“Persons Of Taste” or, “Why I Need An Architect”

The simplicty and elegance of an architect designed house.

Want something simple and elegant? Hire an architect.

While waiting to hear a lecture given on the subject of  the gardens of Newport, Rhode Island, at the Athenaeum Library on Boston’s Beacon Hill, my eyes fell upon their copy of James Gibbs’ 1728 “Book of Architecture: Containing Designs of Buildings and Ornaments”. While Gibbs’ opus has long been a favorite resource in my office, I must confess I had never done more than look at the pictures.  Now, carefully opening the first few pages, I read for the first time Gibbs’ dedication to “His Grace, John, Duke of Argyll and Greenwich, &c.”.  What followed was as succinct a summation of reasons why every thoughtful person (whether Privy Councilor, Master General, or Knight of the most Noble Order of the Garter) should hire an architect to design and direct the construction of his house.

In Gibbs’ own words:
“What heaps of Stone, and even Marble, are daily seen in Monuments, Chimneys, and other Ornamental pieces of Architecture, without the least Symmetry or Order?  When the same or fewer Materials, under the conduct of a skilful Surveyor, would, in less room and with much less charge, have been equally (if not more) useful, and by Justnefs of Proportion have had a more grand Appearance, and consequently have better answered the Intention of the Expense.  For it is not the Bulk of a Fabrick, the Richnefs and Quantity of the Materials, the Multiplicity of Lines, nor the Gaudiness of the Finishing, that give the Grace or Beauty and Grandeur to a Building; but the Proportion of the Parts to one another and to the Whole, whether entirely plain, or enriched with a few Ornaments properly disposed.

SOME, for want of better Helps, have unfortunately put into the hands of common workmen, the management of Buildings of considerable expense; which when finished, they have had the mortification to find condemned by persons of Taste, to that degree that sometimes they have been pull’d down, at least alter’d at a greater charge than would have procur’d better advice from an able Artist; or if they have stood, they have remained lasting Monuments of the Ignorance or Parsimoniousness of the Owners, or (it may be) of a wrong-judged Profuseness.”

This last charge, that less money could have been spent to better effect if an architect had been engaged, is one I see every day in my practice.  I have helped many clients, sometimes at considerable expense to themselves, remedy the myriad deficiencies and crass features of their Contractor-built homes.  I am always struck that these good people have paid top dollar for McMansions they eventually come to feel as embarrassments and marks of personal naivete, rather than showcases of elegance and refinement they had hoped.

If you find yourself building a house and are assured by the Contractor that you don’t need an Architect, please reflect on the words of James Gibbs, given over 250 years ago:

“I mention this to caution Gentlemen from suffering… by the Forwardness of unskillful Workmen, or the Caprice of ignorant, assuming Pretenders.”

Saving an historic Massachusetts house

Historic Thomas Clark House, Belmont, Massachusetts

"Your historic Georgian home has shipped from our facility and should arrive withing four business days."

In an age when so many old houses in and around Boston are torn down it is refreshing to hear of one being saved from the wrecker’s ball by a concerned group of private citizens who have found a new home for a cherished landmark.  Many great historic structures have seen their surroundings change drastically over the years.  Realtors often use the term “external obsolescence” to describe a fine old farmhouse that is now surrounded by the gas stations and parking lots of suburban sprawl.  What was once prime farmland is now a strip mall on a major highway.  We’ve all seen those sad cases of brick Federal houses, with barn and carriage house, just fifteen feet from a six lane highway.  The fortunate ones often live on as professional office space, but too often the value of the land for development sends these misplaced survivors of an earlier age to the land fill.

It is with special pleasure I relate the current situation of the historic Thomas Clark House in Belmont, Massachusetts.  This well sized and proportioned Georgian farmhouse, built 250 years ago, faced certain doom.  A developer bought the property and is building two new homes on the parcel.  Luckily the developer is also a man who appreciates the importance of historic preservation and the traditional character of the town of Belmont.  After many false starts permission was obtained to move the house onto a nearby lot where it will be restored and renovated as a private home.  I think we all owe a debt of thanks to those who, behind the scenes, worked to preserve such a lovely home for future generations.

