Your town believably has an architectural quirkiness or two , a building that locals point out to visitors . In many cases , these are nastiness houses — fabricate to make someone excited . Sometimes they freeze a neighboring sign ’s scene . Sometimes they ’re built especially to queer metropolis planners or dispute city ordinances . In many cases , they ’re an odd shape , or are build on a very little lot . Sometimes the sign of the zodiac are already in existence , and are altered to get revenge , like the Australia householder who paint his house pink and add together a pig snoot and a fag end to protest a denied edifice permit .
1. The Hollensbury Spite House // Alexandria, Virginia
This 7 - foundation - broad housewas build in 1830 by the techy possessor of one of the buildings next door because he wanted to keep people from using the alley next to his planetary house .
2. The Tyler Spite House // Frederick, Maryland
This 1814 mansion was built hastily by a local MD who wanted to prevent the town from building a road through his property . A local law stipulate that the urban center could n’t establish a road if a building was being fabricate in the track of the road , so Dr. Tyler quickly order that a basis be poured for this mansion .
3. The Old Spite House // Marblehead, Massachusetts
There ’s no consensus on why thisoddly shaped housewas built this direction , but many hoi polloi hypothesise that it was reside by a pair of brothers . One brother , angry about the direction their inheritance was part up , build up his section of the house in such a way that it draw a blank his blood brother ’s thought .
4. The Skinny House // Boston, Massachusetts
Another disputed hereditary pattern between brothers resulted in the Skinny House . One brother reportedly built a large house on nation he shared with his pal . When the second brother returned from serving in the military , he built this boney house to block the sunlight from his crony ’s firm . The four - story firm is wider in the front than in the back .
5. The Sam Kee Building // Vancouver, Canada
When the city decided to widen Pender Street , it claim a big collation out of the patch of soil own by the Sam Kee Company . In 1913 , the company build a commercial-grade building less than 5 feet wide . additional blank is achieved with pop - out windows on the second floor that overhang the pavement .
6. The Cambridge Spite House // Cambridge, Massachusetts
What is it about spiteful property owner in Massachusetts ? In 1908 , Francis O’Reilly baffle angry when the owner of the contiguous parcel of land refused to buy his kingdom for a good price — so he work up a house measuring 8 feet wide . Theinterior designerwho now occupies the space has said that the building is like a three - dimensional billboard for her piece of work .
7. Alameda Spite House // Alameda, California
Thisbeloved local landmarkin Northern California was built when the city set aside a large serving of the caboodle to construct a street . Undaunted , the owner built a menage anyway . It ’s ten feet spacious and is still reside over a hundred old age later .
8. Freeport Spite House // Freeport, New York
The metropolis ’s attack to lay the streets out in a perfect grid was scotch by a landowner who built a Victorian house on a triangular plot of country . aeriform views of this town in New York show that the streets had to loop around the large plot , destroying their symmetry .
