In 2007, McCain Library showcased its collection of Leila Ross Wilburn pattern books in conjunction with the City of Decatur’s Tour of Homes and the MAK Historic District’s Centennial. View the Wilburn pattern books online.

The City of Decatur web site provides this information about Leilia Ross Wilburn

“Leila Ross Wilburn, who attended Agnes Scott, was one of only two women registered as an architect in Atlanta in 1920. Ms. Wilburn designed and built a home in the neighborhood where she lived with her widowed mother and younger siblings. She published several popular planbooks that emphasized her status as a Southerner and a woman. Through these planbooks, she influenced neighborhood design throughout the Southeast during the 1920s.

In 1907 John Mason and Poleman Weekes purchased property that was to become Decatur’s first residential subdivision. The district, known today as the M.A.K. neighborhood is named for its main streets, McDonough, Adams and Kings Highway, and encompasses ten city blocks of varying size. Ms. Wilburn was employed by Mason and Weekes to design many of the homes for the new subdivision.

The MAK neighborhood retains many of the Wilburn-designed homes and offers excellent examples of Craftsman style homes that were popular during the first three decades of the 20th century.”

View Leila Ross Wilburn entry in the New Georgia Encyclopedia

View Photos of Wilburn Homes in MAK Historical District

View a Gallery of two Leila Ross Wilburn Homes at AJC.com

Image from "Homes in Good Taste" pattern book by Leila Ross Wilburn

Suggested Reading from the New Georgia Encyclopedia

Jan Jennings, “Leila Ross Wilburn, Plan-Book Architect,” Woman’s Art Journal 10, no. 1 (spring-summer 1989): 10-16.
[Agnes Scott community members only]

Gerald Sams, AIA Guide to the Architecture of Atlanta (Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1993).