An article on the house move can be read here in the on-line “Belmont Patch”.

“Classic Old House Plans”

Traditional house book, plans, elevations, Lawrence Grow, Historic Architecture

The little architcture plan book that started it all

My eyes stray along the sagging old bookcases of my office.  I am struck afresh at how many volumes of old details and floor plans an architectural professional can amass in the course of a healthy career.  This eclectic collection, amassed since school days, is the brimming source of images and ideas which inspires me in my work every day.

Today my eyes are drawn to a high shelf containing a handful of well-thumbed books.  I don’t know the exact date I first encountered “Old House Plans” by Lawrence Grow, but I can still remember the electric thrill that ran through me, that long ago day in the Whitinsville Social Library, at finding an author who had culled from the National Archives a collection of house plans purposefully selected to capture the imagination of a budding architect.

The local library had both “Old House Plans” and “Classic Old House Plans”.  In a clear, systematic way they broke down the history of American domestic architecture into periods and styles with simple examples illustrated with detailed plans, sections, and elevations.  For the first time I confronted now familiar terms:  The Gothic Revival Style;  The Shingle Style;  The Second Empire or Mansard Style.  Examples were culled from the measured scaled drawings held in the Historic American Building Survey of the National Park Service.  Each one of them was a gem.

As a practicing architect who works in historical idioms, these books have also provided a philosophical grounding for doing traditional work in the modern world.
In Grow’s own words: “There is little substance to the body of work which is now being turned out along Colonial lines.  The average Palladian window installed today, for example, has neither the profile nor trim of its 200-year-old Georgian Colonial prototype.  This is not to say that modern work is not legitimate, simply that most of it is not Colonial in a formal sense.  But you must know what is authentic to understand what is derivative.”

Over the years I have given away many copies of the Lawrence Grow books, to friends and also to young people who say they want to be an architect when they grow up.  I even recommend them to clients who evince a desire to learn more about the great yet simple houses that define American domestic architecture.

“Open the gates, we’re expecting an ambulance” –Claus von Bulow

Traditional Palladian House Front Elevation

"Open the gates, we're expecting an ambulance."

Continuing our tour of movie houses we love, Little Tim and I watched “Reversal of Fortune”, the great film starring Jeremy Irons, Glen Close, and (in her film debut) the incomparable Clarendon Court of Newport, Rhode Island.

Clarendon Court, one of the grand “cottages” built by the wealthy magnates at Newport, Rhode Island’s summer colony, presents the appearance of a fairly straight-forward English Palladian country house right out of The Vitruvius Britannicus. Although more modest and of more recent vintage than more famous neighbors such as ‘The Breakers’ and ‘Marble House’, I’ve always felt that this limestone Trianon, built in 1904, is one of the finest and most livable houses of the genre.  The floor plans, a study in classical symmetry and balance, are of a simple elegance almost completely absent from the majority of so-called “classical” work done by traditional architects today.  The well proportioned facade and skillful disposition of the windows give no clue that the double staterooms, dining and living rooms, are each 26 feet wide and 40 feet deep… the outside dimensions of the average modern suburban American home!

While the exterior massing and details could be mistaken for early Eighteenth Century work, the interior layout would have been impossible before the Twentieth Century’s extensive use of structural innovations, such as steel beams, in residential construction.  Upstairs, a myriad of bedrooms, each with en-suite bathroom and dressing closet, gives the impression of a very posh turn-of-the-century hotel.  This heavily loaded bedroom corridor sits over giant open entertainment spaces below; structurally impossible without the use of major steel beams.  The setting of pipes to all those bathrooms, in the immense plaster ceilings of the dining and living rooms below, must have been a headache to that long-ago Edwardian plumbing contractor.  That all these systems and structure are built in and CONCEALED within the stage set of an 18th Century Palladian country house is a testament to the skill of Horace Trumbauer, the architect.  I’m so impressed by this great work of his that I’m planning to take a few days to design a much more modest Palladian country house using Clarendon Court as a point-of-departure.  The simplicity of design and elegance of room disposition suggest many economies of scale.  I wonder if the client exists today who sees in the chaste beauty of such a house the answer to his own design intent?

