Carpenter Gothic is an architectural style that was popular in North America. It was a Folk/Stick Style offshoot of the Gothic Revival movement specific to smaller, more rural wood framed structures instead of the larger brick or stone cousins. While the American Gothic Revival movement ranged from the 1840s through the 1860s, the Carpenter Gothic style extended later into the 1890s, particularly in the western United States.

Carpenter Gothic architecture features some combination of pointed arch windows, circle windows, tall square towers (usually with narrow pointed spires), minor buttresses, vertical board and batten walls or horizontal clapboarded walls, vergeboards, bargeboards, and steep pitched roofs (often with cross gables), among other details. Carpenter Gothic structures were simply adorned as compared to the Medieval Gothic style. However, some structures did include more extensive decoration and trim.

Most Carpenter Gothic structures are houses or buildings of worship, particularly Episcopal churches. Similar wood structures in the Carpenter Gothic style also were built in Canada, England, Australia, and New Zealand.

For more general information about the Carpenter Gothic style, go to: Wikipedia.

In Leadville, several worship structures existed:

• First Presbyterian Church, 119 & 121 W 5th Street, 1879?
• St. George Episcopal Church, 200 W 4th Street, 1880
• Temple Israel, 201 W 4th Street, 1884
• First Evangelical Lutheran Church, 301 E 8th Street, 1888

These photos show some other examples of Carpenter Gothic structures from around the United States.