Photo of the Day: Victorian Home, Upper Nyack, NY

I have an abiding affection for Victorian homes, and I could indulge it to the hilt a week and a half ago while walking along North Broadway in Upper Nyack, NY. That stretch of this Rockland County community is simply lined with them—one after another home filled with balconies, belvederes, turrets, multiple porches, and generously applied dashes of color, on properties lining the Hudson River.

I photographed the exteriors of several of these houses, but I decided to highlight this one because of its combination of so many of these elements.

Photo of the Day: Victorian Home, 'Dressed' for Xmas, Nyack NY

Initially through a work colleague and friend, then increasingly on my own, I have, over the years, enjoyed strolling through the streets of Nyack in Rockland County, N.Y. Its picturesque homes, especially those with Victorian architecture, are a photographer’s dream.

Today, while holiday decorations were still up, I thought it would be a good idea to snap shots of these “painted ladies” "dressed" for the season. There are dozens of homes in the village that have also made a strong effort to be decorated for the holidays, but this one is as good a representative as any of this type.

Photo of the Day: Gingerbread Cottage, Chautauqua Institution

When people ask me about the Chautauqua Institution, I mention its nine-week summer program of public-affairs and religion lectures and its lovely lakeside environment. But somehow, the description seems terribly incomplete without also mentioning the architecture that has led this Victorian Era village in upstate New York to be designated a National Historic Landmark. This photograph I took, when I was vacationing there at the start of the month, shows one of these unique structures: the Gingerbread Cottage, dating back to 1891.

Photo of the Day: Victorian House, Weehawken, N.J.

I took this image from the window of a bus on the long ride into work. There was one house like this after another on this street just off of Boulevard East.

Photo of the Day: Near the Heart of Chautauqua

This picturesque home, recently restored, is one of the distinctive examples of Victorian architecture at the Chautauqua Institution, which I visited on vacation last week. Buckeye Cottage was named in honor of Lewis Miller, one of the founders of Chautauqua, who made his fortune with the Buckeye Mower. Geographically, there might be homes nearer to the heart of this community; as an example of its age and of the men who built this distinctively American institution, however, few sites on the grounds can surpass this structure.