Highland Park Plaza Historic District

Highland Park Plaza Historic District covers a planned suburban neighborhood north of downtown Richmond, Virginia. The 135-acre Mount Comfort tract was bought for development in 1889, and the area was laid out as a street grid around a central park, with avenues named for states and cross streets named for poets. It was annexed by the city in 1914. The district holds about 163 resources, mostly houses. Early dwellings include narrow side-passage frame houses and elaborate Queen Anne and Colonial Revival homes built for professionals and merchants. Later decades added American Foursquare houses, bungalows, Tudor Revival cottages, Cape Cod and Dutch Colonial houses, garages and small apartment buildings, many built in groups by builders or real estate companies. Civic buildings include the c. 1915 Engine Company No. 15 Firehouse, a rare Craftsman-detailed example, and the park recreation building. The district was recognized for its role in the city's streetcar-suburb growth and for its range of early twentieth-century house types.