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[Sg^gg^^ / tamiiHffiy1^ ^\\ r] ARCHITEOJVRAL D aiiiafigoj b r -- * i-ir+X. Vol. XLVI. No. 4 OCTOBER, 1919 Serial N o 25 Editor: MICHAEL A. MIKKELSEN Contributing Editor: HERBERT CROLY Business Manager: J. A. OAKLEY COVEK Water Color, by Jack Manley Rose PAGE THE AMERICAN COUNTRY HOUSE . .;. .-. 291 By Prof. Fiske Kimball. I. Practical Conditions: Natural, Economic, Social . ,. *.,, . 299 II. Artistic Conditions : Traditions and Ten^ dencies of Style . \ . .- 329 III. The Solutions : Disposition and Treatment of House and Surroundings . 350 J . .Vi Yearly Subscription United States $3.00 Foreign $4.00 Stn<7?e copies 33 cents. Entered May 22, 1902, as Second Class Matter, at New York, N. Y. Member Audit Bureau of Circulation. PUBLISHED MONTHLY BY THE ARCHITECTURAL:TURAL RECORD COMPANY VEST FORTIETH STKEET, NEW YORK F. T. MILLER, Pres. XL, Vice-Pres. J. W. FRANK, Sec'y-Treas. E. S. DODGE, Vice-Pi* ''< w : : f'lfvjf !?-; ^Tt;">7<"!{^if ^J^Y^^''*'C I''-" ^^ '^'^''^>'**-*'^j"^4!V; TIG. 1. DETAIL RESIDENCE OF H. BELLAS HESS, ESQ., HUNT1NGTON, L. I HOWELLS & STOKES, ARCHITECTS. AKCHITECTVKAL KECORD VOLVME XLVI NVMBER IV OCTOBER, 1919 <Amerioan Country <House By Fiskc KJmball the "country house" in America scribed "lots" of the city, where one may we understand no such single well- enjoy the informality of nature out-of- BYestablished form as the traditional doors. country house of England, fixed by cen- Much as has been written on the sub- turies of almost unalterable custom, with ject, we are still far from having any a life of its own which has been described such fundamental analysis of the Amer- as "the perfection of human society." ican country house of today as that Even in England today the great house which Hermann Muthesius in his classic yields in importance to the new and book "The English House" has given for smaller types which the rise of the middle England. Perhaps the reason may be classes has strewn over the country and that we have taken too much for granted on the fringes of the city, and with the and should try, as Muthesius does, to variety is infinite, from the dwellings of look on the work more with the eye of a the further suburbs to the distant, self- stranger. sustaining estate. Yet the common char- Things we never mention are in acteristic of all is clear enough a site many cases the very ones which go free of the arid blocks and circum- farthest to make the specific architec- Copyrighted, 1919. by The Architectural Record Company. All rights reserved. FIG. 2. DETAIL VIEW RESIDENCE OF JOSEPH BUSH, ESQ., FIELDSTON, NEW YORK CITY, DWIGHT JAMES BAUM, ARCHITECT. FIG. 3. SUN ROOM RESIDENCE OF J. B. RICH- ARDSON LYETH, ESQ., FIELDSTON, NEW YORK CITY. DWIGHT JAMES BAUM, ARCHITECT FIG. 4. ENTRANCE DETAIL RESIDENCE OF DR. EDWARD B. KRUMBHAAR, WHITEMARSH VALLEY, PA. ARTHUR H, BROCKIE, ARCHITECT FIG. 5. VIEW FROM THE SOUTH RESIDENCE OF STEWART DUNCAN, ESQ., NEWPORT, R. I. John Russell Pope, Architect. FIG. 6. RESIDENCE OF TRACY DOWS, ESQ., RHINEBECK, N. Y. Albro & Lindeberg, Architects. 295 FIG. 7. "THE MANOR HOUSE," ESTATE OF JOHN T. PRATT, ESQ., GLEN COVE, L. I. Charles A. Platt, Architect. f ,'n- -J.T. I'KAI 1 -\ .-" FIG. 7A. FIRST FLOOR PLAN "THE MANOR HOUSE." ESTATE OF JOHN T. PRATT, ESQ.. GLEN COVE, L. I. Chark s A. Platt, Architect. 296 FIG. 7B. VIEW FROM GARDEN "THE MANOR HOUSE," ESTATE OF JOHN T. PRATT, ESQ., GLEN COVE, L. I. Charles A. Platt, Architect. FIG. 7C. GENERAL PLAN "THE MANOR HOUSE." ESTATE OF JOHN T. PRATT, ESQ., GLEN COVE, L. I. Charles A. Platt, Architect. 297 FIG. 8. RESIDENCE OF JAMES SWAN FRICK, ESQ., GUILFORD, BALTIMORE, MD. John Russell Pope, Architect. FIG. 8A. PLAN RESIDENCE OF JAMES SWAN FRICK, ESQ., GUILFORD, BALTIMORE, MD. John Russell Pope, Architect. 298 THE ARCHITECTURAL RECORD. tural and domestic character which we analysis which has been so successful in recognize intuitively as American. A helping us to understand past styles, but search for these basic conditions and ele- which we have usually been content to ments cannot fail to bring us greater drop at the year 1800: seeking, first, the clarity of thought in our domestic design, bearing of the practical conditions, nat- and help make conscious and direct the ural, economic, social, next, the bearing adaptation which tends to remain merely of artistic conditions, the traditions and intuitive and groping. tendencies of style; and, with the insight Let us, then, apply to our own prob- thus won, examine the prevailing types lem of today the same thoroughness of and recent examples. Practical Conditions ** Natural * Economic ^ Social *" far as concerns natural conditions, exceptional conditions of weathering and SOcertain diversities are so obvious of expansion, and that unusual provi- that it might seem impossible to sions of defense