Dean Alvord house, Albermarle Road , Prospect Park South, Brooklyn. Dean Alvord house, Albermarle Road, Prospect Park South, Brooklyn. John J. Petit, 1902. eu John J. Petit. 1902. Plans of first and second fl oors. eu
Queens Frederick]. Lancaster bought a nearby sandy waste with Queens developed much more slowly than Brooklyn. two or three houses and promoted it as New Venice.585 Its ocean shore was considerably further than Brooklyn's The largest development was made by two brothers, coast from the business districts of Brooklyn and Manhat Newbold and Alfred Lawrence. Naming the project after tan, while northern Queens, before the development of mid themselves, they provided land for the Lawrence railroad town Manhattan, was even more isolated. One of the earli station and built the Lawrence Association, which can· est sections to attract attention from New York City was tained a school and a public ha11. 586 The new town was so Far Rockaway, which had a large seaside hotel called the successful that the Rockaway Hunting Club decided to Marine Pavilion.579 Built in 1833, it was famous enough by move there from Bayswater and hired Bruce Price to design 1850 to have attracted Henry Wadsworth Longfellow and a new c1ubhouse.587 Washington Irving. A small suburban-style resort called By 1898, when Queens was incorporated into New Wavecrest, similar to those on Coney Island, developed near York, the Long Island Railroad had started its own service to the hotel in the 1870s.58O Rockaway Beach, the Ocean Electric Railway, and the In 1863 a developer named Dr. Thompson bought most peninsula was firmly tied to the city. Nevertheless in 1915, of the land around Rockaway Beach, further to the west, 1916 and 1917 the local administrations of Far Rockaw~y and built a railroad from East New York to Canarsie, where and Rockaway Beach attempted to secede, and twice had the he maintained a steam ferry across Jamaica Bay to Rocka necessary bills passed in both houses of the state legislature, way Beach which began the growth of the area as an only to be vetoed by Mayor John Purroy Mitchel. One of the amusement resort.58l Soon, in 1869, a steam railroad was only early suburban developments in northern Queens was built to Far Rockaway and extended in 1872 to Rockaway started by a New York lawyer named Albon P. Man, who Beach. Samuel Wood bought several hundred acres of land between 1868 and 1870 bought nearly four hundred acres of located between the Brower's Point railroad station and farm land surrounding a branch of the Long Island Rail Jamaica Bay and renamed the area Woodsburgh.582 He built road.588 Calling the area Richmond Hill, he built a train a large hotel he called the Woodsburgh Pavilion and con station and a post office and hired the landscape architect structed a few houses, but the land was still largely undeve Edward Richmond to layout and manage the new town. loped when Wood died in 1878. Development was slow until 1891, when Man died and In 1877 the New York, Woodhaven & Rockaway Rail his son Alrick assumed control of the proj ect. Alrick Man way Company had built a trestle across Jamaica Bay to paved the roads and laid sidewalks. as well as building many provide direct access to Rockaway Beach, and three years new roads and houses. But the development of Richmond later the Brooklyn Rapid Transit Company began running Hill and northern Queens accelerated even more rapidly summer service over the bridge. A speculator named Wil after 1906, when the borough's corrupt president, Boss Cas· liam Trist Bailey laid out a small subdivision of Far Rocka sidy, was turned out of office. Elevated service from Man way he called Bayswater; the first Rockaway Yacht Club hattan was extended through Brooklyn toJamaica Avenue was built there, and the first hunt with hounds on Rocka and Liberty Avenue, and the Long Island Railroad opened a way started there.583 new line which passed through the northern section of The development of the peninsula was much more Richmond Hill. Man built another station on the new concentrated in the 1890s. Robert L. Burton, who had inher branch and started a development he called Kew Gardens.589 ited majority control of Woodsburgh in 1878, began its The reformed Queens administration responded by instal development in earnest.584 Tearing down most of the old ling a sewer system throughout both developments and houses, he built a new village center and a restricted resi making telephones and electric street and house lighting dential community which became quite fashionable. In 1892 universal in the area.
426 \ Forest Hills Gardens. Queens. Grosvenor Atterbury and the Olmsted Bros., 1909-12. Aerial perspective drawn in 1910. eu
427 Station Square and Forest Hills Inn, Forest Hills Gardens, Queens. Grosvenor Atterbury, \909-12. View from the southwest showing the tower of Forest Hills Inn. CU
The opening of the Steinway Tunnels in 1907, the tion's creation was hailed by the journalist-reformer Jacob Queensboro Bridge in 1909 and the Pennsylvania and Long A. Riis as an opportunity to document the social and eco Island railroad tunnels in 1910 spurred the growth of mid nomic conditions of the city, and by Professor Ed win town Manhattan and shifted the attention of many develop Seligman of Columbia as a possible "laboratory of soc ial ers from Brooklyn to Queens. Typically, the subdivisions experimentation. " ;'92 were uninspired extensions of the city grid, like the nearly The Sage Foundation intended Forest Hills Gardens to one thousand houses built by the Mathews Brothers on be a village that mixed middle-class and wage-earner's hous former farmland in Ridgewood. 590 But early in 1909 the ing, but its nearness to Manhattan made the land cost too Russell Sage Foundation, founded in 1907 with a commit high, and the development established itself as an upper ment to the improvement of the physical environment of the middle-class enclave soon after it opened in 1912. A number masses, purchased two hundred acres of land in Forest of serious attempts were made to keep the costs down: the Hills, nine miles by train from Pennsylvania Station. They highest density development was placed on the costl y land planned the first major project of the foundation, a new nearest the train station, and much of the construction in suburb called Forest Hills Gardens, and hired the Olmsted the early stages utiliztd prefabricated panels.593 Brothers as planners and Grosvenor Atterbury as architect The most English of America's planned suburbs, to build a model residential community as a pattern for Forest Hi11s Gardens was clearly dependent on the example future development.59! Its unique combination of city plan of Parker & Unwin's work at Hampstead Garden Suburb ning and architecture achieved a dense, consolidated image outside London, which like Forest Hills Gardens was an of suburban living that made Forest Hills Gardens the pre aesthetic triumph but a failure at social reform. Station eminent expression of the suburban ideal of the Composite Square was the gateway to the community: the brick-paved Era and the most important suburb built in New York, the plaza was dominated by the tower of the Forest Hills Inn only one to assume international importance. The founda- and bordered on one side by the embankment of the railroad
428 DETACHED HOllSES 7 ROOMS AND BATH SEYI-DETACHED HOUSES to ROOMS AND 3 BATHS
Group XII houses, Forest Hills Gardens, Queens. Grosvenor Atterbury, 1910-12. View from the northwest and pl~ns of the first and second floors. eu
429 Group houses. Willet Avenue to Middletown Street between Shelton and Colonial Avenues. JamaIca. Queens. Eleclus D. Lilchfield. 1911 :\ group of seventeen houses. CU and its station and on the other three sides by a continu "for the reason that there is a kind of subtle odium which ously arcaded building that yielded the impression, as attaches to 'model' things of almost any kind, even when Samuel Howe observed, "of a college or cathedral city_"S!l4 they are neither charitable nor philanthrophic-a slightly Passing under two arches, the principal village streets led sanctimonious atmosphere that is debilitating rather than from the square to residential neighborhoods intended to stimulative of success. " 597 contradict earlier, more romantically planned suburbs such Forest Hills Gardens did serve as a model for future as Llewellyn Park. In the prospectus of 1911, the sponsors development, however, perhaps most notably in the new stated that "fantastically crooked layouts have been aban towns and large subdivisions that were built dUring the doned for the cozy, domestic character of local streets, not First World War for munitions workers and shipbuilders. s9R perfectly straight for too long, but gently curving to avoid Electus D. Litchfield, who would later design Yorkship Vil monotony."595 As one moved away from Station Square the lage outside Camden, New Jersey, one of the best of the urban character became more rural, suggesting a meta shipbuilding projects, in 1914 planned a small privatedevel phoric journey from town to open country. opment of about ten city blocks in Queens. adapting some of Atterbury was responsible for Station Square and some the lessons of Forest Hills to the gridiron and the require of the loveliest buildings in the Gardens, though other archi ments of spc 'ulativC', middle-class housing /~I "Th(' va lue of tects, induding Wilson Eyre and Albro & Lindeberg, also the land is such that in order that the house and 101 Illay be built there. Atterbury's group house development on Puri sold at a price which will appeal to persons in moderate tan Avenue had three buildings arranged to form a court ci rcumstances." the Rrirkbuilder reported, "the amount Of which was divided into individual gardens. The original land to be sold with each house must be as mall as possible. design pioneered new strategies permitting individual On the other hand, it was desired to maintain, as far as ownership and communally held open space that became possible, the suburban character of the neighborhood. For basic criteria for planned suburban development after this reason, it was planned to build only a certain numberof World War 1. Atterbury's group at the fork between Green individual houses, free standing upon moderate sized plots, way North and Markwood Road had four houses, two of and to have the majority of the houses semi-detached or in which were combined into a semi-detached unit. 596 His groups of four or five, and in orne cases in very extensive design skillfully adapted the axial composition principals of groupings." 6oo the City Beautiful to the suburban milieu, simultaneously The largest, in fact, was seventeen houses under one culminating the axis of Greenway North and providing an roof. Although Litchfield attempted to balance the large interior space that made a virtue of the site's awkward block with three smaller group houses across the street, the geometry. sheer size of the group overwhelmed the simpl Colonial Despite the fact that Forest Hills Gardens was an style details. Yet all the houses worked quite well, particu important monument of the Composite Era, its designers larly considering the modest dimensions of the individual were aware that theirs was not purely a project of urban units. Constructed of brick with slate roofs, the houses had beautification and institutional symbolism. Forest Hills custom exterior and interior woodwork. "Whil the interior Gardens was to be an ideal model town sponsored by a finish is extremely simple in it character," the Rrickbuilder foundation, but it was also a business proposition. Atter said , "it displays the quie ~ good taste which appeals to bury was aware in his writings of the problems that this people of refinement." 601 seeming schizophrenia of intentions might bring with it. "It is unfortunate that the somewhat misleading word 'model' The Bronx must be applied to such an eminently practical scheme as When New York consolidated the five boroughs in the development of the Russell Sage Foundation," he wrote, I R9R, t he borders of t he new cit 1/ ('ncompassed large areas of
