the cottages, schoolhouses, literary meeting room, and even the village
pump, all in picturesque form, and generally architectural in character.
The plan given here is probably not like that of the cottage at the
hamlet. It illustrates one room, size 13 ft. by 12 ft., a scullery 12
ft. by 9 ft., and larder under the stairs. The latter are shown with
the double-rise step. The upper plan shows one room of the same size as
that below, and a closet. The scullery on the ground floor is large
enough to form a sleeping room for boys, or to make a small living room.
The height of the lower room is 9 feet 6 inches. The section shows the
general form and fittings of the rooms. The plate below the plans gives
an elevation of the front, showing the rustic seat and the side of the
entrance porch, the gable of the cottage formed into a pigeon-house,
together with the side front of the cottage and its entrance porch. The
small window at the side is intended to light the first steps of the
stairs; a small shed for wood or coals is placed at the back. Such a
cottage could be built and finished complete at a cost of about one
hundred and ten pounds.
[Illustration: Plaster frieze for drawing-room.]
_DESIGN No. 4._
A DOUBLE COTTAGE.
[Illustration: Perspective view.]
[Illustration: Ground plan.]
[Illustration: Upper plan.]
These cottages were intended to be attached to some ornamental grounds
which were very carefully attended to; and as the building formed a
[Illustration: Elevation of front.]
prominent object, it was rendered architectural and pleasing in
character. In plan the cottages are large
[Illustration: Section.]
and roomy, and they are of the cheapest kind. If constructed in plain
brickwork, without the ornamental gable on the porch, the pair could not
have cost more than 250_l._, and at that sum they have been estimated
for by a London builder. Each cottage has one living-room on the ground
floor, _f f_, of the size of 14 feet by 10 feet, with a scullery, _g g_,
attached, size 10 feet by 6 feet 6 inches, and a small larder and
staircase.
[Illustration]
The latter, with ten risers, leads to the upper floor, in which are one
large and one small room. The plate gives the ground plan, and the plan
of the upper floor. The closets are in the yard attached to the
cottages, but not shown in the plan.
The plate gives an elevation of one of the fronts, and a section, taken
through the living-room and scullery: a portion of the ornamental gable
is illustrated in the previous page.
* * * * *
The vignette represents an ornamental escutcheon and handle, in brass,
for an inner entrance-hall door. The drawing is one-third of the full
size.
[Illustration]
_DESIGN No. 5._
A DOUBLE COTTAGE AND VILLAGE SUNDAY SCHOOL.
[Illustration: Perspective view.]
[Illustration: Ground-floor plan.]
This building was intended to be placed in a village of one of the
midland counties, nearly all the buildings in the village being of
picturesque character. It was the property of a gentleman who was
erecting a large Elizabethan mansion in the neighbourhood; the design is
for a double cottage and Sunday school; the latter being under the
direction of the clergyman of the parish.
[Illustration: One-pair plan.]
The porch was decorated to give it importance, and form a shelter for
the clergyman in passing from one school to the other. One part was
intended for boys and the other for girls. The chimneys of the building
were grouped together in the centre so as to form a prominent object;
they were copied from a very fine ancient example, then existing at a
farm-house near Ashford, in Kent.
The illustration gives a view of the front, and the plans. Each of the
two principal rooms was 16 feet 6 inches by 13 feet 6 inches, with a
scullery on the side 10 feet square, and having a good oven; the larder
was under the stairs. The rooms above were
[Illustration: Section through length of building.]
of the same size as those below. One of the cottages had the centre room
below as well as that above arranged so that one had four rooms and the
other two; but this could be changed at any time, to provide each
cottage with three living rooms each. A section through the length of
the building and the chimney stack is given in the previous page, and an
elevation of the front is given above.
[Illustration: Elevation of entrance front.]
The building was to be constructed with sound stock bricks, and red
brick rusticated facing round the upper windows; the finishing of the
gables with their small pediments was of cut red bricks. Small compo
finials crowned the whole.
[Illustration: Finial.]
[Illustration: Finial.]
[Illustration: Elevation of chimney stack.]
