Harold Raynolds House

The house was built for Harold Raynolds, a descendant of the Las Vegas merchants Jefferson and Joshua Raynolds, who co-founded the First National Bank of Las Vegas in 1878. The Arts and Crafts design, attributed to Rapp and Rapp, emphasizes the basic elements that make a house—piers, walls, windows, and roofs. These are organized in a symmetrical composition whose brick construction is highlighted by the inset panels in the porch piers and relief moldings around the upper floor windows. The layered horizontals of the projecting eaves of the porch roof, the main hipped roof, and the paired dormers also suggest an awareness of the Prairie Style.

The contemporaneous construction of the Raynolds House and the neighboring Herman Ilfeld House, which is also attributed to the Rapp brothers, suggests some friendly competition between two leading families of Las Vegas. Despite its own generous proportions, however, the Raynolds House suffers slightly in comparison. The footprints of the house and carriage house (garage) are both more compact, and while the setback of 40 feet and the lot depth of 147.5 feet are standard, its frontage is narrower at 125 feet—the equivalent of five lots, rather than the six standard lots occupied by the Ilfeld House.