430 Group house. Willet Avenue to Middletown Street between Shelton and Colonial Avenues. Jamaica. Queens. Electus D. Litchfield, 1914. A 1914 view of a typical end unit in a group of four houses. CU
Group houses, Willet Avenue to Middletown Street between Shelton and Colonial Avenues, Jamaica, Queens. Electus D. Litchfield, 1914. Block plan and plans of the first and second floors in a typical grouping of four houses. CU
431
... 546. Andrew Jackson Downing. Rural Essays (New York: George B. Builders' Magazine 2 (April 1901): 246. Putnam & Co .. 1853). Cited by Spann. New Metropolis. 194. 555. "House for HJ. Keiser Esq .. Sea Gate. New York. Messrs. Squires 547. See S.B. Sutton. ed .. Civilizillg Americall Cities. A Selection of & Wynkoop. Architects." American Architect and Building News 96 Frederick Law Olmsted's Writillgs 011 City Lalldscape (Cambridge: MIT (August 11. 1909): plates. Press. 1971 ). 294-95. On the value of curvilinear streets as a planning 556. "House for J.H. Biggs, Esq .• Sea Gate. New York. Squires & Wyn· strategy. also see Charles W. Leavitt. "The Makingof a Residence District koop. Architects." American Architect and Building News 96 (August 11 , in Semi·Urban Districts." Real Esta/e Record and Guide 66 (November 10. 1909): plate. 1900): 614-17. 557. Hazelton. Lang Island. 1090. 548. Cited by Christopher Tunnard. "The Romantic Suburb in Amer· 558. "A Unique Suburb. Where a Large Part of New York's Population ica." Magazille of Art 40 (May 1947): 184-87. Also see Andrew Jackson Gravitates To-Thoughts for Real Estate Investors." Real Estate Record Downing. A Treatise all The Theory And Practice Of Landscape Garden· and Guide 44 (August 17. 1889): 1132-33; and Hazelton. Lang Island. illg. Adapted To North America . .. . With Remarks On Rural Architec· 1087-91. Also see "Gate Lodge and Hammersley Library. Sea Side Home. ture. 6th ed. (New York: A.O. Moore. 1859).567-73; Samuel Swift. "L1ewel· Bath Beach. N.Y .• Parfitt Bros .• Architects." American Architect and Iyn Park. West Orange. Essex Co .. New Jersey. The First American Building News 38 (November 12. 1892): plate. Suburban Community." HOl/se & Gardell 3 (June 1903): 326-35; Jane B. 559. Hazelton. Lang Island. 1089. Davies. "Llewellyn Park in West Orange. New Jersey." Anliques 107 560. Dr. E.R.L. Gould. President City and Suburban Homes Company, (January 1975): 142-58; and Richard Guy Wilson. "Idealism and the Origin "Homewood. A Model Settlement." American Monthly Review of Reviews of the First American Suburb." Americall Art louTl/al 11 (Fan 1979): 16 Guly 1897): 43-51. The article is summarized in "Homewood . A Model 79-90. Suburban Settlement." Municipal Affairs I (September 1897): 565-66. 549. "An Am eri ca n Park." A merican Architect arId Buildillg News 16 561. Gould. "Homewood": 47-48. lluly 12. 1884): 1;'- 16; Montgomery Schuyler. "Some Suburbs of New 562. Andrew Scott Dolkart. Suburbanization of Flatbush (Master's York. I-New Jersey." Lippillcol/'s Magazille 8 (July 1884 ): 9-23; "Villa Thesis. Columbia University. 1977). Com munities." Architecl ure alld Building 14 (March 21 . 1891): 137-38; 563. " House for W.F. Moore, Esq .. Flatbush. L.I.." Architecture and Cora L. Hartshorn. " A Little History of the Short Hills Section of Millburn Building 24 Uanuary 18, 1896): plate. Township. N.J .. developed by Stewart Hartshorn." manuscript dated July 564. "House at Flatbush for W.A. Porter. L.I. ... Building 6 (April 16, 31. 1946. in the Millburn Public Library; Marian Keefe Meisner. "A His· 1887): plate. Also see Philemon Tillion. "Possibilities in Detached tory of Millburn Township. N.J .... manuscript dated 1957 in the Millburn Houses." Real Estate Record and Guide 83 (February 13. 1909): 287-88. Public Library; Mil/bllm: 1857-1957 (Millburn: Millburn Centennial 565. Henry A. Meyer. Vandeveer Park: Reminiscences of lis Growth Committee. 1957); Roth. Architecture of McKim. Mead & White: (Brooklyn. 1901): passim; and Dolkart. Flatbush, 13-15. 1870-1900 (A Building Lis/): plates 37. 789; and Robert A.M. Stern and 566. Meyer. Vandeveer Park. 12. John Montague Massengale. The Allglo·Americall Suburb (London: 567. Dolkart. Fla/bush, 14-15. Academy Editions. 1981).26. also published as "AD Profile 37." Architec· 568. Herbert F. Gunnison. Fla/bush To ·day (Brooklyn. 1908),37. Also tural Design 51 (October-November 1981). see Paul Thurston. "Some Well Designed Suburban Houses." American 550. M.. "A Millionaire's Cathedral City." American Architect and Homes and Gardens 3 (November 1906): 296-99; "Prospect Park South." Bllildillg News 6. Part 1 (September20.1879): 91-92. Part 2 (September 27. Architec/s' and Builders' Magazine 3. Part I (February 1902): 134-40. Part 1879): 102-03; Garden City promotional brochure (Garden City: Garden 2 (February 1902): 176-80; "Residence of Dr. Geo. U. Watson." and " Resi · City Company. en. 1910) in Avery Library. Columbia University; "Group dence of T.M. Valleau." Architects' and Builders' Magazine 3 (September of Houses. Franklin Court. Garden City. L.I.. Ford. Butler & Oliver. 1902): 454; "Residence. Wm .J. Harrison, Prospect Park South. Brooklyn , Architects." Architectllre 32 (November 191 5): 305-06; Harriet Sisson N.Y.. " Architects' and Builders' Magazine 4 (November 1902): 78; Dolkart. Gillespie. " An English Cottage Group." House Bea ut,!uI46(August 1919): Fla/bush. 19-20; Marcia Chambers. "Metropolitan Baedeker. Flatbush," 74-76; Henry Isham Hazelton. The Boroughs of Brooklyn and Queens. New York Times (May 7. 1978): C-4; Marge Blaine and Roberta Intrater, COllnties of Nassau alld Suffolk. Lallg Islalld. New York 1699-'1924 (New "The Grandeur That Is Flatbush." New York 14 (August 14. 1978): 42-46; York : Lewis Historical Publishing Company. 1925). 865-69; Donald L. and New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission. Prospect Park Richards. "A Hi story of Garden City. N.y .... Yesteryears 8 (December South: Historic District Designation Report (New York, 1979). 1964): 90-95; and Stern and Massengale. Allglo·American Suburb, 25. 569. Dean Alvord. quoted in Dolkart. Fla/bush, 20. Mumford states that Ebenezer Howard called the form of town he was 570. Clay Lancaster. "The American Bungalow." Art Bulletin 40 (Sep· proposi ng the "garden city. a name he may have picked up from A.T. tember 1958): 239-53; and Dolkart, Fla/bush, 34-35. tewart 's Garden City experiment. on Long Island . during the few years 571. Dolkart. Flatbush. 40-45. he spent in America. though Chicago. which he also knew. had been called. 572. Quoted by Gunnison. Fla/bush of To·day, 93; and Dolkart. Flat· once upon a time. the Garden City." Lewis Mumford. Th e Highway and the bush. 40. City (New York : Harcourt Brace & World. 1963).63. 573. Dolkart. Flatbush. 40. 551. Samuel Swift. " American Suburban Communities IV : Commun· 574. Dolkart. Fla/bush, 43-44 . ity Life at Rochelle Park." HOllse and Gardell4 (May 1904): 235-43; Mont· 575. Dolkart. Flatbush. 45. gomery Schuyler. "St udy of a New York Suburb. New Rochelle." Archi/ec· 576. Dolkart. Flatbush, 45-47. tural Rrcord25 (April 1909): 235-48; Frank E. Sanchis. Westchester County. 577. Dolkart, Flatbush. 46-47. New York: Colollialto Contemporary (New York: North River. Croton·on· 578. Quoted in Dolkart. Fla/bush. 49. Hudson, 1977), passim; and Stern and Ma ssengale, A nglo·A merican Sub· 579. Hazelton. Lang Island. 1011-12; and Benjamin R. Allison. Th e urb.30. Rockaway Hunting Club (New York: Rockaway Hunting Club, 1952).6. 552. "House at Lawrence Park: Bronxville, N.Y., W.W . Kent. Arch·t." 580. Allison. Rockaway Club. 6. American Architect alld Building News 43 (January 6.1894): plate; "The 581. Hazelton. Long Island. 1013-14. Casino. Lawrence Park, Bronxville. N.Y .• W.A. Bates. Architect." Ameri· 582. Allison. Rockaway Club. 10. (01/ Architect alld Building News 70 (October 27, 1900): plate; Theodore 583. Hazelton. Lang Island, 1013; and Allison. Rockaway Club, 10. Tutt Ie . "A Pict uresque American Suburb." Architectural Record 16 (Sep· 584. Allison. Rockaway Club. 10. tember 1904 ): 167-77; " Hotel Gramatan, Bronxville. N.Y .. W.A. Bates and 585. Hazelton. Lang Island, 1013. A.E. Barlow. Associate Architects," American Architect and Building 586. Allison. Rockaway Club, 9-10. Ne u's 91 Uune I, 1907): plates; "Hotel Gramatan, Bronxville, N.Y .• Archi· 587. Allison. Rockaway Club. II. tectural Review II (April 1913): 146; "House of Franklin T. Root. Esq .• 588. Hazelton. Lang Island, 997-1003. Bronxville. N.Y.• Messrs. Delano & Aldrich, Architects." American Archi· 589. Hazelton. Lang Island. 1001-03. tect 109 (February 9,1916): plate; "Exteriors and Plans. Oak Court Terrace 590. See "Demand for Water Front Homes in Queens." Real Eslate Cottages, Bronxville. N.Y., Bates & How. Architects," Architecture 35 Record and Guide 99 (February 3. 1917): 93; and Hazelton, Lang Islalld, (April 1917): 76: and "Apartment House. Bronxville. N.Y.. Bates & How. 982·83. Architects." Architecture 43 (June 1921 ): plates LXXVII-LXXIX. For 591. "Group of Inexpensive Homes at Forest Hills," American Hom es fu rther sources beyond the scope of this book, see Stern and Massengale. and Gardens 7 (June 1909): 244-47; John A. Walters. "A Model Town in A I/glo·A merica ll SlIburb. 31. America. Development of a Suburban Town After the Ideals of Architect, 553. "The Evolution of an Id eal Suburb-Sea Gate," Public Improve· Landscape Architect and the Sage Foundation." Ar/s and Decoration I ml' lIts 6 Uune 1902): 93, 102. (January 1911): 118-20; Edward Hale Brush. "A Garden City for the Man 554. "Resid ence at Sea Gate, L.1.. S.W. Cor. of Atlantic Ave. and Beach of Moderate Means." Craftsman 19 (January 1911): 445-51; Grosvenor 40th St. . Parfitt Brothers, Architects, Brooklyn. N.Y. . " Architects' and Atterbury, "Model Towns in America," Scribner's 52 (July 1912): frontis·
487 ..
