Winslow Ames House
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Winslow Ames House
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Winslow Ames House on the grounds of the Lyman Allyn Art Museum
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| Location | 132 Mohegan Ave., New London, Connecticut |
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| Coordinates | 41°22′34″N 72°6′9″W / 41.37611°N 72.10250°WCoordinates: 41°22′34″N 72°6′9″W / 41.37611°N 72.10250°W |
| Area | less than one acre |
| Built | 1933 |
| Architect | Robert W. McLaughlin, Jr. |
| Architectural style | International style |
| NRHP Reference # | 95000283 |
| Added to NRHP | March 23, 1995 |
The Winslow Ames House is a prefabricated modular International Style house in New London, Connecticut, United States. It was designed by Robert W. McLaughlin, Jr. and was built in 1933. Winslow Ames, a professor of art history at Connecticut College and the art director of the Lyman Allyn Museum, had the home built after attending the Century of Progress Exposition in Chicago. Constructed for $7,500, the prefabricated house is one of two surviving Motohomes produced by McLaughlin's company American Houses Inc. The modular house, comprising three rectangles and a flat roof, was constructed on a concrete slab with a welded steel framework. It was made with asbestos panels and features a core component that provides the heating and plumbing functions for the house. The other two modules feature two bedrooms and a one-car garage.
Ames and his family resided in the house briefly, the Connecticut College acquired the house in 1949 and used it for faculty housing until 1986. The house was in a state of disrepair by 1989 and was a hazard due to its construction with asbestos panels. It was slated to be demolished, but Ms. Hendrickson rallied supporter to the save the house after uncovering its history. A restoration and rehabilitation project was completed in 1994 and it was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1995. The other prefabricated house built by Ames, House at 130 Mohegan Avenue, was also added the National Register of Historic Places in 2009.
The Winslow Ames House was unlike other homes of the 1930s, it is a modular home that was constructed on a concrete slab and constructed with a welded steel framework. The designer of the house was John B. McLaughlin Jr., who co-founded American Houses Inc. in 1932. McLaughlin's designs focused on inexpensive housing through mass production and new materials and technology. The International Style house was modular and intended to allow easy enlargement, dismantling and relocation of the structure if needed. The houses, termed "Motohomes", featured modular "motounits" that contained heating and plumbing equipment. The use of steel in the prefabricated homes would later be limited by World War II, which made steel unavailable for civilian use. After the war, prefabricated homes were typically made of wood and offices were normally constructed of steel and concrete.
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