–Timothy

Classical, symetrical, Palladian house plan

Clarendon Court, First Floor Plan

Second floor, traditional house design

Clarendon Court Second Floor Plan

Four fireplaces, three bedrooms, two baths, one maid.

"Royal Barry Wills... or IS it?"

Royal Barry Wills... or IS it?

This past week-end I sat down with my partner and watched one of our favorite movies: “Mr. Blandings Builds His Dreamhouse”, the 1948 classic film every architecture client should be forced to watch.  I don’t know what part this movie played on my choice of career, but I distinctly remember being mesmerized as a child by the house and the suburban Connecticut couple, Cary Grant and Myrna Loy, who built it.  For those of you not familiar with the film, IMDB (Internet Movie Database) offers the succinct summary:  “A man and his wife decide they can afford to have a house in the country built to their specifications. It’s a lot more trouble than they think.”

When I was a young apprentice on the drawing boards of Royal Barry Wills  it was considered gospel among us draftsmen that the Connecticut dream-house of the title was a bona fide 1940′s creation of our own dear employer. The massive whitewashed chimney, the louvered blinds at windows AND front door,  the wide fireplace and low beamed living room were all old familiar friends seen daily on our own drafting boards.  Besides, who but Royal Barry Wills could have so perfectly rendered the ideal suburban residence of the post-war dream?  Alas, subsequent scholarship has informed me that the house so beloved by classic film fans and architects alike was only a movie set built on R.K.O.’s rear lot in Los Angeles; the same lot used decades later for filming the T.V. series “M*A*S*H”.

However, in an interesting aside, the architect-turned-set-designer who created the “house” for the studio was asked by his bosses to send actual floor plans to contractors who were to participate in a publicity stunt: building Mr. Blandings’ dream house on real lots across the United States!  It is estimated that seventy-eight replicas of varying degrees of faithfulness to the design were built in over twenty-five states to promote the movie.  The poor man had to re-draw the set countless times to accommodate the building codes of every municipality chosen.  A little research uncovered a copy of the first and second floor plans of this charming Colonial Revival house.

"Mr. Blandings' Dream House"

The American Dream: Four fireplaces, three bedrooms, two and a half bathrooms, one maid.

Neo-classical architecture in New England

Timothy Cronin's first architectural commission. Nahant

Does this powdered wig make me look fat?

One of my first clients was a Franco-American gentleman who sought to build a European home overlooking the ocean on Boston’s North Shore.  Symmetry, balance, harmony and proportion were our primary watchwords throughout the project.    It was a great honor to encounter such a kindred spirit upon first hanging out my shingle.

I recently spent a much longer day than anticipated turning-out a classical elevation of the house in the style of the great Eighteenth Century engravings done by Colen Campbell in the Vitruvius Britannicus of  1715-1725.  I thought you might enjoy seeing what’s possible with good old-fashioned pen & ink.

Modern houses of historic importance

Breuer-Robeck House in 1947

Breuer-Robeck House in 1947

Breuer-Robeck House today. Note: The sky hooks have failed at the cantilevered porch and have been replaced with a fieldstone wall.

Breuer-Robeck House today. Note: The sky hooks have failed at the cantilevered porch and have been replaced with a fieldstone wall

My partner, Little Tim, and I recently became the proud owners of a wonderful little Mid-Century Modern getaway house in Peterborough, New Hampshire.  Of course the house needs EVERYTHING and could best be described as an unheated, unplumbed and un-electrified stylish box at the moment.