The porch had trunks of trees for columns, the entablature and pediment
were formed of cut bricks and compo facing; the pilasters on each side
of the lower windows were of cut squared flint, peculiar to the county,
the whole resting on a plinth of rough country stone. A wooden
balustrade of simple pattern surmounted the porch, extending on each
side of the columns. These latter resting on a stone slab. The chimney
stack is shown, and its plan, on the previous page.
[Illustration: Plan.]
[Illustration: Elevation of a chimney stack at a farm-house, Ashford,
Kent.]
The old stack from Ashford, with the plan at its base, and capping, is
also illustrated.
These representations of the two chimney stacks, ancient and modern, are
drawn to the same scale, so that the difference between the present and
old mode of treatment may be seen. The large flues of the old example
permitted the then mode of sweeping, by discharging a culverin up the
flue. The occupants of the dwelling could not then have cared much for
return smoke in their rooms; which in these large flues, with coal as
fuel, must have been considerable, and could only be obviated or
prevented by the numerous cold draughts of air permitted to pass through
the interior of the building.
[Illustration: Plan of capping.]
[Illustration: Plan of base.]
The plan of this building was adapted from a very favourite one of the
late Sir John Soane. He erected it at Wimpole, in Cambridgeshire, for
the Earl of Hardwicke, in 1794. It had a very plain exterior, and the
roof was covered with thatch, a very common mode with architects at that
time, but now objected to from the serious evil of its harbouring
numerous insects--indeed at times they render the building almost
untenantable. The walls of the cottages at Wimpole were built in Pisé,
or with clay and fine gravel, properly prepared and beaten down in a
mould. Each wall was three feet in thickness, the fireplaces and
chimneys were of brick. Every opening was covered with strong wood
lintels, the whole width of the walls, and two feet longer than their
respective openings.
The walls stood on brick foundations two feet above the ground. The cost
of the construction was about 450_l._ Design No. 5 could not now be
constructed for less than 630_l._
It may be here remarked that nothing certain can be advanced about the
cost of a building until the situation and local circumstances are fully
known and considered. In the absence of these no estimates can be given
with that accuracy which every gentleman wishes for, and ought to be
possessed of, before he begins building.
_DESIGN No. 6._
A HUNTSMAN’S LODGE OR COTTAGE.
[Illustration: Perspective view.]
[Illustration: Ground plan.]
[Illustration: Upper plan.]
This edifice was erected in the neighbourhood of some thick plantations
in a sporting district. It was constructed of brick, with a wooden
porch; the facing bricks of the walls being of a light-yellow colour,
with red bricks round the windows; and the whole of the cornices and the
four chimneys were of cut red brick. The building seen from among the
trees looks
[Illustration: Front elevation. Section.]
very pleasing. The ground plan shows a front room 13 feet square, with a
small scullery behind; the larder is under the stairs, which have the
double riser, and a window is placed both at the bottom as well as at
the upper part of the staircase, to give plenty of light. The upper plan
shows three bed-rooms, each about 10 feet by 6, and a small bed closet
for children, the closet having a ventilator in the chimney at the
angle. These chimneys, instead of being grouped together in the centre
of the structure, occupy the four corners--an expensive form of
erection, but one that gives more room in the interior. The elevation of
the front is given in the plate, and the section by its side; the small
figure below shows the different courses of cut bricks forming the
pediment and cornice.
[Illustration]
These were carefully executed, and had a good effect. The first figure
likewise illustrates the oak finial on the top of the roof. A
chimney-piece in one of the upper rooms had a quaint carving in the
centre of a fox’s head, a subject appropriate to the pursuits of the
occupant of the cottage.
[Illustration]
The chimney-piece, and the fox’s head on a larger scale, are here
represented. The gateway seen at the side of the building in the view
was formed by the workmen out of various old fragments; it leads to a
yard in which are various sheds and out-buildings.
[Illustration]
* * * * *
This vignette affords a specimen of ornamental iron railing intended for
exterior work, and suitable for any situation in which such may be
required, in consequence of the neatness of its pattern.
[Illustration]
[Illustration: Rose Hill Villa.]
THE CONCRETE CONSTRUCTION FOR BUILDING COTTAGES.