must be made to secure formulate generalizations such as are comfort both in summer heat and in win- readily made for a homogeneous country ter cold. No small share of the greater like England. Closer examination, how- cost of American buildings in proportion ever, reveals much underlying unity with to relative prices abroad is due to this respect to all but a few exceptional dis- struggle with severity of climate. tricts: semi-tropical Florida, the deserts In winter freezing temperature not of the Southwest, and the temperate only demands deep foundations and care- Pacific Riviera. ful protection of plumbing, but also In climate, the fundamental character- makes central artificial heat an absolute istic is a range of temperature out of all necessity for the plumbing system as well proportion to Western Europe. Whereas as for the comfort of the inhabitants. there the difference between the means of The high cost of foundations tends to January and July is but ten or fifteen prevent the house from ramifying and degrees, as on our Pacific coast, through- to force it into the air, while the cost of out the rest of the United States the the heating system restricts the open fire- mean annual range is immensely greater, place still desirable as the best means seventy degrees in the northern prairies of ventilation and cheer to the few and plains, and forty or fifty degrees principal rooms at most. On the other even along the Atlantic seaboard. As hand, the development of artificial heat- summer temperatures of a hundred de- ing gives us certain advantages that grees are occasionally carried to the Ca- other countries where winter is less nadian boundary and freezing winds drastic do not possess, making the house sometimes sweep down to the Gulf of relatively independent of unfavorable Mexico, the extreme range is even great- orientation and permitting large openings er than this would indicate 110 and between the rooms without incurring the even 135 in given localities. It follows foreign bugaboo of draughts. The ten- that building materials are exposed to dency in the last generation of adequate 299 THE ARCHITECTURAL RECORD. the forms of heating has been to utilize these possibil- for reasons of style. Even have been ities through replacing the more Euro- porch posts and railings the the column and pean. Colonial plan of isolated rooms affected by screens, with inside chimneys and closed doors by the balustrade tending to be replaced by one with outside chimneys and with the square pier and the solid parapet. rooms thrown together by broad-cased Of building materials the natural openings. abundance in most sections has always The heavy and lasting snows of the given a wide range of physical possibil- north have also their influence, by for- ities, and has left the choice to be deter- bidding the horizontal valleys and free- mined primarily on economic grounds. dom of roof composition of the English, That the dominant form of construction and by rendering interior courts exotic in America has hitherto been of wood and unsatisfactory, unless in houses not has not been due to special difficulty in intended to be occupied in winter. securing stone or brick, but to the cheap- The heat of summer must be met ness of wood itself. In the pioneer set- either by high ceilings or by large open- tlement and on the Colonial estate tim- ings, both, but especially the latter, ber was actually to be had for nothing as again demanding adequate winter heat- a by-product of clearing the land neces- ing. The nineteenth century solution, sary for tillage, and masonry has re- seen most characteristically in mid-Vic- mained at a relative economic disadvan- torian houses, was to use high ceilings tage quite unknown in the deforested with openings relatively small, windows countries of Europe. With the deple- closed and shaded by blinds on the prin- tion of our own forests in recent years, ciple of holding the imprisoned air at its however, this disparity has been rapidly night temperature. The system was sat- decreasing. In 1910 careful investiga- isfactory except for the neglect of one tions showed that the excess first cost in factor, disclosed by the medical science dwelling houses of brick over wood had of the turn of the century, sufficient to fallen to ten or twelve per cent. And un- destroy the whole equilibrium and grad- less reforestation is carried out on a large ually bring about the wholly different ad- scale, it is merely a question of time justment of today. It was the discovery when the difference shall ultimately dis- that tuberculosis flourishes in closed appear. Already products of clay, ce- rooms but yields to fresh air and sun- ment, and metal tend more and more to light, with the complementary discovery replace wood at this point or that.

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