piece. 20-35; Samuel Howe. "Forest Hills Gardens." American Architect 603. "Innovations for a Riverdale Residence." Real Estate Rerord and 102 (October 30. 1912): 153-58. plates; "The Sage Foundation at Forest Guide 81 (April 11. 1908): 650-53. Hills." American Architect 102 (October 30. 1912): 159-61; "Forest Hills 604_ Edward C. Delafield. "A Fashionable Suburban Section." Real Gardens. Long Island: An Example of Collective Planning. Development. Estate Record and Guide 92 (November 22. 1913): 939-40. and Control." Brickbuilder 21 (December 1912): 317-18. plates 155-64; 605. Dwightjames Baum. "Making Old Homes New." Archileclure 38 W.F. Anderson. "Forest Hills Gardens-Building Construction." Brick· (December 1918): 333-41. builder 21 (December 1912): 319-20; Forest Hills Gardens. (New York: 606. "Country Club. Fieldston. New York. DwightJames Baum. New Russell Sage Foundation. 2nd edition. 1913) in Avery Library; Mary East· York. Architect." Architect 3 (October 1924): plates X-XII. wood Knevels. "What the Suburban Dweller May Learn from a Model 607. "Portfolio of Current Architecture." Architectural Record 35 (May Town." American Homes and Gardens 12 (February 1915): 39-45; "The 1914): 455-62; Carleton Van Valkenburg. "An Interesting Group of Architect's Scrap Book-Houses at Forest Hills. Long Island." Architec· Houses." American Homes and Gardens II (October 1914): 331-:15: and ture 32 (August 1915): 210-12. and (September 1915): 234-36; "Recent "House of Dwight James Baum. Riverdale Isicl. N.Y .. Mr. Dwight James Houses at Forest Hills Gardens. Long Island. From the Work of Grosvenor Baum. Architect." American Architect 57 Uune 2.1915): plate. Baum also Atterbury. Architect. and Eugene Schoen. Architect." Brickbuilder 25 had a studio in Spuyten Duyvil . in the southwest corner of the Bronx Uune 1916): 139-42; "Two Houses Designed by Albro & Lindeberg. Archi below Riverdale. See "Architectural Studio. Dwight James Baum. tects. At Forest Hills Gardens in Long Island. N.y .... Brickbuilder25 Uune Spuyten Duyvil Parkway. New York." Architect 3 (November 1924): plate 1916): 149-50; Charles C. May. "Forest Hills Gardens from the Town XXVII . For additional works by Baum in Riverdale. see "House and Plans. Planning Viewpoint." Architecture 34 (August 1916): 161-72. plates J.B. Quinn. Fieldston. Riverdale·on-H udson. N.y .... Architecture 41 (April CXIX-CXXVII; "Two Modern Apartments for City and Country." Archi· 1920): 118-19; "Designs for Double and Single Houses for Robert Fein. tecture 38 (October 1918): 286-89. plate CLXX; "The Church in the Riverdale·on·Hudson. N.y .... Archileclure 43 (May 1921): plates LXIX Gardens at Forest Hills. N.y .... Architectural Review 9 (August 1919): LXXI; "Detail. House. Mr. B.L. Winchell. Riverdale. N.y .... Archilert 2 37-40. plate XXIV; "Portrait of Grosvenor Atterbury." Country Life 107 (April 1924): plate XXIII; "House. Mr. William P. Hoffman. Fieldston. (October 1920): 947-52; "Arbor Close. Forest Hills. L.I.. Robert Tappan. N.y .... Architect 2 (May 1924): plates XXXVI-XXXVIII; "House. Mr ' . L. Forest Hills. Architect." Architect 6 (August 1926): plates CXXI-CXXIV; Duncan Bulkley. Riverdale. N.y .... Architecl 2 (May 1924): plate XLJ Frank Chouteau Brown. "Some Recent Apartment Buildings." Architec XLII; "House. Mr. Robert Fein. Riverdale. N.y .... Architect 2 (May 1924 ): ' tural Record 63 (March 1928): 193-272; Lewis Mumford. "Mass Production plates XLV-XLVI; "House. Judge Nash Rockwood. Fieldston. N.y .... and the Modern House," Architectural Record 67 Uanuary 1930): 13-20. Architect 2 Oune 1924): plate LXIX; and "House. Estateof Mr. Cleveland H. (February 1930): 110-16; Grosvenor Atterbury. The Ecollomic Production Dodge. Riverdale. N.y .... Architect 2 Uune 1924): plates LXX-LXXII. of Workingmen 's Homes (New York: Russell Sage Foundation. 1930): 608. "Portfolio of Current Architecture." Architectural Record: 460; Grosvenor Atterbury. Bricks Without Brains (New York: Charles and Valkenburg. "Interesting Group of Houses": 331-33. Also see Carllon Scribner's Sons. 1936); "A Problem of Resources in Planning." Architec· Van Valkenburg. "A Picturesque Hill side Home." American Homrs and tural Record 95 Uanuary 1944): 87-92; Christopher Tunnard. "The Gardens II (December 1914): 416-17. Romantic Suburb in America": 184-87; Francesco Dal Co. "From Parks to 609. "Portfolio of Current Architecture." Architectural Record: 462. the Region. Progressive Ideology and the Reform of the American City." in 610. "Portfolio of Current Architecture." A rchitectural Record: 455-56. Giorgio Ciucci et al. The American City. From the Civil War 10 the New Deal 459. (Cambridge: MIT Press. 1979). 143-291; and David P. Handlin. The A mer· 611. "Portfolio of Current Architecture." Archilectural Rrrord: 462 . ican Home. Architecture and Society. 1815-1915 (Boston: Little. Brown 612. Delafield. "Fashionable Suburban Section": 940. and Co .. 1979).285-88. 613. J.J. Clute. Allllal.~ofStatrlllsland. From lis Disrm·ery to till' I'n's('nl 592. "The Russell Sage Foundation." Charities and the Commolls 18 Time (New York: Vogt. 1877). :1 18. Staten Islander Cornelius Vand('rbilt (1907): 77-78. 191. started his fortune by working on and later buying Tompkin's ferry lim'. 593. Grosvenor Atterbury. Workingmen's Homes, passim. 614. Quoted from the New Brighton prospectus. George A. Ward. D,,· 594. Howe. "Forest Hills Gardens": 155. scription of New Brighton on Staten Islalld Opposite the City of New York 595. Quoted in Tunnard. "The Romantic Suburb in America": 317-18. (New York: New Brighton Association. 1836). Also see an exhibition 596. May. "Forest Hills Gardens from the Town Planning Viewpoint": catalog prepared by Shirley Zavin and Barnett Shepherd. Statell Islalld. 170. An Architectural History (New York: Staten Island Institute of Arts and 597. Quoted in "Forest Hills Gardens. Long Island." Brickbuilder 21 Sciences. 1979).5; and Stern and Massengale. AIlf(lo·Aml'Timll Suburb. (December 1912): 317-18. 18-19. The prospectus was published in 18:lfi. short Iy before the founding 598. See. for example. Yorkship Village. built by the New York Ship· of several other Staten Island suburbs such as Clifton. built by t hc Stalen building Company in 1918. Electus D. Litchfield was the architect. Island Association in 18:~7. and Elliot ville. founded ncar New Rrighton by Richard S. Childs. "The First Emergency Government Towns for Ship· Dr. Samuel McKenzie Elliot in 1839. yard Workers. I. 'Yorkship Village' at Camden. N.J .... AlA Journal 6 (May 615. "County House. Ernest Flagg. Dongan Hills. Staten Island." 1918): 237-44. 249-51. frontispiece; Marcia Mead. "The Architecture of Architecture 11 Uanuary 15. 1901): 24-25. the Small House." Architecture 37 Uune 1918): 145-54; Electus D. Litch· 616. Flagg's houses are published in hi s book Small Housl's. Their field. "Recent Government Housing Developments. Yorkship Village. Economic Design and COllstructio11 (New York: Charles Scribner's ons. !. Camden. N.j .... Housing Problems in America (Washington. D.C.: National 1922). Conference on Housing. 1918). 82-93; and Edith Elmer Wood. Recent 617. See Dongan Hills. Where Ills. What II Is. alld All About II (New Trends in Americall Housing (New York: Macmillan. 1931). 66-69. York: Dongan Hills Realty Company. ca. 1916). a prospectus at lhe Nl'w, Also see government housing in Bridgeport. Connecticut. an infill proj York Historical Society. ect by planner Arthur A. Shurtleff and architect R. Clipston Sturgis. "The 618. DOl/gan Hills. no pagination. Workman and His House." Architectural Record 44 (October 1918): 302-25; 619. John M. Carrere. "Better Taste in Small Houses: Suburban Devel· Sylvester Baxter. "The Government Housing at Bridgeport. Connecti opment Has Been Too Rapid. It is High Time That We Paused To Contem· cut." Architectural Record 45 (February 1919): 123-41; and Reporl of the plate Our Awful Achievement. Some Constructive Suggestions." Counlry United States Housing Corporation (Washington. D.C. : Government Print· Life ill America 20 (May 15. 1911): 18-21: and "Works of Carrere & ing Office. 1919). Hastings." Architectural Record: 63. 599. "A Suburban Development. A Study in Housing." Architectural 620. Carrere. "Better Taste in Small Houses": 21. Recurd34 (October 1913): 349-52; " Houses.Jamaica. Long Island." Arrhi· tecture 29 Uanuary 1914): 18-24; and Garrett H. Irving. "Architectural Design as an Aid to Real Estate Promotion. Principles of Group Planning Applied to Small Suburban Houses by Electus D. Litchfield. Architect." Brickbuilder 23 (December 1914): 295-96. plates. 600. Irving. "Architectural Design as an Aid to Real Estate Promotion": 295-96. 601. Irving. "Architectural Design asan Aid to Real Estate Promotion": 296. 602. "Elmhurst. Residence of Giovanni P. Morosini. Riverdale. New York City." A rchitecture and BuildinK 19 (October 7.1893): plates. Also see "The Residence of D.P. Kinsey. Esq .• Riverdale. New York." American Homes and Gardens 2 (March 1906): 169-72.
488 CIO + THE NEW YORK TIMES, .- , " .: ~ '.,
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&ilt1"Th~k_~'~j! ", 'I·'()PEST~ f-nE!.t; ' GAPDE1 !<).: .- , ..- ' " " • ,c .. l,. 'DE6i~.Er> ·' j:' . , .- ~~il'.GE:--fDC:J :(-I~wi·ic)l~ iiO~1~'CO " '. f ···. \ . ..,.~ :. ~., ., ~I«o ,,. . . : ... i , " !:' . .. , .. .Art honorable . '''!;! .' J',\ " .., " .'.,.: " ;:' . .. U .S~ · tradition :~ . " . ofsubiitban . r ..: ."~ ,' ; '. \t • ·, plann~g; : . :: .. ;:·::: ; ' . ;.. .
