The house was the centerpiece of a 3,000-acre (1,200 ha) cotton plantation, a forced-labor farm worked by black people enslaved by the land's white owners.

The house is a formal two-story frame structure with a hexastyle square-columned portico across the front, supporting a heavy paneled entablature.

The interior has a center-hall plan with the hall extending to the back porch.

[3] Orange Vale was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on May 22, 1986.

This article about a property in Alabama on the National Register of Historic Places is a stub.