Rainbow Row, Georgian row houses in East Bay Street, Charleston, United States.

Rainbow Row consists of 13 connected Georgian houses along East Bay Street between Tradd Street and Elliott Street, each painted in distinct pastel colors. The buildings, constructed around 1740, feature ground-floor commercial spaces below residential quarters, creating a mixed-use streetscape typical of colonial waterfront development.

A fire in 1778 destroyed most of the neighbourhood, sparing only 95 to 101 East Bay Street. The corner house at Tradd Street dates from 1845, while 81 East Bay Street was rebuilt after the blaze. In 1931 Dorothy Haskell Porcher Legge bought part of the row and painted it pink, drawing on a colonial Caribbean colour scheme; other owners followed with pastels.

The name Rainbow Row came from the pastel palette Dorothy Haskell Porcher Legge began in 1931, when she painted her houses pink after a colonial Caribbean scheme. Neighbours followed with blue, green and other shades, so the colours record individual choices rather than a single plan. The row is a private residential street, and visitors read its history from the painted facades and the surviving Victorian storefront at the Dutarque-Guida House.

These are private residences, so viewing is limited to the exterior and photography from the street. Morning light and late afternoon hours provide the best conditions for taking photographs of the colorful facades.

The Dutarque-Guida House, built after 1778, keeps the only surviving Victorian storefront on the row. At 89 East Bay Street, the Deas-Tunno House has a side garden behind a balustraded wall, with a garage facing the sidewalk. The James Cook House at 93 East Bay Street, built around 1778, still separates a first-floor kitchen and dining room from a second-floor drawing room and library.