I fj~ir:JftU\~i:."'sm. \: j ',' ...... ';' . . '. HE suburb is, to most'archi. t.ecturally minded observers, '. . the quintessence of . banality. .' · T Dreary, " unimaginative bou.!ses, scattered across the landscape ·with llttle. concern for much of any• . . . thing except carving up the earth iL a" , " way to give fNery ODe of those di$- . : . . · backyard,jointed struc:tlU'es Its c1~, Its llttle private sliver piece of:.' l~~..:.~~~~-. . ' ~~~~~;'~~~~~~:::::~====~~=;;~ .: . " . of nature, The prevalllng notioo seems . • not so much community as seperatioo .. '- as a village whose physical layout ., seems to symbollu keeping apart., not . jolnlnt together. .' . . . . .~.: .. · ..nus c:ooventiooalimage is not With out Its truth - it surely fits Levittown , . arid most of that -development's post. , World War II brethren, for example. welcome eVent. It is not so much that railroad suburbs (, ,.. ,... 11"", Though the postwar suburban tract Mr. Stem and Mr. Massengale have Frederick Law Olmsted's .. "', ...... , .... house had certain virtues as a building discovered new. and relatively un. m.,and A. T. Stewart's Garden In Itself, the ways In which It tended to known suburbs....;. mOst of the material L.l., amoog them); streetcar . 'be spread across the land made most : Included is fairly well known to stu way suburbs (Forest Hills tract dfNelopments disasters from a . dents of 19t!l- and 2Otb-<:entury Ameri. and Prospect Park $roth in New · pJanntngstandpoint. ·, . 'can housing - as it is that they have City come here, as does Rolaoo .But it was not always so: There is a made an articulate case for the impor. in Bai timore) : resort suburbs long and hoRorable, If too little known, tance of a .rea1 suburban planning Gables, Fla., and Tuxedo Park, tradl tian ot thoughtful and COD.5Cien- tradi tion in our history. . are examples here) ; "automobile sub urbs" (such as Rlldbum. N.J:,'and the f'. tiOlis suburban planning'ln the United ' What Is most Impres:sive, even star ,States - a ler;acy of· places neither. . tllng, In thb exblbition is the te:\lIl. Country Club District of K1lruas CIty) · boring nor lndJtferent to the land, ment It orters to the value 01 planning. and, finally, industrial villages llcape. Some are frankly rustic, like lbis is ,an age in which th~ efforts of (among them Pullman, m., Kohler, ·the altogether remarll:able 'UeweUyn . city planners are generally disdained, Wis., and 'IYrone, N.M.). .. . Parle In West Orange, N.J" and others particularly by the vanguard 01 archJ- Every one olthcse places has II are urban and DOt a IItlie quaint, IIlce tetts who argue in favor of letting the , taln wistful, pleasing appeal, for the graclOWl spread of Forest Hills ~turalProcessesotcityandsuburban not the suburbia of the two-car Gardens In Queens. growth occur by themse1ves; So it is. and the backyard barbecue but 'This tradition Is presented In a small Important to be reminded that plan- suburbia 01 the venerable, solid house. but eloquent exhIbltJon entJ tied , log!- n1ng has at least occa3ionally in our /'eo . of the mature. sheltering lrec~ and of . ally enOugh, "S.uburbs," which cent history managed to cre,ate civi. th~ curving hlJl~ide roaw. These com, opened this week at the Cooper·HeWitt . llzed plac~ - and that If a place is munities conjure up a sense of stabU, . Museum, ..... here It will remain on view planned r;tat need not seal Its doom as Ity, a sense thllt they are pllrt of an es until Jan. 2-4. Organized by Robert an artJ~lcial community cut ort from, tablished. solid world, pr-celsely the A. M. Stem and John Montague Mas- ·reallty,· . . ' opposite of the transient, flimsy air of sengale, the exhibition with Its acc:om- ·. 111" e.xhlbitioo consists mostly of newer suburbs. , panying catalogue (which is called . drawing's and photographs, many of The categories Mr. Stem nnd Mr. "The ~o-American Suburb'· and Jhem oripnal and quite beautiful. AJ. Massengale have creawd nrc appro publlshed as an issue of the British thOlJgh no such distinctions are made, priate, for Within the tradition of older magazine ArcbJtectural Design) are a th(; CAtalogue groups communities lIS suburbs there really are several .. \ ...... ' ~ I. "
f), A).II. If i :\ ! ,""" I ; I ,. I ,'t,'" ., 1I I ~~ , I " '. '. ' . . ... ' .. " ...... , _ ... - , Several cottages' cluster around a curved rqadway iii' ,.-" . Mariemont, a Cincinnati suburb, designed,.Jm 1924; ',: ,' .; "": I , -'" ,',. . , " , >::" " . \ " .. .. '; ' · t'· s;ubcategOnes: and the .means· ·by . which we reach them - railroad" \ streetcar, automobile - are. otten. as good an indication of their -nature as' mc.'HlN . - any other stdtement about·them. And C' " 'the categories are surely a helpful way to place the projects in time. ~- .. :.: .... :_-, '~. UeweUyn Park, created 4n 1853 by the architect Andrew J acboo. Davis at lIVlt(. ~T1 , ' - the edge of Eagle Rock in Essex Coon . .:. 'ty, is llIte a single vast estate, with · , '1-===" hills and forests and open lawns. The .goal here'is to give the Illusion of COUJ). One of the larger cottages tty W4h the advantages of a village 'features three bedrooms, and of proximity to the city. The devel o .opment's roads and houses are tightly . one bath and a 'porch. ·_· -intertwined, despite the considerable ,amount of space; the entire com· munlty feels llIte a vast version of the I Ramble in Central Park, with country more like old-style villages than COWl" . munlcate a total idea. In some cases, I villas marking the space instead of try towns, With energetic and pictur such as the celebrated utopian suburb : lampposts. ·' . ' . esque little commercial squares and, of 1929, Radburn, N ,J., there Is Uter- . . : It Is DO accident that Llewellyn Park frequently. a mix of apartments and ally a common open space shared by r was established in the same decade as single-family houses. . all residents; in others outdoor space' Frederick Law Olmsted's and Calvert Forest Hills Gardens,' designed by is mostly private, but It seems to come ( Vaux's Central Park design; both rely Grosvenor Atterbury and completed In . togetherto create a coherent totality. heavily 00 the mid-l9th-century styles 19U for the RusseU Sa!e Foundatloo, Related to this, surely, Is that ' in i 01 rustlc landscape design; . Itself d& is the prototype here - a utopian com none of the planned suburbs Is archl I rived from the .English landscape munity underwritten by a foundatioo tecture paramount, Though many" \ a-actitloo. Ohruted played a central concerned with improving the bousing such as Tluedo Park. Shaker Heights, role in the development 01 the Ameri• . lot of the middle class. Forest Hills Ohio, and Coral Gables, have build- l CAD planned suburb - his Riverside, Gardens remains, even today, an im . i.ng3 of great delight (and sometimes \ ·m" plan of 11169 was based on curving pressive design. an inventive mix of of real architectural importance), it is roads that loll owed the topography, . classical, Beaux-Arts lormallty In Its . always the overall planning that Ukes and the entire idea was to Integrate ar main axial roads and Olmstedian In precedence, The houses are only ) chi tecture &nd nature, formality in its residential streets. rarely uniform and they are almost \ The goals were somew!1at different Park.5 and houses are neatly int& never dull, but they do subordinate In the In-town suburbs, the communi grated. as they are In virtually all themselves to an idea larger than that \ ties Mr, Stern and Mr. Ma.ssengale caU these communities. For while there of the individual Slructure sitting stnoetcar and subway suburbs. There are vast c1itferences In layout. houslr.g alone in the landscape. 11la t an exhi bl WId was too precious to permit the design and social makeup among tile tlon organized by a pair of architects UI(aJ III usia'! of rus In urbe, and the so suburbs, some common threads can be could dare to take this sta.nce Is 11 dal,int.c:ntions were different. Many of perceived.. Serious aUention to nature pleasing event lodeed, For the polot or tbese suburbs were in tended for the I is perhaps the most important: in each t.Iili exhibition, in the 'end, is to tell us lI!lddIe class as a means of escape place there is a desire to ~ the scale that in the suburbs as In the city the from aowded urban conditioos. But of construction to crea te a toUi' Is nd whole must be greater than the sum of they1!~re d.~ and carefully laid out, scape, a set of open spaces that com- the parts: \ I ..~~~~~ .. ~~ .. .a· -~-:--~:..:::4fi:: .. ::::::::::=:.£S::5: _ ::;:':P:Q::.::::::::::::::::.:_:a*:::.a~-~t~~::~ -~.. -.--~ . ' --.~~---~~- "-----~ - .- - ~. ---- -'- .'- r -; .! ." 1 .~ A"MODEL VILLAGE" UNDER WAY By LOUIS ~RAYES HEN you have barely settled the Cotton Exchange and the Constitution down to reading your maga- and George M. Cohan? No, it cannot. It zine story-when the golden- is somewhere near the Rhine, and it's not W. haired heroine is just on the . new at all, because you've been transferred point of climbing down a rope ladder from . back a few centuries, like Mark Twain's the topmost window of a lofty tower-the Connecticut Yankee. You've just accepted conductor hurls the door open with a bang . this as the only satisfactory explanation when and emits a jumble of sounds that are sup- you wake up. The ideas of the Sage Founda posed to represent" Forest Hills Gardens!" tion Homes architect, Mr. Grosvenor Atter Whereupon you jump from your seat, rush bury, have begun to take form and here out upon the station platform, and-what is arising a village-a" model village," some do you see? Nothing less than that same people prefer to call it-the like of which is medieval tower from which the heroine was not to be found in all America. At bottom preparing to descend to her eager lover. it may have all the common-sense practi .: :Can this be just "fifteen minutes from cability of modern America; artistically it is Broadway"? you ask yourself. Can this be European. It smashes all the conventions on the same fragment of land-entircly-sur of commonplace suburban building around rounded-by-water as prosaic Brooklyn and New York. So surprised is the newcomer up-to-date Belmont Park and the Astoria at the first view that the whole outlay seems gas-making plant? Can it be on the same a trifle bizarre. But when he has had a hemisphere as Forty-second Street and moment to free his memory of the chess ",,'r.. Pittsburgh and Col. Henry Watterson and board aspect of East Appledale and Clear I,( . -t' - '. • o. f :. '. "f ." " ,. " .." ~ . r• - • -_• .-~-,---",._. _ ::__ ::~..:.:..: ,_'____ o - " , 13 U I LDIN (J P R () (; R J: S S 19 Mountain and North Ardale and half a are worth to men who can't afford them hundred other perfectly ,proper suburbs, the but to demonstrate that conservative real appearance of this rising village is inexpressi estate operators can provide homes near bly soothing. New York, with plenty of light and air and The public has been told a great deal of playground space,.dispose of them to men of -. the motives that prompted the formation of moderate means, and yet earn a fair return the Sage Foundation Homes Company, so upon their.in vestment. ' that it is not necessary to review them at Hitherto most of what has been said about length. Briefly the origin of the project Forest Hills Gardens has taken the form of was as follows: Russell Sage left his widow promises and prophecies. Now the Foun- .' ·:1 ': , i, .