A SMALL POCKET-BOOK AND A LARGE IDEA.--AMBITION, DOLLARS, AND A
GOOD HOUSE.--THE GROWTH OF THE HOUSEKEEPER'S IDEAS.--POINTS ABOUT
THE HOUSE.--$2,900.
It is frequently said of those who would build, that their ideas are
larger than their pocket-books. It is certainly not discreditable to any
one that his ideas should be larger than his immediate resources. Such a
condition causes the enlargement of the individual and his pocket-book
at the same time. The man who says that he wants two thousand dollars'
worth of house does not get as much for his money as he who in effect
says, "I want three thousand dollars' worth of house for two thousand
dollars." The latter is an ambitious man; the former has only a little
ambition. He merely wants a house. Fortunately, however, there are few
such people. It is more likely to happen that a man and his wife, who
have worked hard for several years, get enough money together to build a
home, and it is possible that this home has been talked about for
several years previous to their building. In fact, they have been
educating themselves in house-building. They have acquainted themselves
with all of the modern conveniences. They have studied porches,
vestibules, and stairways; they know how many rooms they want on the
first floor and the bedrooms that they will have above. At first this
house presents itself in a very crude form; but in the course of time
the plan shows itself more clearly to them. They begin to place the
furniture in the imaginary rooms, and as they do this their ideas
enlarge. They add at first inches, and then feet, to the size of the
various rooms. At first their ideas of a kitchen were quite moderate; in
time a sink begins to assume certain vague outlines, then it takes
definite form on one side of the room; then a pump is placed beside it;
afterward the wife says, "How nice it would be if we could have a
hot-water faucet over the sink." At first they shake their heads and say
that it would cost too much; but in the course of a few evenings' talk
on this and kindred subjects, they come to the conclusion that if the
hot-water arrangements do not cost too much, they will have them; and
that as things are so much cheaper than they used to be, they certainly
ought to get all of these for about what they originally expected to pay
for the house. Their ideas have been of slow growth, but continuous, and
in the aggregate the growth has been great. During all the winter
months, previous to the time when they would build in the spring, many
sketches are made, of the floor-plans of the house that is to be.
Finally the net result is handed to a builder or an architect,--more
frequently the former, as most small houses are built without
professional service. The figures from the builder come in, and are very
much higher than was expected. It is quite a shock, for certainly there
is nothing there that they can well do without. Everything has been
thought of so much. Nothing that their plan contains appears to them to
be less than a matter of necessity. Other builders are asked to figure
with results little more satisfactory. In the end there must be a
compromise; the builder and the owner both yield, and, as a result, a
very satisfactory house is built. There are little things which they
would have different, but, in the main, the house is satisfactory.
This is the universal experience, and the effect upon the domestic
architecture of this country has been very pronounced. We can now get a
better house for a given sum of money than ever before. Better not only
as to general construction, but as well on account of external
appearance, and the convenience of its internal arrangements. One may
get more of what are regarded as the little conveniences, which mean so
much to the housekeeper. This is not altogether the result of lower
prices of the material and labor which go to make a house, but is as
well on account of the skill which has been developed in planning and
arranging buildings, with reference to economy in space, and cost of
general construction. The planning of houses has undergone a revolution
within a few years past; and instead of having the long, narrow halls at
the side and in the middle of a house, and the long halls and narrow
passages through the upper floor, all of which was ugly and
inconvenient, we now have the same area thrown in large square rooms, so
as to be available.
It may be known that chimney stacks are quite expensive. For this reason
an effort has been made to group them, so that they may be made to
answer for a number of rooms; and the success with which efforts in this
direction have been attended has been wonderful indeed. The modern floor
plan is altogether different from that of the past; it is more
convenient and less expensive to build; and, as said before, this is
largely the result of efforts of the owner, who has ideas larger than
his pocket-book, and the architect or builder, who exercises his
ingenuity to bring the ideas and the money together.