As real estate agents and architects we are both absurdly gratified by the traction “Mid-Century Modern” is gaining among the public.  The term, with its implication of high-style mixed with academic scholarship, obtains a new respect for a population of houses recently dismissed as “those ugly houses from the 50′s”.

Little Tim and I recently attended a seminar given by ‘Historic New England’ nee ‘SPNEA’ on the challenges inherent in preserving Mid-Century Modern homes.  Historic New England are the longtime caretakers of the famous Gropius House in Lincoln, Massachusetts.  Their admirable attention to preserving original materials and furnishings as well as restoring the original landscape have made a visit to this amazing property a must-do activity for any student of architecture who visits Boston.

In addition to the great houses owned and maintained by the Society there are eighty private homes protected by easements in their Stewardship Program. A preservation easement is a legal tool that protects privately owned historic structures from neglect or insensitive alteration.  It preserves the exterior elevations and many interior features of significance.  It also prevents subdivision of the estate or the construction of additional structures on the property, maintaining the original landscape.

A great recent example from the Stewardship Program is the Breuer-Robeck House in New Canaan, Connecticut.  Built by the great modernist Marcel Breuer in 1947 as a week-end house for his family, the wood-frame house was featured in Architectural Record magazine in 1948.  The current owner, John P. Horgan, distressed at the trend of tearing down Modern houses to build “McMansions” in old established neighborhoods, worked with Historic New England to place this masterpiece out of the reach of the wrecking ball.

It is a strange thing when the houses we or our parents grew-up in are considered worthy of historic preservation.  It is a heartening development, though, when we consider the traditional “blind spot” each generation has for the architecture of its immediate predecessor.  The “stiff” Georgian buildings dismissed in the Nineteenth Century were mourned as lost monuments by the Colonial Revivalists three generations later.  The Victorian homes despised in the early Twentieth Century were lovingly restored by the great-grandchildren in the late Twentieth Century.  Perhaps we have learned from our history and are not doomed to repeat it, as George Santayana said.  Future generations will thank us for saving the particular slice of American architectural history entrusted to our care.

Perhaps the finest residence in Wellesley, Mass.

Archaeologically correct brick Federal Colonial house in Wellesley, Mass.

It has recently been my extreme pleasure to observe up close one of the finest houses I know.  This brick Federal Colonial in Wellesley, Mass., one of the fashionable suburbs west of Boston,  is a well known landmark for residents and visitors alike.  Its prominent site and mature gardens provide the perfect setting for what appears to be nothing other than an original Federal Georgian masterpiece from the late Eighteenth or early Nineteenth Century.  In fact, over the last two decades, several architect friends and I have assumed that this must be the original estate from which the surrounding suburban neighborhood was developed in the post WWI period.

Well, even the best trained eyes may be fooled for this house was in fact built in the 1920′s alongside its neighbors.  What sets it apart and allows it to pass as a period structure is the incredible historical scholarship and attention to detail the original architect brought to this commission.  This man knew his business: to replicate the scale, materials, forms and details used in house construction one-hundred years earlier; no small feat when you  consider his design also provides the central heating, two-car garage, modern baths and kitchen demanded by the upscale client of 1925.

Some things that caught my eye:

1.  The use of flat, gauged, skew-based arches, three courses high, above the first floor windows.  So much additional work is required of the mason that even the most insistent architect may quail at the wrath of the sub-contractor forced to turn such an arch in the field.  This detail is so seldom used today that its use suggests the house is 150 years older than it really is.

2. Setting window sashes flush with the brick veneer
In most contemporary brick-veneer houses the windows are framed flush with the plywood siding behind the brick.  In this instance the double-hung “12 over 12″ windows are built five inches out from the structural stud wall.  This innovation sets the sashes flush with the exterior brick,  giving credence to the fiction that this is a solid structural brick wall from the Eighteenth Century.