Considerable pains have been taken for the last fifty years to discover
the best and cheapest method of building cottages; bricks, stones, wood,
mud, plaster, and lately straw and bitumen, have all been selected.
Sound bricks and good building stones, well incorporated with mortar of
a good and binding quality, will last for centuries; while those of mud,
clay, plaster or concrete are continually becoming out of repair, and
therefore ought never to be introduced where sound construction is
desired, and better materials can be procured. In our moist climate,
unless great pains are taken in compounding such materials as clay or
concrete, in constructing walls, and in protecting these against the
effects of the weather, they will soon decay. Mud walls, however, made
perfectly in the common manner, of clay well tempered and mixed with
sharp sand, will last very many years.
The preceding view represents Rose Hill Villa, near Stockbridge,
Hampshire. It is probably the largest and most important specimen of
such a construction in England, and comprises dining and drawing-rooms,
each 20 feet by 18 feet, morning-room, housekeeper’s-room, kitchen, back
kitchen, pantry, excellent cellars and all requisite offices; five very
superior bedrooms, two dressing rooms, a water-closet on the landing and
ground floor, and five servants’ bedrooms. It has a double coach-house,
harness-room, and stabling for four or six horses, and in the outhouses
a four-roomed cottage for the coachman.
This villa was formerly in the occupation of Fothergill Cooke, Esq.,[A]
the inventor of the Electric Telegraph, and is now the residence of Sir
Augustus Webster, Bart.
The building is constructed of chalk concrete, and has stood the test of
forty years’ exposure without any signs of decay. Mr. James Flitcroft
sent in 1843 a view of the villa to the “Builder,” and thus described
the construction of such houses in the locality:--The walls are carried
above the ground two and sometimes three feet to prevent the damp from
rising to the mud, which if wetted would scale off by the action of
frost. The kind of earth used is fine chalk, dug from the surface; if
timely notice of any building will permit, it is best dug in winter,
that the frost may act upon it. Buildings formed of this material can be
erected only in dry warm weather. The workmen in preparing this chalk
for use put about a cartload of it together, throw water over it, and
tread it with their feet, turn it over, again tread and turn it, until
it begins to bind something like loamy clay; then let it soak a little
while, when it is ready for use. The waller is able to put on a layer of
about fifteen inches; he begins at one corner and goes round the
building, putting one layer on another, taking care that the lower one
is sufficiently dry to bear the upper. In buildings of two stories high,
the walls are generally eighteen inches thick. When the walls are got up
five or six feet, and pretty dry, the quoins are plumbed, and the walls
dressed down a little, in order that the waller may see what he is
about. A small short spade is the best tool for this purpose, with short
handle and rather bent. The work is then proceeded with as before, until
it is raised up to the square of the building, when the
[Illustration: Elevation and section of a wall (see p. 86).]
walls get their general dressing, ready to receive their coating.
Mr. Flitcroft describes Rose Hill Villa as coated with stone,
lime-coloured and drawn. The columns of the villa are of brick. He
states that there are several other buildings of this kind at
Stockbridge, Winchester, and other places in the neighbourhood. He
describes a better method of constructing such walls by the use of a
moveable trough or box about 12 feet in length by 18 inches in depth.
This trough rests on bearers put across the wall, with a mortice at each
end wide enough apart to receive the sides, and the thickness of the
wall; in these are inserted uprights to prevent the sides giving way,
with others to go across the top. This mode of construction is however
very ancient, and when done on a large scale the primitive method is
still pursued.
This method is shown in the preceding engraving, which gives an
elevation and section of a wall in process of construction, with the
posts, _b b_, the moveable planking, _c c_, and cross pieces, _d_. It
will be seen that three courses of bricks are put about every five feet
in height. The figures here given are copied from a very old French work
on Architecture and Building; they also show the manner in which roof
construction was attempted with slabs of the same material, as shown in
figs. 1 and 2: the building is supposed to be square, as shown by the
dotted lines _a_, _b_, _c_, _d_.
[Illustration: Fig. 1.]
[Illustration: Fig. 2.]
[Illustration: Elevation.]
[Illustration: Section.]