[Illustration: Plan No. 7]
Plan No. 7 is of an eight-room house, and is fairly representative of
the ideas expressed. The general form, it will be seen, is square. It is
a two-story house with a reception-hall, parlor, dining-room, kitchen,
china-closet, pantry, and stair-hall on the first floor; there are
three chambers, the servant's bedroom, the bath-room, and a
communicating hall on the second floor. The first floor is ten feet six
inches high, and the second, nine feet six inches. From the second floor
there is a stairway going to the attic, which is large and roomy, and
which may have various uses. The cellar is seven feet high, and is well
lighted by having the joist set well up from the grade line. There may
be a laundry here, and, separated from it by a door, we may have a
coal-cellar and a furnace-room. As we approach the house, there is,
first, a broad porch about eight feet in width, and fourteen feet in
length. At a slight additional expense, say fifty dollars to sixty
dollars, this porch might be extended across the entire front. Before
reaching the front door, there is a small vestibule,--arranged with or
without storm-doors, as may be thought desirable. It is the impression
of the writer that storm-doors are seldom used. The distinctive feature
of this house is the hall, which is large enough--thirteen feet six
inches by fifteen feet--to be used as a sitting-room. In the front part
of this hall, and at the right as we enter, are a window-seat and a
broad window in front and immediately above it; this is slightly
separated from the main room by the small pilasters or casings on each
side. Immediately in front of the doorway, there are a grate and mantel
set in one corner of the room. There are large doorways, five feet wide,
leading into the stair-hall immediately back of this room, and into the
parlor at the left as we enter. In this case there are merely door
openings, portières or curtains taking the place of ordinary doors.
Sliding-doors might be used in addition to the curtains, and thus have
the advantage of both curtains and doors. From this room the outlines of
the stair-hall and the stairway are visible or not, according to the
arrangement of the portières. There is a side entrance into this hall,
and from it one may go into the kitchen by passing through two doors. It
is a good principle in planning a house always to have two doors between
the kitchen and any other part of the house. One door could as well be
used in this instance, but a second one is added to make the isolation
more complete. In the plan here given, it may be noticed that there are
cellar stairs passing under the main stairway in the hall.
The dining-room may be entered either from the front parlor or from the
stair-hall. In each case doors are used. It is always desirable to have
a dining-room so arranged that it may be closed from the other parts of
the house. There is a grate in each of the two principal rooms, the
hall, the parlor, and the dining-room, and all communicate with a single
stack. This is much more economical than having three distinct stacks,
which are so frequently used for accomplishing the same result. The only
other chimney stack is in the kitchen. The two answer every purpose.
The outside corners of the dining-room are cut off at an angle of
forty-five degrees, so that the end of the dining-room presents the form
of a large bay window. In the middle space at this end may be placed the
sideboard, in which event a window will be placed over it,--that is,
well toward the ceiling. The dining-room communicates with the kitchen
through a large pantry, eight feet square, or through a slide in the
back of the china-closet. In the kitchen there are broad windows on the
two sides, and a door leading into the back yard.
In following the stairway to the second floor, it will be noticed that
there is a broad landing something more than half-way up, and that there
is a large window, slightly above it, which lights the hall below, and
partially lights the one above. The advantages of having a stairway
which lands approximately in the centre of the house, as does this one,
is that no room is lost by having long halls which have to lead from the
front to the rear of the house. All we need have is a short hall in the
centre of the building, which will communicate with the rooms around it.
Another convenience of this arrangement is that all of the front of the
house is utilized for chambers. Where the stairway lands in the front of
a house, there must either be a long hall, which is a waste of room, or
one must pass through one or more chambers to get to others. In this
plan the rooms are arranged around the hall, there being three large
ones over the three principal rooms below. In each of these chambers
there is abundant space for the usual bedroom furniture,--viz., a bed,
dresser, wash-stand, and chairs. In these rooms there are closets, and
at the end of the hall there is a store closet for bedding, etc. The
servant's room, as shown, is over the kitchen, as is also the bath-room.
[Illustration: Fig. 12.]
It may be noticed that the fixtures in the bath-room--that is, the
bath-tub and closet--are directly over the sink below, so that the pipes
may have the most direct and the shortest runs possible, which is not
only economical, but also safer from flooding in case of accident. The
tank in the attic, which contains the soft or cistern water, is directly
over the tub, and the laundry sink in the cellar is directly under the
kitchen sink. Thus, from cellar to attic, all the plumbing fixtures are
in line, and all pipes exactly vertical, excepting where it is desirable
to take a short branch to connect the fixtures. Having the bath-room
slightly separated, as it is, from the main hall, it is safer, from a
sanitary point of view, than if it opened directly into the main hall.
There is a closet for soiled linen next to the bath-room, which is
accessible either from it or from the short hall leading to it. The
stairs to the attic lead out of the hall, as shown. The attic is
floored, but is otherwise unfinished. If found desirable, one or more
rooms could be finished here, which would be quite as large and pleasant
as any of the other rooms in the house. This house can be finished
complete, including fences, sheds, walks, gas fixtures, plumbing,
mantels, and furnace, for $2,900.
Fig. No. 12 is an elevation.