Rosedale Gardens Historic District

Rosedale Gardens meets national register criterion A for marking the real beginning of suburban development in the western Detroit suburb of Livonia, previously a nearly rural township. The first residential subdivisions of the much larger development that are included in the district were platted in 1925-26 and contained about 120 homes by 1930, about 375 by the end of 1941, and about 525 by the end of 1960, when development was nearly complete. The district's beginnings reflect the dramatic growth of Detroit in the early twentieth century as a result of the automobile industry and the development of new suburbs in previously outlying areas around the city's fringes that were made newly accessible by the automobile. The district meets criterion C for its concentration of Colonials, English cottages, Arts-and-Crafts-inspired homes, and other houses reflecting middle-class architectural tastes of the 1920s to 1940s and 50s that is unique in the city of Livonia.

The Rosedale Gardens Historic District is a 570-building residential neighborhood of middle-class single-family homes built primarily between 1925 and 1960. The rectangular, approximately one-half by one-half-mile tract comprising the district is laid out in long rectangular blocks outlined by narrow streets entered from a main road to the north through gateways formed of gabled stone piers and black metal ornamental fencing. The houses are generally 1000-2000 square feet in size. Among them Colonials, English cottages, Arts-and-Crafts-inspired homes, and ranches and other 1950s modern homes predominate.