( I GENERAL VIEW OF STATION SQUARE FROM THE RAILROAD :' i., many millions of dollars, and she set about dation Homes Company has begun-we will I '," to spend the income therefrom in a manner use a phrase that may shock the eminent that she and her advisers thought would gentlemen who are responsible for this enter most benefit humanity. As good housing is prise-it has begun to "deliver the goods." one of the great problems of the day, nothing Roads are laid out. Water mains and sewers seemed more useful than to provide an ob are in service. New citizens are already liv ject lesson in combining comfortable, health ing in their own homes and are traveling ful and low-priced homes with proximity to back and forth between there and New the heart of R p'rpnt ritv "' T •. 1 20 13 U I LDIN (J P 1~ () (J R I: S S , . station, that is enclosed by the rail road, the hotel and two or three apartment houses. The brick flag ging was not down yet, and the ' scaffolding was still disfiguring the_ ., J . gray stone walls, but the construc tion had progressed far enough to give us the general impression of what this square was to be. It is the tower of the hotel that gives the stranger the feeling that he has suddenly been transplanted in the old world. At first the construction at For est Hills was carried on by a gen eral contractor, but as soon as the first contract was near completion the Foundation Homes Company itself took over all the building operations. Thus it is better able to execute exactly the plans of the architects. Every detail of the work -the planting of trees, the grading of streets, the mixing of stucco for the exterior of the dwellings, every LOOKING TOWARD STATION SQUARE PLAZA FROM OUTSIDE thing-is now under the direction partment, Mr. Charles H. Scammell. In of the superintendent. his automobile he whisked me from one . The visitor is deeply impressed with the group of houses to the other, east on this thoroughness with which things are done highway and west on that, until we had here. On one corner of the property is a pretty well covered the 142-acre tract, and sort of factory and test house, where build then we ended the sightseeing expedition by ing materials are made and tested before making a rapid survey of Station Square they are put into use. For example, the the plaza immediately opposite the railroad architects may decide upon a reddish stucco · , 13 U I L)) I N () P l~ () (~ R J: S S 21 for a certain group of houses. Then follow But froin the very nature of the project no " a series of experiments to determine just such motive enters into the calculation of " what proportion of chipped tile ought to be those in charge of the undertaking at Forest used, how big the chips should be to give the Hills. The management is interested in most satisfying effect, and to what extent the building homes, not in a real-estate specula mixture ought to be treated ..with acid to tion. It advises prospective buyers not to bring out the rich coloring. The stucco is buy for the purpose of reselling, but only if not used in a dwelling until it is just right. they intend to settle down with their fami Again, a floor plan may require the use of lies and live here. Of course, in time the heavy concrete beams. The ingredients of property may appreciate in value and own the concrete--sand, broken stone, cement ers may be able to sell out at a profit; but are mixed here in this factory with the that is an incident, not something to count ft,, - A GROUP OF DWELLINGS greatest care. When the beam is molded it upon. The Foundation Homes Company is put through a severe test to make sure aims to give men with limited salaries a I· that it is strong enough. And it is the same chance to live in healthful surroundings, with every other material that is to go into away from crowded city streets, at a fair the buildings; nothing but the strongest price--that is the proposition in a nutshell. ,I and best is used. It is consistent with the whole scheme that In this, Forest Hills Gardens presents a the homes should be made indestructible. distinct contrast to hundreds of other sub Long before the ground was broken for urban settlements around New York. foundations the architects had built a labo Though it is true that real-estate operators ratory in N ew Jersey for the testing of all are coming more and more to realize that it kinds of materials, to ascertain which of all is a wise policy to put up substantial dwell others would most successfully combine the ings, there are still many who have their qualities of strength, imperviousness to I ' r ! 22 J3 U I L)) IN (j P.R () (~ R 1: S S I I I I " ROW OF HOUSES READY TO BE OCCUPIED blocks, the material that is now being the eye as does no other American village. adopted so widely for home construction. Perhaps the average American would say To form the exterior, stucco is applied to that the place has no street plan at all. As these blocks. And this stucco may be of that phras is ordinarily understood, it whatever color the architects choose. From hasn't. Two main thoroughfares lead out the artistic side, perhaps no one feature has from the railroad toward Forest Park, the received more minute attention than has the public reservation that bounds the property composition of the stucco. For it is this, on one side, and two curving avenues when a great number of houses have been stretch from Station Square. The other built, that will give the color tone to the streets will follow no fixed chessboard plan. whole settlement. Enough has been done Most of them will be quiet, "homey" already to show that the achievements in this streets, the use of which for thoroughfares direction are remarkable. To the texture of will not be encouraged. Each one will have the stucco there is a richness which will in a character of its own ; it will not be simply evitably make Forest Hills Gardens impress one of ten or twenty, all alike. " 13 UI LDIN (} P l~ () (j R I: S S 23 A DETACHED DWElLING. BRICK VENEER OVER HOLLOW TILE Only part of the grading and surface fin have formed about this project. Some of ishing has been done, but the superintend them seem to think we're establishing some ent's automobile was able to pick its way to sort of' institution.' Of course, those who've pretty nearly every block where anything taken any pains to inquire have quickly was going on. Mostly the houses now under found out that this is far from the truth. construction are in groups, three or four " You can see from these houses already houses in a group, but there are some de up that it's not going to look like any' made tached residences. The homes vary widely to order' town. There are going to be all III pnce. sorts of homes for all sorts of incomes, just "It is a little amusing sometimes," said as there are in the average suburb. There Mr. Scammell, "to hear what ideas people will be some streets more desirable than ---...... 24 J3lJ I L DIN (J P l~ () (J R I: S S others, as there are everywhere. Over there gradually, this is not so of all. The com you see going up a detached house that will pany has set aside a limited number of sell, with the ground around it, for fourteen homes for rent. Thus the doubter may r or fifteen thousand dollars. On the other make a trial of the place for a year before hand, one of those inside houses in the row committing himseff to permanent habitation ahead of us-a house closed in on both sides there. ] -will sell for not more than six or seven A record of the occupations of those who thousand. " have purchased houses and lots up to date is The Foundation Homes Company, just illuminating as to what the character of the like any real-estate concern, has its selling population will be. The percentages of the department. The probable purchaser is various occupations are as follows: archi )1 supplied with prospectuses and street maps tects 3;nd artists, I I per cent.; authors, edi and as much word-of-mouth information as tors and reporters, 8 per cent.; doctors and 54 t c.. 8EMI'FIREPROOF DWEllING8 UNDER CON8TRUCTION he can absorb. He is told of school facili lawyers,s per cent.; engineers, 7 per cent.; ties, the proximity of Forest Park, and the teachers and educators, 12 per cent.; ac altitude above sea level, and the healthful countants, advertising agents and printers, ness of the climate, the train schedules to 7 per cent.; brokers and manufacturers, 7 and from the city, and everything else about per cent.; merchants and managers, IS per which he likes to ask questions. If the tale cent.; salesmen and clerks, 22 per cent.; rail that is unfolded is a little less boastful in its road officials and in other occupations, 6 tone than that of the traditional vender of per cent. suburban lots, it is because the management The construction of the buildings at For of Forest Hills Gardens is conservative from est Hills Gardens is continuing straight on start to finish. It wants to win a reputation through the winter. Outside work of a kind more for its performances than for its that could be done only in warm weather promIses. provides shelter for the inside work, and in Though most of the dwellers in the new the early spring a number of new houses will I ' " TOWN PLANNING ON A LARGE SCALE BY SAMUEL HOWE last man to voluntarily deceive. It is the system which is un ~~;i~~~~~~!~~N~:ew~'Y~OrkerHills Gardens generally as a successfulspeaks of satisfactory. The prospective purchaser is just a little uiJ That is the way he dis reasonable. He asks too much. He often presupposes ," ~ it, in his brisk, analytical knowledge the real estate agent does not have, and has m . There is certainly some means of getting. The questions are pertinent and timely thing attractive in the name. There They are perfectly natural, The prospective purchaser i is much more that is interesting in well within his rights. A man who expects to live a goOc scheme. Here it is upon paper. share of his life in any locality would be foolish t!> ignore th, 1~~;~t!