False front
Architectural feature
Mayan roof combs in Uxmal
Western false front architecture: Brick false front of Ismay Jail in Montana

In architecture, the false front (also false facade, flying facade, screen wall) is a façade designed to disguise the true characteristics of a building, usually to beautify it.[1][2][3] The architectural design and purposes of these wall-like[4] features vary:

  • making a building appear larger, more important, and better-built, like in the Western false front architecture,[5] German Blendfassaden [de] (lit. 'blind facades') or Brick Gothic main facades (Schaufassaden, lit. 'show facades'). Some sources also use the term screen facade when discussing the Medieval and Renaissance churches,[6][7] not to be confused with the modern "membrane" screen facade;
  • creating a fake appearance to improve aesthetics, an architectural equivalent of trompe-l'oeil;[8]
  • in facadism, keeping the old facades with the goal of preserving the visual character of a historical neighborhood while allowing an entirely modern design of the actual buildings. In the view of preservationists, this creates a "Disneyland of false fronts"; [9]
  • deliberate violation of the truth to materials principle ("false in material")[5] for economical, insulation, or aesthetic purposes, like masonry veneer using a non-structural outer layer of stone[10] or a membrane screen facade;
  • hiding a gable roof, like a tall parapet wall;[11]
  • a purely decorative way to increase height, like the one of a roof comb, a flat structure that tops buildings in Mesoamerican architecture. Sometimes the comb was shifted from the center of the roof to one of the walls, forming a flying facade.[12]

Tradition of "show facades" goes back to the very beginnings of the architecture, when the simplest buildings might have just one opening serving both as a door and a window. The special role of the wall with this opening was stressed through articulation and decoration.[13]

Outside of architecture, "false front" is used to describe a deceptive outward appearance in general,[14] false hair in front (like bangs).[15]

Facadism

In the early 1920s, the Anglo-Czechoslovak Bank tore down its head office, the Sweerts-Sporck Palace [cs] in Prague, and had it rebuilt behind the preserved façade on a design by architect Josef Gočár, visible in the background

Facadism, façadism (also pejorative facadectomy, façadomy[16])[17] is the architectural and construction practice where the facade of a building is designed or constructed separately from the rest of a building, or when only the facade of a building is preserved with new buildings erected behind or around it.

There are aesthetic and historical reasons for preserving building facades. Facadism can be the response to the interiors of a building becoming unusable, such as being damaged by fire. In developing areas, however, the practice is sometimes used by property developers seeking to redevelop a site as a compromise with preservationists who wish to preserve buildings of historical or aesthetic interest. It can be regarded as a compromise between historic preservation and demolition and thus has been lauded as well as decried.[citation needed]

Show facades

Flying facade of the Stralsunder City Hall [de]

In the Brick Gothic,[citation needed] the Schaufassaden (lit. 'show facades',[18] display facades), the facades facing the main street, were richly decorated and frequently concealed the cross-section structure of the building.[19]

Western false front architecture

False front commercial buildings in Greenhorn, Oregon, 1913

Western false front architecture or false front commercial architecture is a type of commercial architecture used in the Old West of the United States. Often used on two-story buildings, the style includes a false front facade often hiding a gable roof.

The goal for buildings in this style is to project an image of stability and success, while in fact a business owner may not have invested much in a building that might be temporary. By emulating the rectangular profile of buildings in eastern North American cities, the style attempted to lend a more settled, urban feel to small frontier towns.[20]

  • the front façade of the building "rises to form a parapet (upper wall) which hides most or nearly all of the roof"
  • the roof "is almost always a front gable, though gambrel and bowed roofs are occasionally found"
  • "a better grade of materials is often used on the façade than on the sides or rear of the building" and
  • "the façade exhibits greater ornamentation than do the other sides of the building."[21]

See also

References

  1. ^ Ching 2011, p. 16.
  2. ^ De Gruyter 2008, p. 143.
  3. ^ Stevens 2008.
  4. ^ Kreuz 2016, p. 509, Note 277.
  5. ^ a b Heath 1989, p. 210.
  6. ^ Malone 2004, pp. 90–92.
  7. ^ Davies & Jokiniemi 2012, p. 426, screen facade.
  8. ^ Lessard 1987, p. 38.
  9. ^ Stevens 2008, p. 34.
  10. ^ Thompson 1983, p. 23.
  11. ^ Treu 2012, p. 28.
  12. ^ Stone 1931, p. 40.
  13. ^ Pech, Pommer & Zeininger 2014, p. 12.
  14. ^ Phillips 2018, p. 168, façade.
  15. ^ "false front". Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary. Merriam-Webster.
  16. ^ Stevens 2008, p. 246.
  17. ^ Paul Spencer Byard (1 January 1998). The Architecture of Additions: Design and Regulation. W.W. Norton & Company. pp. 105–. ISBN 978-0-393-73021-0.
  18. ^ Giese 2021, p. 432.
  19. ^ Koepf & Binding 2005, p. 411.
  20. ^ Love, Christy; Sheila Bricher-Wade (1980-05-16). National Register of Historic Places Inventory—Nomination Form: Odd Fellows Hall. National Park Service. Retrieved 2025-03-12.
  21. ^ "False Front Commercial". ColoradoHistory.

