Rainbow Row

Rainbow Row is the name for a series of colorful historic houses in Charleston, South Carolina. The houses are located north of Tradd St. and south of Elliot St. on East Bay Street. It is referred to as Rainbow Row for the pastel colors used to paint all of the houses. It is a common tourist attraction and is one of the most photographed parts of Charleston.

History

After the Civil War, this area of Charleston devolved into near slum conditions. In the early 1900s, Dorothy Pocher Legge purchased a section of these houses numbering 99 through 101 East Bay and began to renovate them. She chose to paint these houses pink based on a colonial Caribbean color scheme. Other owners and future owners followed suit, creating the "rainbow" of pastel colors present today. The coloring of the houses helped give the area its name.

Further reading

* The Buildings of Charleston: A Guide to the City's Architecture by Jonathan H. Poston, Historic Charleston Foundation

External links

* [http://www.charlestonphotographs.com/html/rainbow_row.htm Photos of historic Charleston]