Why does our mind play these fun little games with us – and usually when we are alone or trying to sleep!? Well, for me, I believe it is all of those glorious horror movies I watched growing up! Especially when a major contributor of the creep factor was the spooky house that the movie monster was running amok in. Every intricate staircase just waiting for that mystery hand to reach through, every home with windows that seemed like eyes staring out at you (yeah, you know the one), that closet that was a portal to another dimension, or when that mystery ball bounces down the stairs into the basement - that has you yelling at the fictional person on the screen, “WHAT?? ARE YOU CRAZY!? DON’T GO DOWN THERE YOU FOOL!”. These realistic home settings grab ahold of our imaginations and pull us in with the actors and give us that adrenaline jolt we crave.
Let’s take a few moments to stroll through the architecture of some real-life houses that play starring roles in our movie and tv nightmares.
Amityville Horror (1979)
This Dutch Colonial Revival style home on 112 Ocean Ave, Amityville Long Island in New York, was built for John and Catherine Moynahan by builder and possible designer, Jesse Purdy, around 1924-27. It is currently 5 bedrooms, 3 1/2 baths, and 5000 square feet of beautiful woodwork, with a distinctive gambrel roof, and traditional design. Before the terrifying movie was released, you would have driven by this home in awe of its architectural beauty and serene rustic setting. After? Overnight, it was turned into a living evil that was hard to look away from for a different reason. Fortunately, this classic home has been given a second chance at a new life with a recent remodel to remove the iconic quarter-round windows at sides - that were considered to be its evil eyes staring at you - and its address number has also been changed to 108 instead of 112.
Season One of American Horror Story: Murder House (2011)
Actors, directors, and producers of the American Horror Story series have all been noted as saying that the Rosenheim house itself is the star of the show! I say, how could it not be? With its Tiffany glass, curved turret wall with sweeping staircase, six stunning Batchelder tile fireplaces, and loads of custom African Oak, Maple, Teak, and Walnut woodwork throughout, it is still an architectural gem over 100 years later! You’ll be happy to know this beauty will be around for many more years too because in 1999 the Rosenheim mansion was declared Historic and Cultural Landmark #660.
Poltergeist (1982)
This real home located at 4267 Roxbury Street in Simi Valley, California is a two-story California Valley mock Tudor style home that blended perfectly with the normal everyday small-town family feel the producers wanted. With its airy floating curved staircase, open eat-in kitchen, exposed beams, and let’s not forget the swimming pool in the backyard (although the pool does get a bit too crowded for comfort later), it’s no wonder the Freeling family is so excited at move-in day! And doesn’t all of this just make the movie even scarier when it is such a “normal” home on the surface and an evil presence begins to show itself lurking beneath? The beautiful built-in shelving and large walk-in closet seem like a dream for a child’s bedroom…until that same closet tries to pluck those children from their beds into a portal to an evil realm nightmare!
Rebecca (2020)
Released from Netflix, on October 21, 2020, is Rebecca, based on the classic 1938 gothic novel of the same title by Daphne Du Maurier. This film has been brought to life again “across the pond” on location in Cranborne Manor in Dorset County England.
For those of us who have read the book and watched the classic 1940 Alfred Hitchcock film, you know that a large majority of the story gets its suspense inside and on the grounds of the fictional Manderley estate in Cornwall. We have the honor of peeking inside Cranborne Manor as it grips us in this new retelling of Rebecca, as our new Manderley.
Cranborne Manor, originally a hunting lodge for King John, was constructed around 1207. It later underwent a remodel by popular stonemason and architect of the time, William Arnold, in the early 17th century, to convert it into the manor house for the 1st Earl of Salisbury. The manor is still a private residence with limited access, so the new Rebecca film can give us a rare glimpse of this historic architectural treasure while we are kept on the edge of our seats watching the suspenseful story unfold again on screen!
The Winchester Mystery House: The Real-Life Inspiration for Disney's Haunted Mansion
If the Cranborne Manor is a historic architectural treasure, The Winchester Mystery House is an
Located at 525 South Winchester Blvd in San Jose, California, this Queen Anne Style Victorian mansion began its birth by firearms magnate widow, Sarah Winchester. By purchasing an unfinished farmhouse in 1884, she took on overseeing the design and construction herself – construction that lasted an unimaginable 38 years! – to continuously add on, remodel, redo, and creatively twist the emerging structure into the incredible mansion open to the public today.
Originally constructed to a soaring seven stories it’s thought to have been repaired, after the 1906 earthquake, down to the current four stories of today. An unusual floating foundation system has likely saved this mesmerizing home from two earthquakes.
With too many oddities to mention, the biggest of them all is probably the concept of her vision for construction; to build rooms for the spirits of those killed by Winchester rifles as she was guided to do by a spirit medium. The history of this home is spooky enough but with things such as doors and stairs leading to nowhere, still unfinished rooms, repeated use of the number thirteen, spiderweb designs, over 10,000 panes of glass, strategically placed mirrors, one working toilet with the rest used as decoys for spirits, and more, it should be no surprise that this home is the real-life inspiration for Disney’s Haunted Mansion. With a history this eclectic, and architecture this riveting, it’s earned our interest in digging a bit more into its story... and maybe even a tour!
There are numerous examples of how the architecture surrounding the story is just as important as the story itself to emotionally connect us in a way nothing else can. So next time you are watching The Shining, House on Haunted Hill, It: Chapter One (or Two), Insidious, Halloween, Phantasm, or any of the numerous other horror films that use real homes as their filming backdrop to grab us and not let go, I challenge you to explore a bit more of that Creeptastic Architecture that really is the star of the show!
So, what are some of your own favorite horror movie homes or real-life funny stories from your own spooky home adventure? We’d love to hear about them!