3.  Front door surround: detail and setback
In a neighborhood known for its historically inspired houses, this Georgian door surround and pediment are exceptional.  Fabricated of wood, the precise detail and monumental scale of the pillars and quoins suggest historical models executed in stone.  The deep setback of the door also adds to the illusion that the house’s walls are two feet thick.

4.  Window excellence
The twelve sash over twelve sash design of the windows is executed with such attention to detail they might fool even an historic-preservation scholar into thinking they are two centuries old.  The thickness, profile and glazing of the muntin bars are indicative of the 1820′s, not the 1920′s.  Thick wavy glass with minor imperfections was specifically chosen to give the signature “sparkle” of antique fenestration.  The extraordinary thick wood sills and full wood architrave would have been quaint anachronisms in the “modern” 1920′s when the house was constructed.

5.  Quality of brick
Hard-burned, red, water-struck brick, the signature brick of old Colonial work, was selected for the walls and chimneys.  More expensive and harder to set than modern extruded brick, this material is still produced by certain select brick makers in New England and Virginia specifically for historic work.  Its use adds considerably to the attractiveness (and price) of a house.  Water-struck brick should be explicitly specified by the architect in the Spec Book, otherwise the contractor is under no obligation to use the appropriate material.

6.  Appropriate window blinds (shutters) with appropriate hardware
The window blinds, commonly referred to as “shutters”, are custom built, thick, fixed-louver blinds of the sort used in the early years of the Nineteenth Century.  Painted gloss oil BLACK, they swing on pintel type hinges (not butt hinges as is sometimes incorrectly assumed) .  The blinds should cover the windows perfectly and the louvers should shed water when in the closed position.

These small details may seem hardly worth the mentioning.  The additional thought and expense might seem out of proportion to the aesthetic value gained.  It is only when taken together that the overall effect becomes such that even “the experts” will stand up and applaud.  For the layman, the sum total of the architect’s full “bag of tricks” renders an experience of contentment and joy which can be enjoyed without needing to understand how it was created.

Royal Barry Wills in Milton, Mass.

I recently received a letter from architectural historian Anthony Sammarco.  A huge history buff and longtime resident of Milton, Massachusetts, Mr. Sammarco admits to being a part of every “historical thing” that came his way:  The Milton Historical Society, Historical Commission, the Historic Forbes House; as well as writing several books on local history including:  Milton, Milton Then & Now, Milton Architecture and Milton: A Compendium.

Mr. Sammarco’s research includes the role Royal Barry Wills played during the post World War II period in housing returning G.I.’s seeking their piece of the American Dream in the suburbs west of Boston.  Though a partnership with Milton Savings Bank, Royal Barry Wills provided blueprints for a series of attractive and affordable houses pre-approved by the bank for V.A. mortgages.  A perusal of real estate listings in Milton will reveal just how desirable these sturdy and attractive homes remain today.

R.B. Wills Cape Cod style home for sale in Milton, Mass.

Royal Barry Wills, AIA (From: Milton: A Compendium by Anthony Sammarco)

During the early twentieth century, the interpretation of colonial design

was done by many architects, in some cases quite successfully, though the

authentic details of the eighteenth century were often adapted for modern day

living. One architect, however, made an important contribution to

American architecture and, thanks to the Milton Savings Bank, was able to

leave his impressive mark on our town.

Royal Barry Wills (1895–1962) was a noted architect who reintroduced

classic eighteenth-century architecture to the public during his long and

prodigious career. He once said, “We keep building traditional New England

houses because people like them so much. And, if they’re kept simple the

way they were intended to be, they’re almost as modern as Modern.”

Wills’s interpretations of charming classics were to be built throughout the

United States and Canada and to accommodate the desire for smaller, more

economical yet old-fashioned houses that offered a traditional and long

appreciated design.

Following his graduation in 1918 from the Massachusetts Institute of

Technology, he began his career with the Turner Construction Company

in Boston, but he soon tired of the commercial designs offered by this firm.

