The Carson Home in Eureka, California 

Where else would the most beautiful home be other than California, the state of broken dreams. The Carson Mansion, located in the old town of Eureka is considered to be the most beautiful Victorian home in the United States of America. Originally built in 1884 for a man named William Carson, who was a major woodsman and a co-founder of the Doolbeer and Carson Lumbar company; later bought out by the Pacific Lumber Company. Carson helped to build many dams and ship wood all over California, contributing to the growth of the state. When starting the construction of his home, Carson stated, “If I build it poorly, they would say that I am a damned miser; if I build it expensively, they will say I’m a show off; guess I’ll just build it to suit myself,” so despite not knowing him, a person can get a feel for his personality through the architecture of his home. The home cost 80,000 dollars (equivalent to 2,605,630 dollars today) and after the Carson family left the home in the 1950s, it was purchased for only 35,000 dollars by a private country club. This lead the home to being not open for tours to the public sadly and is only available to paying country club members.

What makes this home unique is it is a mixture of many different style of Victorian architecture styles including Eastlake, Italiante, Queen Ann and Stick (next week’s post will go into how to differentiate the styles). Many have described the home as “a baronial castle in Redwood.” What are your thoughts on this home? Do you think it is truly the most beautiful Victorian home in the United States?

Photos of the interior