Swedish Hill Historic District

Swedish Hill is a compact East Austin neighborhood of twelve houses fronting East 14th and East 15th streets, between Olander and Waller streets. Built between about 1880 and about 1938, the houses represent every decade of that span. The area was part of the Original City of Austin and was developed earlier than most of East Austin, housing downtown business people and tradesmen, several of them carpenters. Styles include vernacular Victorian L-plan, T-plan, Cumberland-plan and corner-porch houses, along with a pyramidal cottage and bungalows. Many display carpentry ornament such as porch columns, brackets, spindles and varied siding and shingles. Setbacks, landscaping, scale and materials are consistent, and the buildings are well maintained. Two buildings, a small modern residence and a Cumberland-plan cottage with applied siding, do not contribute but fit the scale of their neighbors. The district was recognized as the best example in East Austin of a late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century residential neighborhood that remains intact. Surrounding blocks were left out because their facades had been heavily altered.