Dutch Colonial is harassed by QA's little brother..;.)

Some other views from Bing and Google, albeit poor quality, to help with ID:

https://docs.google.com/leaf?id=0B3RyWP0NxAhrNDNhMzZlNzktY2I2ZS00ODBlLTliY2MtNzcyMmUzODY0MTRk&hl=en_US&authkey=CKXiuXs

https://docs.google.com/leaf?id=0B3RyWP0NxAhrMWZjNTkzNzItOTBlMS00Mzc5LWFmOTItZDk3NjVkODczZTkx&hl=en_US&authkey=CMXKx_EB

https://docs.google.com/leaf?id=0B3RyWP0NxAhrMDg5MjEwNGQtYzY4Yy00YWZkLTk5ODQtYWFhZWQ5MjkzYmJk&hl=en_US&authkey=CIPozp8I

Thanks,

Dave

Dutch-Colonial-Victoria-Palladian, I'd say, which is to say: eclectic.  Don't "restore" it, give it a new chapter appropriate to your era AND desire to maintain its historic spirit.

So in other words, there is no "appropriate" style but there *is* an appropriate level of quality.  Does it have quality hard wood floors?  Don't use Pergo.  Does it have 8" interior crown? Don't buy Fypon's 4" version.  Use quality materials and qualified craftsmen, to ensure that its life of over 100 years already is extended by another 100.

do it like this as if you were in a west coast design magazine...

LOL, thanks everyone for your comments.  I'll find out about the floors after we close and take possession; right now it's all hidden under nasty mangy carpet.  Funny about the comment about Pergo; the previous owner was using this as a rental property, and upgraded the kitchen on the cheap, including Pergo flooring.  Immediate turn-off when we first toured the place.  You can see what we're dealing with if you look through some of the other pictures:

http://www.weichert.com/37325809/

Another "charming" touch is the use of asphalt roof shingles as siding all around.  Although cosmetically it needs a lot of work, we see a lot of potential in the large rooms and period details and think we can renovate it to be pretty great.

Thanks,

Dave

it's a difficult line you'll be riding. while there are glimpses of queen anne, if you were to pursue the characteristics of queen anne in your renovation, you'd probably overdo it. the dutch colonial aspect of this house (triggered largely by the gambrel roof) almost demand that you take a humbler/simpler approach to the renovation of the exterior. 

really the dutch colonial is even a stretch. the roof shape was borrowed by the craftsman style later. (this predates craftsman, but it was coming....) the mullion patterns at the windows, too, while coming from a victorian era precedent, were borrowed into pre-craftsman and then craftsman builder houses. the house is a thrown-together mix of things that were in common currency at the time.

like donna said, this can only be called eclectic - a common mixing of styles at the period this house was built. like today, there were builders who would take anything they could recreate to give a house more appeal, whether or not it hung together in a coherent way. this isn't a criticism: the buildings that came out of this period have their own special charm in their casual use of styles that would previously have been considered to be in conflict. it sort of freed house design from the rigidity of any single 'style'. 

this had good and bad consequences. when style became less meaningful and was more applied, it allowed modern architecture to blossom because it could be argued that it was more pure. (a 'good', for most architects.) conversely, the door was opened to every vinyl and fake stucco gewgaw that contemporary builder/developers feel like applying to mcmansions. 

best bet for you is to just to a lot of looking around your neighborhood and surrounding neighborhoods to find similar houses and see how they were handled. i'd bet that the lower two floors of this house were some sort of clapboard/horizontal siding and that the upper floor was a shingle of some sort. what looks like grey asbestos siding or asphalt shingle siding that's on the house now would have been added later. it's possible that the old siding is still underneath - or at least hints at what it was. exploring under the siding might also give you some clues to colors. probably not the bright playfulness of queen anne here; more likely pretty sedate.

have fun!

Thanks for the insight, it's definitely helpful.  We had planned on doing exactly what you described before planning out the renovations; we are going to drive around the neighborhood and look at similarly-styled houses and photograph them for ideas.  The comments above are helpful in the sense that we have more latitude and freedom to upgrade, without confining ourselves to narrow style constraints. 

Thanks,

Dave

Pergo and lay-in ACT, yay!  Sorry.  You've got a big project on your hands there!  It reminds me of my 1st home in Philly - 1870's rowhouse that had been a rental for almost its entire lifespan.  The same landlord-cheap finishes (glued-on ceiling tiles, Home Depot cabs) and cutting up of space to maximize bedrooms. We ended up doing a very contemporary kitchen - Ikea, in fact - and keeping the living room of the house a little more traditional with new built in cabinetry.

Orhan your cow-theme is excellent.