In 1925, he opened his own architectural office on Beacon Street in Boston,

where he designed garrison houses, saltboxes and Cape Cod cottages that

began to attract national attention. Following the Depression, his compact

yet distinctive designs were taken up with alacrity by a public seeking a

sense of economy in new domestic architecture. His designs were so widely

appreciated that in 1932 he received a gold medal from President Herbert

Hoover for his winning entry in the Better Homes in America Small House

Competition. Throughout the 1930–50 period, his firm, known as Royal

Barry Wills Associates, offered a wide array of designs that could be adapted

to suit individual choice and taste. His firm’s motto was “No stock plans” and

was to result in close to three thousand residential commissions. A prolific

author of eight books on architecture, among them Houses Have Funny Bones

and Better Houses for Budgeteers, he had architects in his office whom he “guided and controlled, yet encouraged them to add their individual design talent to the accomplishments of the firm.”

Milton has many houses designed by Royal Barry Wills, but it was following

World War II that the Milton Savings Bank approached him to design a

series of houses that could be used by residents who might build a new

house in town and thereby seek a mortgage through the bank. GIs returning

from the war were encouraged to build houses for their families, and Wills’s

“House of the Month” created interest and encouragement. Seen here, the

Tremont design was a two-story Colonial with a center chimney that would

be built at 2 Hurlcroft Street in Milton, a street laid out in 1942 by Hurley

& Driscoll of the Cary Hill Associates, though it is a mirror image of the

design seen in the Milton Record. The advertisement said that the “charm of

this authentic Early American exterior combines narrow white clapboards,

louvered shutters of contrasting hue, large capped chimney” and the very

necessary one-car garage for modern-day needs. The design, however, was

adapted to suit the family and built in red brick, and today it is an impressive

residence that perpetuates Royal Barry Wills’s vision.

Royal Barry Wills was a respected architect whose vision is kept alive by

his family, who continues his architectural office in the Back Bay of Boston.

He was awarded a Certificate of Honor in 1949 by the Massachusetts State

Association of Architects and in 1954 was elected Fellow of the American

Institute of Architects.

Reprinted with very kind permission of Mr. Anthony Sammarco.

Anthony M. Sammarco will speak on his new book Dorchester: A Compendium, published by The History Press, on Thursday, June 16th at the Lower Mills Branch, Boston Public Library.
The book outlines some of the clubs and societies, the artists and authors, fellow townswomen and townsmen, and businesses of this fascinating neighborhood of Boston.
A book signing follows.

Greek Revival house moved in Lexington, Mass.

Historic Lexington house finds new home across town

Proposed image for renovation to house in Lexington

Proposed image for renovation to house in Lexington

Starting the day with the Boston Globe and a cup of black coffee, I was happy to see on the front page of the Metro section an article about a house I’ve had my eye on for some time.  Several projects have brought me to historic Lexington over the past few years.  I’ve always loved the village character of the town, centered as it is on ‘Battle Green’, site of the first armed engagement of the American Revolution.  Time seems to have stood still on this sacred spot, white clapboard houses and church steeples primly arranged about the greensward of the common.  One house always drew my attention, both for its great character and for its state of dilapidation.  This wonderful old Greek Revival farm house (NOT “Colonial” as misidentified by ‘The Globe’)  was formerly owned by St. Brigid’s Catholic Church and had come under the protection of the Lexington Historic District Commission.  I had always hoped some clever and ambitious fellow would come along and move the house to a new site where it could be renovated and restored to its former glory.  It seems I wasn’t the only one with this bright idea as Mr. Patrick Carroll, co-owner of J&N Construction, did just that.  On Saturday the structure was moved from its original site along Massachusetts Ave. to a new foundation in Hancock Street.  My hat is off to Mr. Carroll for having the moxie to take on a project that many builders would shy away from.  Would there were more men of his creative vision.