~~~~These views were taken a few days immediate future, the general outlook of the district. . ~ ago, They are not enriched like The gnrden city idea, which has inspired the designers 0 1 painted pictures by some distinguished artist! • They are just Forest Hills Gnrdens, JIlries from the ordinary real estat. plain every-day views taken with a ca~era, The photographer development idea in its general plan, which pro,-ides for th, worked under direction; that is, the scenes were selected for definite treatment of a large area in a specific manner, It him. These photographs speak eloquently in a language thnt provides that roads shall be laid out and planted, and that is acceptable the world over. They are not interesting bits, the estate shall be so divided up into lots as to give to each little show pictures, from the land of ancient courtesies, and purchaser a certain individunl attraction, Garden cities arc romantic ideals. They are not inspiring memories from little made beuutiful from their commencement, before the road> by-ways and forgotten lanes, and sloping hillsides in remote are cut, before drains are inserted, or houses erected. _, .A sections of southern Europe, but they are views oC-new work, certain uniformity of building is detennined upon, covering tangible evidences of American enterprise. They sho~v , hpw , tJle ,,'e,xed question of. st.yle, cost, materiaL , Many other ques the place is wearing, how if is improving, how it is mellow tions nrc settled, such as the way in which the houses shall be ing, and what an excellent place it is in which to live, It is grouped in their relation to each other, The study of these full ' of shade and shadows, of interesting detail, ' and unex points~esseris the' uncertainty confronting the purchnser, ' Y~,t pected 'views, all interesting in color, usually stimUlating the it permit. certain individual interpretation likely to , be ac,- persol1ality of lhe people in the neighborhood, and above all, ceptable: ' , and ' for' all,- one great golden opportunity for a homc, for When first the interesting drnwings for this Dream City, a"s those who want ,a home, and who knOW! a' home is, it wns callcel, were exhibited in public on the walls of the 'The uS;lal 'home-seeker, 'l.n ' visiting a I ' estate develop- Architectural League, and prominent clubs in this city and ' ment, is 'inva'riably confronted ":ith a v ,serious problem, elsewhere, the whole scheme was rejected ns being too idealistic, He'may be 'more than'satisfied with that portion'of ,the prop to!> far remo,·ed from the requirements of American peoplll. erty w~ich he proposes ' to purchase, he may be morc , than' The 'drnwings were attrnctive. They were ambitious in the pleased ,with the 'outlook as it is today, but.-what' of tlic' ,mor-, 'extr~me, They'were highly colored, The views befo.re us are row? Who will his neighl:,ors be? How lind ju.st ,,,l¥re will ' far more atisfactory. Not" only do they pay delicate hom they build? What kind of trees, if nny" !iI11ine_ th.e- side- : nge to'the place'as it is, but tributc to, the gcntleman who made walk? What treatment will be accorded the corner'lots?, And -thoSc,'drawings", four 'or fiv'e years ago, They are before me just -what, disposition will be made of ' t?e- -rew" de!ig~tful aid ' ' no~', ' :In',many cases the photographs are better than the trees; which' gi,:e to' the property a cert!-i~ ~il{'l~ty !lna char- , prosp~~tlve 'sketch, in spite -of, the color and the texture of acte'rr : Boiled doWn into one sentence, the prospective pur- ' ' the - ~I\rivas" tIle 'well-{]rnwn ,figures imd the subtle introdiic:. chiiser"is'- requested to be patient, to nwlii.t: results; which; at :tiori _of ,mo,'emcnt in thc foreground: , ' ' : hl;st ;:r~ matt~rs : for speculation, ofte~ mad.:i:ap ;v.eculati~n, or : , I -recall, witli no little' satisfaction, the critical ' romm~lft he is- liskoo -to- exercise an imagination he 'may not-have', and of, ,visitors at the League, when 'first thesc, elrawings werc, on to conjure up ' ~ suitable setting for his house aft~r his 'own - \ 'iew. ' ''This kind ofthing is alright for England, I have flishion, , seen it, at Hampstead and Le~chworth an'd nt Port Sunlight. , It would be futile, unfair, to assign' to the industriou~ real ' The triangle !lnd 'the park at Bourm-ille ,is 'the kind of thing e~tate agent ~ desire to misrepresent' in 'any way, ~hape or , tha~ these gentlemen would like to introduce hcre. On pnper manner, To him also is the future 'a blank. , His ,business it's 1\ mighty in,teresting story. But it won't flO here. Ou~ is to inspire confidence and, incidentally, to sell. He is the ' people won'~ sta~d for it.~' It is so' easy to c:riticise. _,< CQWright, 191!, "" Th Houl. Beautif"l P"bll,Aing Co" Inc. EVEN SO UTILITARIAN A THING AS A RAILROAD STATION HAS BEAUTY. GROSVENOR ATTERBURY, ARCHITECf The accompanying "ie\\s, still on paper, by the way, but have nn unusunlly interc-sting dillgonnl'view of the rOlld , ill n language intelligible to the 1I11111 of the street, show the which they front, nnd present to their neighbors nn interc' folly of the critics of the Lengue and ure a splendid triumph ing picture. They nrc built of brick, being known, tee' for the enthusiasts of the schcme. nimlly, to be of semi-fireproof construction, with rough-c" To quote, in part, nn officinl nnnouncement, "Forest Hills surfacing, IIncl, like the rest of the houses, nrc roofed wi ' Gnrdens is known technically as n suburblln lund development red tile. The caves o"erlmng, lifter the fllshion of nllllly , of one hundred and forty-two acres, within the city limits, on the pensllnt cottllges in rustic England. It is through n hoo, the new line of the Long Island Railroad, at the Forest Hills cd porch thnt the front c100r is reached. There i, in the Ii station, nine miles in distunce and thirteen minutes in time ing-room nn lIe1mirahle open fireplnce. from the Pennsylvnnia terminal in New York, nnd about three a'he buildings balllnce well with each other, a certain sy" miles on the New York side of Jamaica. The railroad is lIletry is obseTYed which contributes to the qual it)· of rep" directlv at the entrance of the estate." It is still further nnd of wholesome restmint. This spcnks splenc.lidl)· for t' known" 1\8 a business investment of the Russell Sage Founda whole-souled management, for the industry and skill of t tion, conducted on strictly business principles for a fnir protit. supen-ising architect, for the genernlllly-out of the placc. ~Irs. Sage has been, for a long time, interested in the need of There is 11 whole lot of COOllllon sense in the geography ' better and more attractivc housing facilities in the suburhs, philosophy or planning-call it WIUlt you will. The ba, for persons of moderate meuns, who could pay (it is well to yards, if sllch a nllme can be given them, arc madc inten·, bring things down to dollars nnd cents), from twenty"five ing. The~' are planted. Thc family laltndry is conccllll'll I dollnrs n month, upwnrds, in the purcllllse of n home. hinrl trellis enclosures, open, Jet sheltered. L"ndergroun Of course, these houses are well contrivctl, titting the site, half-sunken dri\"Cways lead the automohile to the ~nm .. the pocket-book and thc fnmil~·. Some of them arc in groups Thc 110uses are groupecl so as to form a J,icture as well as of three nnd four. Some nre semi-detacheel. One group, Illay .helter for the inmatcs. There is nnthing "rro~ant or 11 I write, hlessed hy the cognomen 13, comprises two e1etnched fected about nO\' of the houses. To me some of the little II anel two semi-Iletached, single family houses. The fonner run tachcd cottages 'costing hut a few thousands arc a' e1clightf east and west, the latter north nnd south, nnel so form three and ennobling to the place as the lllrger, Illore costly holts, sides of a square. They each ha"e an .indi,·idual gnrden nnel Block 59 is another illustration of what I mean. Here t *f lSO ~ I THE FOUNTAIN IN THE CENTRAL COURT AND THE COVERED BRIDGE BETWEEN THE RAILROAD STATION AND THE HOT! houses face the informally picturcsque dcpression-for the en c,'en in joint. Therc are chcap bricks; thut is, thcy are ginccr has grcat respect for topography, the natural undu rcet from the firc, not sclccted, and thcv al'e ul1 the !Jettcr I lating surfaccs of the ground and of the littlc hills, and it. Thcy build in splcndidly togethc; and mllke t\ rcry hollows arc considcrcd and prcstr,"cd. The small houscs facc tcrcsting picturc. Thcy go wcll with the stylc of the 1'1 this littlc gardcn and turn their backs upon thc roud. Thc and the rock which has !Jeen blasted from the foundations kitrhcn and offices gencrally front the roud. Thcre arc also the neighborhood, used us buse lind dwarf fencing, 'OIllC delightful cottages built in tcrracc form, the entrances Somcone--I\ womun of course--wl'ote the other dlly tl to which arc grouped and hooded and the rool1l~ mRde in one grellt thing about thc writing of Arnold Bennett, in I ,Ii"idllfll by consistcnt attention to ~ssential5-<)pcn fireplaces, "Tales of thc Fh'e Town," was the rcmllrkllblc man ncr 1'llSCll1ent windows and windows well grouped to enjoy ecrtain which he maintained 1\ certllin quiet, cqullblc interest along \Oistns. definirc line, dealing with e"cry-day, middle-dass peop The golf cnthusiast ,~iIl be pleased to Icarn that the ad e,'ery-duy ambitions, and with this mllteri,,1 he held his publ joining park challenges his skill; co'urts for the squash player charming thcm delightfully by his fantastic mcthod of l IIrc huilt upon the top of the hotel building, and tennis courts pression. Just so hllrc thc IIrchitects of For~t Hills clung Ildjoin the Japanese Ten Garden. The Jamaien High School an IIttrncti\'e usc of simplc mllterillis. still has accommodations for additional scholars. Arri"ing at For~t Hills Gardens hy thc railroad, thc " Thc houses are built of every-day materials. Right royally itor feels at once the heart of the litt1~ place, getting r.:l i1 hArc the architects clung tcnaciously to their self-imposed pression of the Gllrdens 115 n whole. The word "\' illa~e" tllsk of making the bcst out of good, hard, well-burnt brick, good enough for IIl1yonc, lifter Thorcau's lucid chal'llrtcl'i~ of ingcniously contriycd concrete, applied to unexpectcd und tion, still "town" is bettcr, because it inmh'es the i,lca of i unusual purposes, such as trcllis grating, copings to walls, di"iclulIl ownership. The approllch is uncxped,·cI. the fil chimncys, shafting and caps, corbelling, imposts and curbing, "icw is t\ ~nernl "iew of the wholc scheme. Thc railroacl 1'11 water troughs, bowls nnd large six-sided anel square \'lIses for along an elemtecl emhankment. and fro111 II height the ~rou dwarf-growing juniper trees that lm'e to cling to a rock-likc of houses IIrc secn. It i. a scttlement. the CO\ll-t of which suh.tnnce. The bricks are laid in many ,"arietics of bone!. dominated by a large buiMing, which gi\'es to the mode. TIley are rich in color, texturc and oc~asionally diversificd American suburb much of tIle quiet picturesqueness of ~ lSI ..... -'----:-.-- --.------~ .