About

 

This blog is about finding the homes and commercial buildings that the architect Carl Graffunder designed during his career from about 1950 to 1980.  There were reportedly about 100 residential homes and several commercial buildings built with his design mostly around the Twin Cities in Minnesota. 

Our interest in Carl Graffunder began in August of 2006 when my partner ran across a newly posted MLS listing for a home near the lakes in Minneapolis, Minnesota.  We had absolutely no intention of buying a home and actually were just moving from the design phase to the construction docs with an architect on our existing home.  So we were as surprised as anyone when we found ourselves closing on that home 11 days later.  

That home is the one that we live in currently and was designed by Carl Graffunder.  We were lucky to find a home by him and especially one that had been owned by only one family – the original owners who contracted Graffunder in 1955.  Very little changes were made to the home over the 50 years that they lived in it.

From our initial purchase of the home, I found that there was very little information available about Mr. Graffunder.   It was also very difficult to find other homes that were designed by him.  I’ve done some research through various architectural societies and the University of Minnesota where Graffunder was a professor for years. 

 I am not an architect so this is my lay-person’s view of what I find.  For those of you with more knowledge than me in this area, I hope to hear from you if you have additional information or corrections.