For a home to be considered historic, some requirements must be met before it can be listed as a historic property by the National Register of Historic Places (NRHP). It must be at least 50 years old, the property must be associated with events or activities that represent U.S. events or elements, and have a certain architectural style.
What kind of historic home do you own? Is it a colonial revival, Cape Cod, Mediterranean, or Victorian? Your home offers such beauty, a favorite in the community, with passersby and neighbors enjoying the sight and history your home offers. Eventually, certain components will need replacing, and you’ll need to adhere to certain requirements that protect your home’s aesthetic and historical integrity. One of those components is the gutter system, especially if your gutters have never been replaced.
Wondering what gutters are best for historic homes? Keep reading to learn about gutter systems that preserve the aesthetic and architectural integrity of recognized historical homes to keep them a recognized historical properties.
The Importance of Quality Gutters for Historic Homes
Your historic home needs preserving to keep it a historical property, often requiring approval by a local historic preservation board or entity before making any renovations or changes, including replacing gutter systems. Kansas City is rich in history, with many homes that are structurally maintained and renovated to adhere to strict requirements. All home renovations on historic homes in Kansas City must comply with the Historic Preservation Commission (HPC) and are registered in the Kansas City Register of Historic Places to ensure they retain their historical integrity.
Gutters protect a home from water damage, ensuring heavy rainfall and meltwater are collected and drained away from the roof. Quality gutters preserve the roof, siding, soffit, fascia, windows, foundation, and landscaping from water damage. Essentially, the gutters are responsible for preventing drainage issues, something that’s common with faulty gutters. Therefore, quality gutters are essential to protect historic homes and their structural and architectural integrity.
Best Gutter Systems for Historic Homes
When replacing the gutters on your historic home, you don’t want to install just any gutter system. Look for one that complements your home’s beauty and helps preserve your home. Below are some of the best gutter systems for historic homes:
Copper Gutters
Cooper offers several advantages and disadvantages. The best advantage is that it adds beauty to historical Victorian homes, especially those with copper accents. Though this gutter material is stunning and can add an eye-catching look, it needs frequent gutter cleaning to keep it looking its best.
Like a penny, copper gutters can transform due to oxidation when the metal is exposed to heat, rain, and snow. Over time, that shiny copper color will turn blue, looking tarnished, compromising the beauty of your historic home. Unless you have the time to perform regular maintenance to prevent your copper gutters from tarnishing, they might not be the best option to protect your historic home.
Box Gutters
Box gutters can be a great option for historic homes because they hide the entire gutter system, keeping it out of sight and out of mind. However, box gutters often clog, impeding water flow and forcing water to spill over the sides of the gutters and seep under the roof shingles.
Because box gutters are out of sight and often out of mind, clogged gutters and other issues can go undetected for a while, resulting in extreme damage that compromises the structural integrity of your historic home, causing foundation damage, basement leaks, roof damage, and other issues.
K-Guard
K-Guard Leaf Free Gutters are the premier choice for historic home preservation! Not only do they add curb appeal and enhance your home’s overall aesthetic, but they also never require maintenance, unlike copper and box gutters. K-Guard is a complete system with a curved hood and gutter guards that keep all debris, like leaves and pine needles, that can cause clogs out of the system, never allowing them to enter the gutter guards.
Having a historic home means it needs the best gutter system installed to preserve its structural and architectural integrity and adhere to regulations for the preservation of historic buildings and structures.
How K-Guard Protects Your Historic Home’s Architectural Integrity
Installing K-Guard Gutters from K-Guard Heartland protects your historic home’s architectural integrity. Our gutter product blocks debris from entering the gutters or downspouts, eliminating the risk of clogged and overflowing gutters that can damage your historic home. Installing K-Guard keeps water flowing through the system quickly, keeping up with heavy downpours and rapid ice melt while withstanding severe weather like strong winds and hailstorms. K-Guard Gutters will never overflow, preventing erosion and landscape damage. Therefore, K-Guard is the best option for historic homeowners in and around Kansas City.
Our gutter covers are also sleek, adding curb appeal to any home. Whether you have a multiple-story colonial, new construction, historic, or a single-story ranch, K-Guard will complement the beauty of your home and add value. Our gutter covers are available in many colors, including earthy neutrals to vibrant blues and greens. We have plenty of color options in stock and access to 25 extra color options, making it easy to customize your K-Guard Gutters.
From the most extreme weather, like hailstorms and severe thunderstorms, to high humidity levels, K-Guard will last for the life of the home. Our aluminum gutters are so durable that we offer three lifetime warranties, including a lifetime no-clog warranty, a paint warranty, and a workmanship warranty. K-Guard is better than other gutter guards and gutter covers, protecting your home from water damage year-round.
We also have a convenient estimation calculator that gives you a ballpark estimate for installing K-Guard Gutters. In just minutes, you can get a free quote without having to schedule an estimate to get a feel for the installation cost. Our installation process is simple, with three easy steps to get lifetime gutters. Contact K-Guard Heartland today for a free estimate, a detailed analysis of your current gutter system, and estimated costs for installing K-Guard on your home.
