West Side Painters — Worcester's West Side

Worcester's West Side has two quite different kinds of house. Along Salisbury Street there are early-1900s single-family homes, some of them inside local historic districts. Closer to Park Avenue are three-deckers that the National Register three-decker study calls "predominantly white collar", built for families who commuted downtown. Painting either one well starts with knowing which kind you own and what the house is clad in.

The Massachusetts Avenue district study report shows how mixed the surfaces are. Within a few lots you'll find clapboarded Georgian Revival houses, stucco-and-shingle Prairie and Jacobethan designs, a stuccoed frame house under slate, and a brick Regency Revival house from 1919. Clapboard, cedar shingle, stucco and masonry all take different primers, different repair methods and different drying times, so one house can need three prep plans.

The three-deckers mostly came a little later. The National Register study cites a 1904 example on Abbott Street, west of Park Avenue; three-deckers scattered between May and Pleasant Streets in the 1910s, including one from 1912 facing Elm Park; and a row on Lovell Street near Columbus Park, the only West Side area still building them in the 1920s. The same study notes that land-use change along Park Avenue cost the area scores of three-deckers, so the survivors are worth maintaining.

Historic district review covers color

The Massachusetts Avenue and Montvale districts are local historic districts. Worcester's Historical Commission reviews paint color in both, and the original study notes that Chapter 40C review weighs texture, material and color. Before choosing a palette, check whether your parcel is inside a district boundary. If it is, plan for a Certificate of Appropriateness.

A documented color tradition

The district study found nine of the eleven Massachusetts Avenue homes unified by colonial influences and black shutters against a light painted surface. That recorded pattern is a sensible reference when you choose colors, though the commission still makes the call on each application.

Stucco is not clapboard

The stucco houses in this area need breathable masonry coatings and crack repair before any paint goes on. Paint that seals moisture inside old stucco tends to blister and can loosen the finish coat, so fix the hairline cracks and patches first and match the coating to the wall.

Three-deckers with tall porch work

Where a three-decker still has upper porch tiers, the balusters, columns and ceilings sit two and three stories up. That means staging or lifts, slow hand scraping, and lead-safe containment, since the documented West Side three-deckers date from 1904 to the 1920s.