The plan, elevation, and section given below represent a small tomb
wholly formed of concrete slabs, the door alone being excepted. This
little building forms really a solid concrete monolithic edifice.
[Illustration: The entrance door.]
[Illustration: Plan.]
A very common method of forming partitions, and even roofs in some of
the agricultural districts in Hampshire, is first to put them up with
strong wattle hurdles. They are double the size of the common hurdle,
and made of a thicker material. When in their place, they are plastered
over with concrete, and made about four inches in thickness; they very
often require repair. It is said that concrete walls are subject to
contraction and expansion, and speedily show vertical cracks at
intervals, which in our damp climate would soon permit the wet to enter.
There can be no question as to its strength as a building material, as
some experiments conducted by the Institute of British Architects gave
the following results--viz., “Concrete composed of two parts of lime,
thirty-six parts of sand, and five parts of cement, can resist a
crushing weight of four tons to the square inch, being twice the
strength of Portland stone, eight times the strength of Bath stone, and
sixteen times the strength of brickwork.”
In constructing cottages with concrete everything depends upon the
goodness of the cement and the care with which it is used. The occupiers
of these cottages are frequently their own operators; the work is
generally too speedily performed, and the consequence is that the fruits
of their labour are in most instances of but short duration.
For obvious reasons it is necessary that the greatest economy should be
observed in the construction of peasants’ cottages, and for these
reasons the apartments should always be on the ground floor, which will
render it unnecessary to build them more than eight or nine feet high.
Where mud walls are introduced, the lower they are made the better, in
which case they should be made to batir on the outside so as to resist
the pressure of the roof, the covering of which should project as much
as possible, to throw off the wet and protect the walls. The chimney
flues in these clay and concrete walls are formed of drain-pipes, which
answer admirably. These humble dwellings should be paved with
brick-on-edge paving laid on sand, which is much warmer, and more
conducive to health than any sort of rough flagging, plaster, mud, or
concrete floor. The latter, although much cheaper, can never be made to
look clean. Foundations of clay or concrete walls should be of brick a
few courses above the surface, and the walls when dry should be covered
with a thick coat of plaster consisting of lime and sand, or what is
still better, a coating of good Portland cement. This ought constantly
to be kept perfect, as everything depends upon the goodness of the work.
Concrete improperly mixed is not so strong as brickwork, but is mere
rubbish; but when perfectly done it hardens with age, becoming like
stone, impervious both to wet and frost.
Materials can be found in every locality. One of the principal
constructors using such, Mr. Tall, who works with an excellently
contrived apparatus, thus describes them:--“Clay, which may be burnt
into ballast easily and cheaply, and is a most superior material for
concrete; gravel, stone, crushed slag from furnaces, smith’s clinkers,
oyster-shells, broken glass, crockery, or any hard and durable
substance. Where sandstone or any flat stone is to be found, walls can
be built even cheaper than of gravel concrete, as a labourer can break
the stone.” He gives the proportions of materials used in houses then
being constructed at Gravesend, as follows:
£ _s._ _d._
7 yards of burrs from brickfield, at 5s. 1 15 0
7 yards of gravel stone, at 3s. 1 1 0
1 yard of Portland cement, 16 bushels to the
cubic yard, at 2s. 1 12 0
Labour, at 2s. per cube yard 1 10 0
---------
Total £5 18 0
---------
Three cubic yards of concrete will build 60 yards of 9-inch work, at a
fraction under 1_s._ 11_d._ per yard.
Concrete cottages have been built at Setting, in Kent, under Mr. Adkins,
architect, that cost only 105_l._ per pair; the ground floor contained
two rooms; with the usual larder and closets, and the upper floor three
rooms and a cupboard; these cottages had gabled fronts and were
picturesque in character. It would be an extra expense over the common
method to construct floors and roofing of concrete; the advantage to be
gained would be their fire-proof character.