Sources

  • Camus, Marie-Thérèse (1991). "De la façade à tour(s) à la façade-écran dans les pays de l'Ouest : l'exemple de Saint-Jean-de-Montierneuf de Poitiers" [From the tower facade(s) to the screen facade in Western countries: The example of Saint-Jean-de-Montierneuf in Poitiers]. Cahiers de civilisation médiévale (in French). 34 (135): 237–253. doi:10.3406/ccmed.1991.2497. ISSN 0007-9731. Retrieved 2025-10-16.
  • Ching, Francis D. K. (2011-12-30). A Visual Dictionary of Architecture. John Wiley & Sons. ISBN 978-1-118-16049-7. Retrieved 2025-09-24.
  • Davies, Nikolas; Jokiniemi, Erkki (2012-05-04). Architect's Illustrated Pocket Dictionary. Routledge. ISBN 978-1-136-44406-7. Retrieved 2025-09-26.
  • Huber, Rudolf; Rieth, Renatehg, eds. (2008-12-31). Das Baudenkmal: Zu Denkmalschutz und Denkmalpflege. Systematisches Fachwörterbuch [The Architectural Monument: On Historic Preservation and Conservation. A Systematic Glossary] (in German). De Gruyter. doi:10.1515/9783110978872. ISBN 978-3-598-11113-6. Retrieved 2025-09-24.
  • Giese, Francine (2021-03-22). "The Hybridization of Sebka Ornament". Mudejarismo and Moorish Revival in Europe: Cultural Negotiations and Artistic Translations in the Middle Ages and 19th-century Historicism. Brill. pp. 431–460. doi:10.1163/9789004448582_022. ISBN 978-90-04-44858-2. Retrieved 2025-10-02.
  • Heath, Kingston Wm. (1989). "False-Front Architecture on Montana's Urban Frontier". Perspectives in Vernacular Architecture. 3. Vernacular Architecture Forum: 199–213. doi:10.2307/3514305. ISSN 0887-9885. JSTOR 3514305. Retrieved 2025-09-24.
  • Koepf, Hans; Binding, Günther (2005). "Schaufassade". Bildwörterbuch der Architektur [Illustrated Dictionary of Architecture] (PDF). Kröners Taschenausgabe (in German). Vol. 194 (4th ed.). Stuttgart: Alfred Kröner Verlag. ISBN 978-3-520-19404-6. Retrieved 25 September 2025.
  • Kreuz, Gottfried Eugen (2016-07-11). Besonderer Ort, poetischer Blick: Untersuchungen zu Räumen und Bildern in Statius' Silvae (in German). Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. ISBN 978-3-647-20870-1. Retrieved 2025-10-02.
  • Lessard, Michel (Summer 1987). "L'art du trompe-l'oeil: le phénomène de la fausse façade" [The art of trompe-l'oeil: the phenomenon of the false front] (PDF). Cap-aux-Diamants (in French). 3 (2): 37–40. ISSN 0829-7983. Retrieved 25 September 2025.
  • Malone, Carolyn Marino (2004-01-01). Façade as Spectacle: Ritual and Ideology at Wells Cathedral. Brill. ISBN 978-90-04-13840-7. Retrieved 2025-09-26.
  • Pech, Anton; Pommer, Georg; Zeininger, Johannes (2014-09-23). Fassaden (in German). Birkhäuser. ISBN 978-3-99043-087-3. Retrieved 2025-10-02.
  • Phillips, Mark (2018-06-26). Vocabulary Dictionary and Workbook: 2,856 Words You Must Know. A J Cornell Publications. ISBN 978-0-9727439-4-5. Retrieved 2025-09-25.
  • Stevens, Deirdre A. (May 2008). Changing the Perspective of Facadism within San Francisco (Doctor of Architecture thesis). University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa.
  • Stone, Daniel James (1931). The culture of the Mayas as shown by their ruins (MA thesis). University of the Pacific. Retrieved 25 September 2025.
  • Thompson, Bethany (1983). Historic Bridge Inventory, Island of Oahu. State of Hawaii, Department of Transportation, Highways Division. Retrieved 2025-09-26.
  • Treu, M. (2012). Signs, Streets, and Storefronts: A History of Architecture and Graphics Along America's Commercial Corridors. Johns Hopkins University Press. ISBN 978-1-4214-0494-3. Retrieved 2025-09-26.
Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=False_front&oldid=1317828178#Show_facades"