Richard Phené Spiers

“ The introduction of the purer Italian style into England in the 17th century created a great change in domestic architecture. Instead of the projecting wings and otherwise picturesque contour of the earlier work the houses were made square or rectangular on plan, in two or three storeys, crowned with a modillion cornice carrying a roof of red tiles ”

“ Houses in stone from the 12th to the 16th century are found in Cologne, Metz, Trier, Hanover and Münster in Westphalia, where again there are whole streets remaining; and in brick at Rostock, Stralsund, Lübeck, Greifswald and Dantzig, forming a very remarkable series of 15th and 16th-century work.
Of half-timber work in Italy there are no examples, but sometimes (as at Bologna) the rooms of the upper floors are carried on arcades, and sometimes on corbels, as the casa dei Carracci in the same town. ”

“ Of the houses in succeeding centuries, those found in the cities of central Syria, described in the article Architecture, are wonderfully perfect, in consequence of their desertion at the time of the Mahommedan invasion in the 7th century. Very little is known of the houses in Europe during the dark ages, owing to the fact that they were generally built in wood, with thatched roofs. ”

“ The porte-cochère also, from its dimensions, is a feature of more importance than the ordinary street doorway, even when a portico of some kind is added; on the other hand, the strict regulations in Paris as regards the projection of cornices and other decorative accessories gives to the stranger the appearance of monotony in their design, which certainly cannot be said of the houses in flats lately built in London. ”

“ The house of Livia on the Palatine Hill was in two storeys, and the decoration was of a much finer character than those of Pompeii; this house and the House of the Vestals might be taken as representative of the Roman house in Rome itself. In those built in colder climates, as in England and Germany, account has to be taken of the special provision required for warming the rooms by hypocausts, of which numerous examples have been found, with rich mosaic floors over them. ”

“ In the north and west of England, where stone could be obtained at less cost than brick, and in the east of England, where brick, often imported from the Low Countries, was largely employed, the ordinary houses were built in those materials, and in consequence of their excellent construction many houses of the 16th and 17th centuries have remained in good preservation down to the present day ”

“ The stone staircase in the palace rising through two storeys shows that even at this early period the houses in towns had floors superposed one above the other; to a certain extent the same extension existed in the later Greek houses found in Delos, in two of which there was clear evidence of wooden staircases leading within to the roof or to an upper storey. The largest series hitherto discovered is that at Priene in Asia Minor, where the remains of some thirty examples were found, varying in dimensions, but all based on the same plan ”

“ In some of the London streets, where shops occupy the ground floor, a far finer type of house has been erected than that which could have been afforded for the shopkeeper’s residence above, as in old times, so that London promises in time to become a city of palaces. The same change in the aspects of its streets has long been evident in Paris, but there is one feature in the latter city which has never yet found its way into London, much to the surprise of French visitors, viz. ”

“ To the 13th century belongs the old Rectory House at West Dean, Sussex, and to the 14th century the Parsonage House at Market Deeping, Lincolnshire. The principal examples of the domestic architecture of this early period in the country are castles, manor houses and farm buildings, as town houses occupied sites too valuable to be left untouched ”

“ It is probable that in Italy and Spain “l’art nouveau” may meet with the same success, and for the same reasons, so that in the latter country it will be a revival, with modifications, of the well-known Churrigueresque style, the most debased Rococo style which has ever existed. ”

“ The French architects, however, project their piers on immense corbels, and then sink their windows with deep external reveals, so that no benefit accrues to the room, so far as the increased light is concerned. ”

“ Of such structures in English towns (see Plate II. fig. 9) there are still preserved some examples in York, Southampton, Chester, Shrewsbury, Stratford-on-Avon, and many smaller towns; the greatest development in half-timber houses in England is that which is found more particularly throughout Kent, Sussex and Surrey, in houses of modest dimensions, generally consisting of ground and first floor only, with sometimes additional rooms in the roof ”