DOI Heft:
No. 108 (March, 1902)
DOI Artikel:Scott, Mackay H. Baillie: A country cottage
DOI Seite / Zitierlink:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.19875#0103
A Country Cottage
passing through the main portion of the hall, and a prevailing horizontal line which makes for repose,
curtain may also be introduced, if required, to screen Large enough to give ample light, they are not so
the staircase during meals. Here on entering from large as to form glaring gashes in the wall, which
the porch, with the wide doorway between parlour must be shrouded in all the elaborate modern
and hall open, one may at least feel in the house trappings of lace curtains and Venetian blinds,
itself and not shut in by the four walls of those Their leaded lines are bars of shade, which serve
prison cells which we call rooms nowadays. but to enhance the beauty of the landscape they
The walls may be covered with a plain canvas conceal and yet reveal. Imagination which is
of a coarse texture, and the woodwork painted foiled by the bald complete revelation of the plate-
white, while the principal feature is the broad glass window has here a chance to play its part, and
open fireplace with its spaces of red brickwork, to weave a beauty of its own out of the actual
The chairs, rush-seated with high backs, are made facts, partially displayed. The doors, too, are of the
of unpolished wood. The floor should preferably cottage kind, wide and low, constructed of broad
be of hard wood and not covered with a carpet, planks with horizontal ledges, and wrought-iron
but with a few well-chosen rugs only to ensure latches and hinges. Those which open into the
comfort. In these, as in the general colour- parlour disclose a scheme of blues and greens with
ing, the usual dirty drab, which seems to be the lilac and grey, and on the walls a few Japanese
average tone of the modern dining-room, should be prints perhaps, broadly and simply framed,
replaced by a certain cleanly freshness of aspect In its general treatment it owes much to a certain
with broad spaces of pure colour and no competing negative virtue, and in the omission of the vulgar
patterns. In such a room a single vase of daffodils its merit chiefly lies. "Here you felt"—one might
will appear almost as much at home as in their own say with Walter Pater—"all had been mentally put
green world, and, instead of showing as a mere to rights by the working out of a long equation
trivial detail, will form such a salient feature that which had zero equals zero for its result." We have
one feels the whole room might perhaps have been all heard of the artist who obtained his effects by
designed to show off the curves of their petals, so rubbing out, and in spite of the obvious sarcasm
well do the walls and floor know their place and which the record of such a process suggests, it
function. The windows follow the characteristic may perhaps be not unwisely practised by the
proportions of the room, and repeat again the designer of the rooms we live in. For there is so
if
A COUNTRY COTTAGE M. H. BAILLIE SCOTT, ARCHITECT
90
passing through the main portion of the hall, and a prevailing horizontal line which makes for repose,
curtain may also be introduced, if required, to screen Large enough to give ample light, they are not so
the staircase during meals. Here on entering from large as to form glaring gashes in the wall, which
the porch, with the wide doorway between parlour must be shrouded in all the elaborate modern
and hall open, one may at least feel in the house trappings of lace curtains and Venetian blinds,
itself and not shut in by the four walls of those Their leaded lines are bars of shade, which serve
prison cells which we call rooms nowadays. but to enhance the beauty of the landscape they
The walls may be covered with a plain canvas conceal and yet reveal. Imagination which is
of a coarse texture, and the woodwork painted foiled by the bald complete revelation of the plate-
white, while the principal feature is the broad glass window has here a chance to play its part, and
open fireplace with its spaces of red brickwork, to weave a beauty of its own out of the actual
The chairs, rush-seated with high backs, are made facts, partially displayed. The doors, too, are of the
of unpolished wood. The floor should preferably cottage kind, wide and low, constructed of broad
be of hard wood and not covered with a carpet, planks with horizontal ledges, and wrought-iron
but with a few well-chosen rugs only to ensure latches and hinges. Those which open into the
comfort. In these, as in the general colour- parlour disclose a scheme of blues and greens with
ing, the usual dirty drab, which seems to be the lilac and grey, and on the walls a few Japanese
average tone of the modern dining-room, should be prints perhaps, broadly and simply framed,
replaced by a certain cleanly freshness of aspect In its general treatment it owes much to a certain
with broad spaces of pure colour and no competing negative virtue, and in the omission of the vulgar
patterns. In such a room a single vase of daffodils its merit chiefly lies. "Here you felt"—one might
will appear almost as much at home as in their own say with Walter Pater—"all had been mentally put
green world, and, instead of showing as a mere to rights by the working out of a long equation
trivial detail, will form such a salient feature that which had zero equals zero for its result." We have
one feels the whole room might perhaps have been all heard of the artist who obtained his effects by
designed to show off the curves of their petals, so rubbing out, and in spite of the obvious sarcasm
well do the walls and floor know their place and which the record of such a process suggests, it
function. The windows follow the characteristic may perhaps be not unwisely practised by the
proportions of the room, and repeat again the designer of the rooms we live in. For there is so
if
A COUNTRY COTTAGE M. H. BAILLIE SCOTT, ARCHITECT
90