-----r- - --: _. J SEVERAL ARCIDTECI'S AND A WELLKNOWN LANDSCAPE GARDENER HAVE WORKED TOGETHER IN FOREST HILLS GARDENS ~ 132 i* IN THE COMBINING OF BRICK, WOOD AND PLASTER, THE ARCHITECT HAS BEEN PARTICULARLY SUCCESSFUL - ,. .: . . E HOUSE BEAUTIFUL dressy or an 'airy' place. One little house is 50 delightful well-swept, distinctly joyous, in that they form essentially ' that I must describe it. You have to climb up to the second part of the district, and are distinctly private roads to pri':nt floor to reach the front door. It is built of brick. The ends houses. You feel this. You feel that you arc in no wu\" ' of lhe brick project, very much as they do in Holland. I al trespasser but arc welcome. Of course, all things of th i most expected to find a three-wheeled cart, drawn by a little kind are matters of association. .A person Im'cs a picture, ' lu~ywith a wrinkled brown ,face, selling delicious Clam melody, a verse, because it calls up for him forgotten lll~nlO cheeses for three sous." , ries of times when he was young, in lo\'e, or peculiarly happ" It pays, to own a home. The payment is character. The '.And so docs he transmit to the village he loves. . payment is a stimulating impulse of sclf-educntion, of sclf Some people might like to think of the garden city liS " expression a'nd of self-reliance. You feel tl~e limitations of tiny principality, presided o\'er by a strong personalit):, who. the ordinary apa.rtm~nt or: f1_at" , a~d ' that , ~eir , popula,rity, in some subtle manner, at times humorous and again defiant. fortunately for tne community, is now slowly but surely... on but always good natured, endeavors to extract frolll e,'er\"on,' the wane . .. As ·the' facilities for rea~hi!lg , ~he city increases, 'so fortunate as to be within its boundaries; the nuturu l g()()(1 so does the 'demand: for s,!!all houses in , thll suburbs . .. ,~he and worth-whileness of each chamcter, so as to mllke of thi, spirit of An\crica, will :be, better, s,tronger for . fos.t~nn~ .the neighborhood a' pleasing page in the history of the localih·. lo\'e of home. The flat and the apartment are SImply abldllig . The ltist "iew of the Gardens, as we return to town , i;.· places, not by any stretch. of the imagination can they be vites a general summing up of everything. Homes are nl'C(lcci Ilccepted as homes. Recently I visited Forest Hills Gardens, for the people, of that there is not any doubt, and anything 1\ suburb recalling somewhat the garden cities at Krupp and which will throw light upon the thought in a practical wa,·. Essen, in Germany, and Roland Park, Baltimore, 'Yhitinsvillc by illustrating what so many thousand dollars will do in'a and Hopedale, in Massachusetts. Here are bright, cheerful gil'en position, is indeed welcome. 'Ye, as ' a nation, nrc houses, well arranged, well trimmed lawns, hedging carefully thinking, chnnging, growing. 'Ye are learning. The nation cut. The effect is admirable. The roads Ilre quiet, bright, is alive to the need of this increase of individunl ownership. IN THE WORK OF ALBRO & UNDEBERG IS SEEN A MOST HOMELIKE SMALL HOUSE *f 186 1* .. .. • t .: _\" ':" \ . ', 'I"J. ~CJ r/ /1 I ..UIII '~"IIlII" TIle Umry .r tile kMW . ., LullKaIC ArcaJloCtvc aM aQ '..... ' . I .: r. . ~. r .",,· , _'.:-- ;" .,. ,!:,_I. : tr.!' .I~ ' A SUilHtBAN TOWN BUILT ON BUSINESS PRINCIPLES FREDERICK LAW OLMSTED .-::> F_ Hille Carden., w'- 1"","- I_tur.. are d...,ribed by Mr. Olmond in the followine artide, io a Iouoi_ in_tm.nt of the Ru... U Sq_ F ....ndation. Th. town \a oituated within the bouDdariee of N.w York City, and whil. not diff.rine materially fron. oth.... Lone 1.land real ulete enterpri... , emphui.ze. En.liah cardell city f ••tu .... that are ao often un- known in our AnMrica.n auburba.. Ample playp-ound and rec.... tion ladll ti•• are provided and minute attention ia ..iyen to an att:ractiv. city plan that confornu to the tentetive plan 01 Creeter New York. Thio Idea of a woU-rounded policy of ouburben d ...lopment-a policy that coincideo with the plan of the ....ter city-mieht well be appliecl to the outlyinc oecliono of any lare. community. It I. 00 ..Idom that an Am.rican town plano Ito crowth with an idea of future dey.lorm.nt that the ._p1.'01 F_t Hillo Card.n. io noteworthy.-Edu.." ' The Russell Sage Foundation, as a O~ 'in'the case of those land speculations means of earning the income which it where the only source of profit is the uses in various lines of philanthropic unearned increment. It is conducting, work, has invested a part of its capital in fact, a process of manufacture and in a suburban land company operating merchandising, A3 raw material it has in the Borough of Queens, in New York bought agricultural land at wholesale, City, This concern, the Sage Founda- although at suburban prices which in tion Homes Company, has bought a c1ude a large and purely speculative tract of some 160 acres on the Long advance secured by previous holders. It Island Railroad sixteen minutes from is manufacturing thatl land in some cases the Pennsylvania Station in Manhattan partially and in other cases wholly, and is developing it into building lots. lDto good individual suburban dwellings, A3 a business proposition the enterprise with all that term implies in the way of differs in no essential respect from those equipment and surroundings. Finally ·of other land companies except in this: it is marketing the product at retail, that whereas the ordinary land-company in various styles and stages of comple will put upon the market only the same tion, to suit the purchasers and tenants, old standard article in the way of city from the vacant lot on a clean, paved, lots that is already selling successfully planted street, to the non-housekeeping in the vicinity, the Sage Foundation apartment of one to four rooms and a Homes Company is willing to risk some- bath in a building with a restaurant, thing by introducing to some degree a garden and a.~quash CJLo. i. • • what may be regarded as novelties in Its profits, as in the c&.>~ vi other well the New York retail land market, ccnducted land companies, are those of novelties which it believes the public the manufacturer and merchant who will appreciate and pay for, which if performs an actual service to the com successful will be copied by others and munity; they depend not at all on hold raise the general.f standard, but which iDg laud for a speculative rise, but on are not sufficiently certain in their appeal turning it over as quickly as possible to induce the average real estate man to the retail purchaser at reasonable to try the experiment on his own account. retail prices, with the 'least possible loss There is a speculative element in any through accumulated interest and taxes. transaction in city land, but what the In laying out Forest Hills Gardens Sa~e Foundation Homes Company is there has been an attempt to secure the dOlDg, asImany land development ccn- full benefit resulting from three important cerns alliover the country are doing, principles in city planning, the advantages is not mere gambling in land values, of which are coming to be more and more SD.S li ,- . .1: "'~: , • " . L ,------~----... -- - ~------,-- .00 "* tn lit' ~1cvuh.. llu 11M' ,"IUl .lInk·tllt rtc.rty n'C'UICuilWll ItA 1*''''1. ul' liM! ntl'''U, ..ill he une "' Ihe rtuu.. :len.. ,j,., 'eaLu"", Mlva.ncit,1C ~11t'"f1. "n... ted,.. tit 'he "'Il~ of lh. _IlCJIcI "c~"'1I"wnl . l'tvlMWt joeL OM of Ute ...L 1MtlalJtc dt...-.rlftUlkt 0 ... uI Utce prindt*- rct.IC'II In the of Ynmll lIilLa G .... ~ hum tiM' ,_at ttl.... U"","llthfIU'C.. which .." ... &41 be of view of lite humr'llttkrf'. .Mota the .Iired. am,_ a."l t"IHt,,"'~ll. ftU l'I.tlrt I" ..... an: rNlju,l.• iD h. lhe ('\"', ho- tMy <1Il the luMt. T ...... 'Iltl, itd'I'~ ,'u"\('IIIlie dI..... "'" vf lhcoc tur.I .11'f'C't.. loul IIIlreelll .rc CIlrrWd .. ,,.ilCht. Ih"HJtcil .Itere lhe IIM"lUlun1 ,If "ndk-. IIh.ilth., ... IIHI ....I:' ... 111I1""llChl.".,. . "hic-h afY 1m ~:'/i:--n!' ;:.~\= ~~~~=! :':::c; New Yurk .,'""1', ...... of ,,11't"eU. will the ...il"'" IIIMI i" ..."",I.IIIY _'illt !(i"e 1_'" In "hurt. IIIIK-I, .... '''"'"I.hM"d New Yun nly'. ,,,.. ,.th·c .,",,",l ,".n "". •.,;".. ...IjIMTnt t,",""lu'l. .\ 'M"IW i~~t r.:":~i~iill~~:i~:'"::~.I:.... h.,, \'.n' l ' ... . A SUBURBAN TOWN BUILT ON ~INESS PRINCIPLES 587 SYLLAIIl OF BOSTON-IOU CONFERENCES 90D on ",hic.h the 4k-ep, badly lighted tcnc- to .ull every l)urehutr other lou are • lnent houJte It..,. dc\·cloped. and will I.id out of the UlJual depth. and in a have the advanu,cu .1~acJy de'M:,;heu few cues of more lhan the u¥uaJ depth. for with 110 increue of cost: wl,He in oro..., • I,rice that i. but .liRlttly ath'ancttl. ·GROUP~ • "IHII:.·,. ·rOUT·&.... LE;·rN«l.y·O'I'!tLUHQ6' IaTO , ...... '. ····,SYLLABI OF BOSTON-1915/'" CONFERENCES The lfel,bborhood Conference .. Ab't'IIC.... "": " ('1) 11I111nn'clllt'nl t\!'l'IIIM'iulilln14. " I New ortCulli'~'llCIIl'4 ill tllU.'4C .lislrae"" lIot,. .Ireillty l''''Cft."t1. 't lU,,"'ll]4C in ml.-mllt·n""i, ••• ltclltl"IK.~ ItIUI i"lcrnl in n.'l~M.:inliulll4. (b) ~ltlt·lIu.. ·III1't tllUJ Nri.:ht.nfhuu.l (\'uln",. -\ .. 1 1"·tI", ...... IK·",1 \vtuwlt'tlf(c ur lin: IIlItk· rl.kill~ HIIII n~ulht uf ""lite in (·xislillf( 1tC1iIctl~lIbc . " i Moral IUIII ""lI1H·inl ~lIllpurl U( 141t111.... •.. . !.I The l~lllhli.<4hnl('II' ill lI,e "ulmrl", or Uu,.lnn of .,. cll~i,\:Jr *1"I·illll'Cut"-.. ror nd~hhurhuod 'I\·dCnre. • " Muro J:cllt!rul II~ He lilt' illrormnlioll 1'0. ..."It..""-<4t.'t1 Ity Ihe 1'It!b.tCIlICII~ rur city lUlU nt'iboiIIMtrllUt"1 lul'·l\nt.'Cfllenl. , (,.) Heller sod.. 1 in't'r... Ii~lricl ~laliuuJl. 1I0l'It alc " 'oultl IIC IIrvUWJl .houl hy exdmnJ:c ur l'fhll·tttiuIIUI .uIII Jluci ... 1 c'Ourte}iil~ h"'I",c~tI MC·huols. cllurchn. MClltCIIlCIIU. lultl illlJlNVClllcnt ""-'KX:iation.'f, clc. I !, I I · I : . . . .. ;. HOUSES THAT FIT THEIR NEIGHBORS A IIIODEL AMERICAN CO~tMUNITY, PLAN~"ED BY A GREAT PHILANTHROPY, TO SHOW How WELL WE t.1JGHT BUILD By CARLYLE ELLIS ':. • . 'oJ;;" ..... . '.' " ..... ' .. :. . ... '. .. '.\ .' ~" . .. . ...... • 0 .. • •• , Vie., or Station Square rrom the railroad platrorm. Shops and non.housekeepin, apartments. nesicned by Grosvenor Atrerbury for the Sage Foundation Homes Co. A MODEL TOWN IN AMERICA DEVELOPMENT OF :\ SUBlIRBA:\ TOWN .-\FTER THE IDEALS OF ARCHITECT, L.-\.-;OSC,\PE ARCHITECT A)10 THE SAGE FOUNDATION Dr JOH~ .\. W.\LTERS ,T:'ACING certain economic conditions, such as the landscape architect, Frederick Law Olmsted. The archi· ~ high value of land in the neighborhood of a !Jig tectural dC\'elopment is in charge of Grosvenor Atterbury, .l:. city, the cost of rnilroad wmmutation and pRosent· who is planning attractive, substantilll and durable build day conditions of home life, the Russell Sage Foundation ings. An experienced business management has been Homes Company is building a model suburban residen called in to conduct the enterprise at a fair profit. tial town within a quarter of an hour of the heart "f Xc\\' This is the first time that a proposition of this kind has YOlk. been tried in this country. England has her "garden Forest Hills Gardens, as the town has already been dties," there are model towns in Germany, but America named, was carefully and comprehensively laid out hy the has up to now grown in a more ur less haphazard way. Group or sman single ramily houses designed ror the Sage Foundation Hom., Co. by Grosvenor Arr.rbury (ull ... . " ARTS AND DECORATION perfectly str:l.ight for long stretches. ·TOlIr.sT·HIIl.S·GARDtNS· ,nCSIGNID· rDR· THt· SAGE· rUNDI\.JI0N HOMt~·CO. The monotony of endless, straight, wind swept thoroughfares, which are the New York conception of ~treets, will give place to short, quiet, self-contained and gardenlike neighborhoods, each having its own distincth'e character, A public green has been formed at the point where the twomrunavenuesdivide. This will form the residential focus o[ the ••, ...... ' ..... : . ! • • .:: ...... community lIS the neighboring Station Square wiJI.lJe its business focus. The , . Station Square itself, though primarily a traffic (enter, is of considerable size, and the whole of the surrounding archi tecture, induding the railroad station and ·THC·RAILROAD· STATION· its approoches, is ~inK de"eloped as tt..., ·/uOM·THI;'HorrMAN·8OULtVARD· :- . ' .