream home, and also the blueprints, but no building materials.
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Thanks to Rachel Shoemaker, I recently discovered this little plan book house, "The Carmen." This house is ubiquitous in North Carolina. I've found it in Rocky Mount, Elizabeth City, Durham, several in Raleigh and now Charlotte.
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And here is The Carmen in Charlotte.
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As mentioned above, another surprise was finding a "Modern" Sears Westly in Charlotte. Who's building these homes? I'd love to know!
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Sure is a nice house, but I'm quite certain that this is a new house. And it's in a neighborhood of new houses, that were all built to look like old bungalows.
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Just around the block from the Westly (shown above), I found a Sears Cornell.
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The Cornell, but it's new! Note the attention to detail. Even the belt-course is exactly where it should be, and the upper portion is shingle and the lower is clapboard. So who's building new kit homes?
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If you know of any other Sears Homes in Charlotte, or you know who’s building these “new old houses,” please leave a comment below.
I’d love to come back to Charlotte and do a proper survey! If you know how to make that happen, please contact me!
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To see interior photos of the Sears Corona in Charlotte, click here.
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How wonderful. We occasionally get Sears Home calls.
I believe there to be some in Myers Park. There are twin Carmens – one in the Plaza Midwood neighborhood and one in Dilworth.
The Carmen was a house design every plan book company offered. It was first offered circa 1921 by the Architects Small House Service Bureau (ASHSB), a group of architects approved by the American Institute of Architects to provide “proper and correct” residential designs (compared to those offered in plan books and pre-cut housing companies).
ASHSB was never serious competition for the plan book companies as its designs were what architects thought people should live in, not what people wanted to live in. This design was more successful than most and was copied by several plan book companies. Lewis Homes offered a pre-cut model of this design for short time. I find these “Carmens” all over the Midwest.
I’m glad I found this.
I live in West Virginia and there are three Maywood homes here.
One of them is on the market and I am hoping to purchase it.
Since I feel in love with it I have since found the other two. Each are a little different.
I had no idea these were Sears homes.