In superior buildings the high tenacious power of good cement is
repeatedly, it may be said commonly taken advantage of in the
construction of roofs. These are formed by cementing plain tiles, and
they have considerable strength. Roofs of 12 feet span, constructed in
segmental form, rising three feet, and only of three plain tiles in
thickness, successfully resist great pressure, and are durable in a very
superior degree; but they require to be well tied in, and formed
between iron girders connected together with iron tie rods, otherwise
they sink and force out the walls. Roofs of cemented tiles have been
constructed from 30 to 40 feet span, and have been found to answer well;
hoop-iron bond, laid at intervals between the tiles, is a great
advantage. The tenacious power of good cement was proved in a very high
degree a few years ago by Mr. Brunel, in the construction of two
semi-arches built of brick, springing from a pier or abutment 14 feet in
height. One extended 50 feet in length, the other 38; the rise of the
arches was 10 feet, the width only 4 feet 6 inches; a weight of about 40
tons was suspended to the extremity of the shorter arch without breaking
it.
The result of this test proved that arches of 200 feet or 300 feet span,
and probably more, might be constructed in the same manner at very
moderate expense, without centering. Iron-hoop bond is said to nearly
double the strength or holding power of the cement. Flat experimental
beams have been constructed of brick and cement, with hoop-iron bond
laid horizontally between the joints or courses of the brickwork, which
have given equally extraordinary results.
Concrete for walling was extensively used in England at the beginning of
the present century; it got into bad repute through failure of a river
wall at Woolwich, where it was either badly done, some mistake was made,
or it was unsuited to the position. The wall was constructed of blocks
of concrete cast in moulds, and submitted to pressure while setting; a
coating of fine stuff being applied for the sake of appearance, ample
time having been allowed for the blocks to set and harden before use.
The blocks were 1 foot 6 inches high, the binders and stretchers in the
course being each 2 feet 6 inches long, the bed of the former being 2
feet, and of the latter 1 foot; the wall was built upon piles, its
height above the piles being 24 feet; the thickness at bottom was 9
feet, at top 5 feet with a batir in front of 3 feet in 22.
The face of the wall was composed of blocks, as described, and rough
concrete thrown in to complete its thickness, and that of the
counterforts. After a frost it was found that this wall was seriously
damaged, hardly a single block having escaped, and in many cases their
whole face had peeled off to the depth of half an inch. The discharge of
a drain from a height of 6 or 8 feet had worn away the lower courses to
the depth of some inches. On a like wall at Chatham, similar but much
more severe effects were produced.
The failure of this wall costing about 80,000_l._, was a serious matter,
and for several years after architects looked upon concrete as being so
much uneatable hasty pudding, considering that it was only beneficial
when confined in a trench for foundations. Sir Robert Smirke used it in
the foundations of the Penitentiary, Millbank, and Sir John Soane in
1830 used it in the foundations of the New State Paper Office (now
pulled down) in St. James’s Park. Here the ground had to be excavated to
a depth of 22 feet before arriving at a gravelly stratum; at each high
tide the Thames filled the trenches with water, which remained in
considerable quantity; as this was pumped out, the adjoining party walls
of the buildings in Duke-street cracked so completely that they had to
be taken down. The trenches were first filled to the height of two feet
with broken stones and bricks from the old buildings, and then dry lime
and clean river sand, with a large quantity of small broken granite
stones, were thrown in from the height above. A body of concrete 8 feet
in width by a thickness of 3 feet was thus formed; the water ceased to
enter the trenches and the building was commenced.
Mr. G. Godwin, the editor of the “Builder,” in an essay on concrete
which gained the first prize given by the Royal Institution of British
Architects, appears to have been the first to suggest its use in walls
above ground; and for these Portland cement concrete, when properly
prepared, is without question an admirable material.
_DESIGN No. 7._
[Illustration: A garden gate--plan and elevation.]
In France it is used to a very great extent, in numerous bridges, and
several miles of large sewers. A church (that at Vésinet, near Paris, of
mediæval architecture), constructed entirely with iron and this
concrete, is completely fireproof. In England a considerable length of
sewer has been constructed of concrete at Sidmouth, under the direction
of Mr. Phillips; and near London, between the Kensington and Gloucester
Road stations of the Metropolitan Railway, a very large handsome bridge,
rusticated, and in design similar to, and in every respect in appearance
a stone bridge. From some alteration required in the railway, it has
been removed.