~' '. ,. single composition, with a regard for Th. ralltoed ... arioa 'rota ,1M HoU",•• 8ou&cYllrd the pleasure which the residents may derive from its use, that is impossihle in For the first time we shall see if suburhan development the indil'iduali.tic development of husiness centers which cannot have a distinct educational value, while it p:lYS usually occurs in suhurhan district•. reasonable dividends. Adjoining the rail" ..d station and furming the Station Mrs. Russell Sage and those whom she has associated S'luare are three and four-,tury 'buildings designed by with her in the Foundation have been proloundly im· Mr. Atterbury. They will contain ,tures, uflices and res pressed with the need of Oclter and mnre attr.lctiYe he IUS taurant, and in the upper sturies small nnn.huusekeeplng ing faCIlities in the suburbs fnr persons of mndest means, al~lrtmcnt., bnth for men anfl wllmen. From this center who could pay from $25 a month upward in the purrhase out toward Forest Park, which hounds the property on of a home. They have thllught that homes c;,uld he sup· the southea..t, the huusl.'S are planned to correslMlOd to the plied with some greenery around them, with accessible "arying ,-alues of the lois ;L~ determined I,y their size, loca playgrounds and recreation fadlities, and at no apprel'i tion and prospect, the larger single family dwellings con ably greater mst than is n"w paid Inr the same roof roK,m taining ten or tweh'c ffM,ms and the smaller fuur or "'·e. in bare streets without any such adjarency. They hal'e Followi"g the lantl and ruad (lmtours thesc arc romhined abhorred the constant repetition of the reCi."lnb'Ular "Ioe:k in smaller and mure detarhed groups as the p"'perty be where land contours im'ite other street lines, They h''''e comes mnre hilly. thought tha.! buildings nl tasteful design, constructed nf Frum an an'hitecturall",int of "iew the greatest oppor. , brick, cement or other permanent material, thnugh uf tunity- alxlrt from cert:tin nm'e! uses of material and somewhat greater initial cust, were really more emnumi meth,.ls 01 cnnstrurtion-willlie in that general harmony cal in their durahility and lesser repair bills than the repul· of desi!!:n which is possible unly where the entire scheme tlf sive, cheaply huilt strudures which arc to" often the type del'dopment is laid out a nd executed under such a system of New York's nutlyinll districts. In laying out Forest Hills eardens r------Mr. Olmsted horc in mind three im portant principles in city p!anninl( : first, that the main thoroughfares should he direct, ample and convenient; second, that purely IUGd streets should be planned and ,,"nstruded to meet the purposes of quiet, attmdi"e residenre streets in the best possible manner ; third, that certain are'L~ should he de liberately set apart fur the common use and enjnyment of residents. :\cmrd· ingly, the town In, two &rfeK,t streets running straight through it, and a IXlUle vard "5 feet wide. L'K'al streets, while not lantastirally c",oked, itre never St.rion Squere. railroad .tatioa. 'fon. and arutmtnt. · .. 120 ARTS AND DECORATION J A..'1CAIlY, ) " ,., '" t •. ~. f'" .... . , : •• " I .. ' : , Bird's-eye view of Forest Hills Gardens as laid out by Frederick Law Olmsted of cooperation by the various .experts as in the work for be accomplished. Study was directed to the problem 0 1 Forest Hills Gardens. a better use of the land, from both its economic and it~ _-\5 a matter of fact, the chief difference between the de esthetic viewpoints, than is afforded by the usual rectan velopment here and any other land de\'elopment so far gular subdivision. undertaken in America is in that of design and " town This is what the Sage Foundation Homes Company ex planning." By this is meant both the designing of the pects to realize. It will provide more healthful and more houses, whether to he built singly or in groups, and the de attracti\'e homes for many people. It will demonstrate that signing of the roads, the lots and the various public open more tasteful surroundings and open spaces pay in subur spaces. It is chiefly in the quality cf design that a new, ban de\'elopment, and thereby encourage imitation. It will distinctive and, it is hoped, educational work is sought to encourage more economical methods of marketing land. Larger single family houses designed by _Mr. Atterbury for rhe Sage Foundation Homes Co. UW A. At. ~,&tJ;,i. uTf., M· k~ /Ju"I- ~ fJ-t~;n (!7f(A.~ ~i'" ?~. Ittt/ll11U7~ ~ (flY Forest Hills Gardens Queens, New York. Russell Sage Foundation, developer. Grosvenor Atterbury, architect. Olmsted Brothers, landscape architects. 1912 I Grosvenor Atterbury. Greenway Terrace. 1912 (ph : Marta Gutman' 2 Typical twenties house (ph : Ed Stoecklein-' 33 . !"".:~ :-·!-!:l.:.l.5·~i..,\~P:!: N~· .. " ", ·~!('I .; .. u . r e • •T'i" I"" ·I'• .t\r:· " i"~.rt':'\-IC'·: • "(~J r: '" cr· ' ll"OLf'f',Y!' 4 Grosvenor Atterbury and Olmsted Brothers, 1910 5 Plot plan of 1916 6 Grosvenor Atterbury, Group XI, 1914 Forest Hills Gardens, designed by Grosvenor gets in the Station Square is, as Samuel Howe tinction built at Forest Hills Gardens in its in itial Atterbury and the Olmsted Brothers, was built observed, that 'of a college or cathedral city, stage of development. including W ilson Eyre , in 1912 by the Russell Sage Foundation as a The arching from one section of the hotel to and Harrie T Lindeberg - Lindeberg's house model suburban residential town 15 minutes the other also does much to help the illusion, '2 and studio for the artist Boardman Robinson is by rail from Manhattan, The Sage Foundation Despite the participation of the Olmsted particularly distinguished. A few blocks of flats intended Forest Hills Gardens as a village of firm, Forest Hills Gardens was intended to are also included w ithin the village: in addition lower-income housing, but its nearness to contradict the earlier, more romantic, and anti- to the flats at Station Square, the Fred F Manhattan made the land cost too high, and urban suburbs such as Riverside. In the pros- French Company in 1917- 18 built a much the development quickly became the upper pectus of 1911, the sponsors stated that larger six-storey elevator complex on Dart- middle-class enclave it remains today, 'fantastically crooked layouts have been aban- mouth Street, the Gardens Apartment. A number of serious attempts were made to doned for the cozy, domestic character of local Another of their bu ildings, the Leslie Apart- keep the costs down: the highest density streets, not perfectly straight for long ments, was not completed until 1943 on an development was placed on the costly land stretches, but gently curving to avoid mono- awkward site along Greenway Circle. nearest the train station, and much of the tony'.3 As one moves away from the square Forest Hills Gardens is un ique in that it is at construction in the early stages utilised prefab , the character become more rural. Though once a 'model' community and a 'business' ricated concrete panels, an early example of most of the land was sold in its undeveloped proposition ; Atterbury was aware of the prob- this technique applied to residential arch itec state, an architectural review process was lems that this seeming schizophren ia of intent ture, But as Lewis Mumford observed, in his initiated under the direction of Atterbury and might bring w ith it. He wrote: 'It is unfortunate article 'Mass Production and the Modern his successors. that the somewhat misleading word " model" House', Forest Hills Gardens is 'an attempt The loveliest of Atterbury's own designs is must be applied to such an eminently practical that failed. Atterbury designed , , , for industrial the group of houses that stretch along either scheme as this development of the Russell workers in the fashion that he did for the upper side of Greenway Terrace as it leads from Sage Foundation, for the reason that there IS a middle classes, , , , ' Station Square. But other groupings, such as kind of subtle odium which attaches to Forest Hills Gardens is the most English of that on Puritan Avenue (development group "model" things of almost any kind, even when American planned suburbs, clearly dependent XXVIII). are in some ways more interesting. In they are neither charitable nor philanthropic - a on the work of Parker & Unwin and on the group XXVIII , three bu ildings are arranged to slightly sanctimonious atmosphere that is de- example of Hampstead Garden Suburb, But form a central court and thereby enhance the bilitating rather than stimulative of success. '4 unlike the diffusely organised Hampstead sense of privacy. This court, divided into To contemporaries, Forest Hills appeared an Garden Suburb, Forest Hills Gardens is a individual gardens with private entrances from anomaly, 'a supposedly model town ... built sequentially organised community based on a the street. is a small testament to Forest Hills largely of contiguous houses in more or less continuous line of movement from the railroad Gardens' ch ief planning virtue, its sensitive continuous rows directly adjoining plowed station to Forest Park, a metaphoric journey balance between individual expression and fields . ... ,5 from town to open country, communality that later inspired a res ident, The gateway to Forest Hills Gardens is Clarence Perry, to base his highly influential Station Square, a brick-paved plaza dominated planning strategy, the 'neighbourhood plan', Notes by the tower of the Forest Hills Inn, bordered on his experience there, Atterbury's group XI I 1 In Architectural Record 67 , January 1930, pp 13-20; February 1930, pp 110-116. on one side by the embankment of the railroad at the fork between Greenway North and 2 In his articles 'Forest Hills Gardens', Amencan Architect station and on the other three by a continu Markwood Road consists of four houses, two 102, October 30 1912, pp 153-160. ously arcaded building, containing apartments semi-detached, and successfully culminates 3 Christopher Tunnard, 'The Romantic Suburb In America', and shops, that spans the two principal streets the axis of Greenway North while providing an Magazine of Art 40, May 1947, pp 184-187. 4 In his article 'Forest Hills Gardens. Long Island', leading from it into the residential neighbour interior open space which makes a virtue of an Brickbuilder21 , December 1912. DP317- 318. hoods of the village, The impression that one outwards geometry. Other architects of dis- 5 Atterbury, op Cit (Bnckbuilderl, 0 317 34