Looking through the McAlester guide to American architecture and other periodicals, suddenly noticed a nonbark. Dozens of types have names or subnames, with prefixes and suffixes like folk, neo, revival or eclectic. With 1.5 exceptions, all types are foreign. Most are named after foreign countries or foreign monarchs. French, Dutch, Italianate, Greek, Roman, Spanish, Victorian, Georgian, Tudor, Queen Anne, Second Empire.
The full exception is Cape Cod. The partial exception, Richardsonian Romanesque, is a prefix on Roman, and is named for an American architect, NOT an American region or monarch.
More native names are sometimes used outside academic circles. Prairie is called Wrightian or Chicagoan. Craftsman** is called California or Stickley. Neo-Cod is Levitt. New Deal architecture was varied by region because LOCALISM was the key to the New Deal. Even so, CCC built instantly recognizable rubble-stone castles. When you see one of these you recognize CCC in the same way you recognize Wright.
If we named styles after our own monarchs, Bungalow would be Harding, who ushered in a time when ordinary people could own decent and halfway artistic houses. Ranch would be Eisenhower for sure. McMansion would be Reagan. Neobrutalism, characterized by tents, sleeping bags, dead bodies, and burned-out RVs, would be Bush.
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** Fussy footnote: The books use Craftsman for a decorative style more than a form. When I say Bungalow I’m talking about a specific floor plan, plus optional wide overhangs and front porch. The exterior could be decorated with Colonial or Italianate or Modern flavor, and it would still be a Bungalow.
Polistra's Mill 