DOI Heft:
Domestic architecture
DOI Artikel:Scott, Mackay H. Baillie: A suburban house
DOI Seite / Zitierlink: https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.41871#0035
A SUBURBAN HOUSE. BY M. H. BAILLIE
SCOTT ARCHITECT
IN the two plans for small country houses just considered the Gothic tra-
dition of building has been followed. In most cases this seems to be the
best, because it is elastic and does not impose unnecessary restrictions on
the builder. It gives him a larger freedom of expression in craftsman-
ship, and looking as it were from within outwards, it leads to a variety of
irregular forms. In the small house now illustated the later manner of the
Renaissance has been attempted—the varied apartments of the house, in-
stead of being allowed to arrange themselves in some irregular form, are
packed into a rectangular symmetrical box. This is a process which reminds
one of packing for a journey, and the difficulty which arises is very similar
to that which often ends in some additional parcel to accommodate the over-
flow of a traveller’s belongings. The attempt at symmetry often breaks down
too, and leads to such devices as sham windows. And yet there is a particu-
lar charm about this eighteenth-century manner of building. It has a cer-
tain sedate primness. It has a well-behaved and well-drilled aspect, and being
somewhat artificial and conventional finds itself more at home in town or
suburb than in the country. It does not suffer so much from mechanical
workmanship as the older manner of building, and since it imposes some re-
straint on natural gesture it may be compared to a strait-waistcoat which
A SUBURBAN HOUSE—FRONT TO ROAD
l9
SCOTT ARCHITECT
IN the two plans for small country houses just considered the Gothic tra-
dition of building has been followed. In most cases this seems to be the
best, because it is elastic and does not impose unnecessary restrictions on
the builder. It gives him a larger freedom of expression in craftsman-
ship, and looking as it were from within outwards, it leads to a variety of
irregular forms. In the small house now illustated the later manner of the
Renaissance has been attempted—the varied apartments of the house, in-
stead of being allowed to arrange themselves in some irregular form, are
packed into a rectangular symmetrical box. This is a process which reminds
one of packing for a journey, and the difficulty which arises is very similar
to that which often ends in some additional parcel to accommodate the over-
flow of a traveller’s belongings. The attempt at symmetry often breaks down
too, and leads to such devices as sham windows. And yet there is a particu-
lar charm about this eighteenth-century manner of building. It has a cer-
tain sedate primness. It has a well-behaved and well-drilled aspect, and being
somewhat artificial and conventional finds itself more at home in town or
suburb than in the country. It does not suffer so much from mechanical
workmanship as the older manner of building, and since it imposes some re-
straint on natural gesture it may be compared to a strait-waistcoat which
A SUBURBAN HOUSE—FRONT TO ROAD
l9