1903 South Main Street, Rufus Authur and Lula C. Spaugh House, 1908

This lot is unusual in that it contains both the Rufus and Lula Spaugh House (the original structure) as well as the former 1957 Our Lady of Mercy Catholic Church and School building to the rear of the house (along Sunnyside Avenue). Rufus and Lula moved here in 1908 to be closer to his jobs at factories just up Sunnyside Avenue. Spaugh was treasurer, then vice-president of Salem Iron Works and Forsyth Manufacturing Company as well as vice-president of Arista Mills and Washington Mills Company. The couple moved on to Buena Vista in 1933.

The two-story hip-roofed frame house features a pedimented projecting bay at each side elevation. Fluted Doric columns with a picket balustrade support the one-story wrap front porch which includes projecting front and side entrance bays topped by a segmental arch. The wooden double door entrance is surrounded by an upper transom and sidelights; the large first floor window is an operable single sash with transom. The retaining wall and corner steps are concrete.

After the property was purchased by Our Lady of Mercy Catholic Church, the house was used by the Sisters of St. Joseph, who operated Our Lady of Mercy school, as their convent. Needing more space, the church opted to sell the various structures that eventually formed its larger campus in 2002 to the State of North Carolina for use by the UNC School of the Arts. The building now houses the UNCSA Office of Public Relations.

Sitting directly behind the Spaugh House is the 1957 yellow brick Modernist Our Lady of Mercy Catholic Church and School, which was formed in 1954 with a congregation of 235. It was built on a section of the lot that had once been a tennis court owned by Harry Spach, who lived across the street at 1901 Sunnyside Avenue (now gone). Designed by Greensboro architects and engineers Andrews and McGready, the structure accommodated over 600 parishioners by its completion.

The structure was designed in the International style, popularized in North Carolina when Bauhaus architect Walter Gropius taught at Black Mountain College during the 1940s. It now functions as classroom and performance space for UNCSA, and is titled Workplace West V.

International style - Minimalist in concept and devoid of regional characteristics, the style stresses functionalism and rejects all nonessential decorative elements. Typically emphasizes the horizontal lines of a building, and usually has a flat roof. Windows treatments include horizontal bands of windows, large floor-to-ceiling windows, metal window frames set flush with the exterior walls, and glass-to-glass joints at corners without framing.