Architects' own houses provide opportunities for experimentation. When a fire destroyed the house on this site, Jacob Albert (a partner in the firm of Albert, Righter and Tittmann) created a fresh response to the vernacular residential and commercial architecture of East Cambridge. He fronted this narrow rectangular building with a second level projecting over the entrance porch, sheathing the first floor in clapboards and covering the second floor in gray and black diamond-shaped asphalt shingles, a common pattern formerly used for houses and stores in the neighborhood. The facade extends above the gable roof to form a false front embellished with classical swags. Fluted posts supporting the overhang provide another vernacular neoclassical detail.