Square (urban space)

“ It is a curious fact that an impression of vastness can be secured by inclosing a relatively small space. A square, like the Place de la Concorde, or even the inside of a cathedral, produces a feeling of size almost, if not quite, as great as an open prairie or sea. ”

“ There is no house that can claim beauty, and yet the Square, as a whole, has a fine charm, something that age and colour, haphazard adventure, space and quiet have all helped towards.
There is, perhaps, no square in London that clings so tenaciously to any sign or symbol of old London that motor-cars and the increase of speed have not utterly destroyed. All the oldest London mendicants find their way, at different hours of the week, up and down the Square. There is, I believe, no other square in London where musicians are permitted. ”

“ For, in the first place, men are very rarely seen in this strained posture; it is not natural to them; neither is it at all becoming. Secondly, the view of the human figure so disposed, does not naturally suggest the idea of a square, but rather of a cross; as that large space be tween the arms and the ground must be filled with something before it can make anybody think of a square. Thirdly, several buildings are by no means of the form of that particular square, which are notwithstanding planned by the best architects, and produce an effect altogether as good, and perhaps a better. ”

“ All the streets run at right angles to one another, so that a short cut, the joy of the accomplished Londoner, is impossible. It is a chess-board on which the bishop’s move is unknown. Nothing diagonal can be done. The city is ruled like the page of a ledger, from top to bottom with streets, from side to side with avenues. It is all divided into squares. When you are first told this, a vision arises of the possibility of cutting across these squares from corner to corner. Not a bit of it: a square at Philadelphia means a solid block of houses, not an open space enclosed by buildings. ”

“ And let not those whose eyes have been accustomed to the aristocratic gravity of Grosvenor Square and Hanover Square, the dowager barrenness and frigidity of Fitzroy Square, or the gravel walks and garden seats of the Squares of Russell and Euston, suppose that the affections of Tim Linkinwater, or the inferior lovers of this particular locality, had been awakened and kept alive by any refreshing associations with leaves however dingy, or grass, however bare and thin. The City square has no inclosure, save the lamp-post in the middle, and no grass but the weeds which spring up round its base. ”

“ Each square plot is encompassed by handsome streets for traffic; and thus the whole city is arranged in squares just like a chess-board, and disposed in a manner so perfect and masterly that it is impossible to give a description that should do it justice. ”

“ The plan of the city is very peculiar indeed, but made with the one view of bringing the employés of the system into [286] little communities near the place of their occupation. It resembles a portion of a great checkerboard, eight squares long by six in breadth. Each square is a half-mile in length and breadth, and has an area of one-quarter of a square mile. Four of these squares is called a section, making twelve sections, or twelve square miles in the city. Each section is divided into eight triangles of equal shape and area by diagonals from its corners. ”

“ All our communities cover equal surface space, a square fifteen hundred by fifteen hundred terrestrial feet or 2,250,000 square feet. All the communities except those adjoining the center oval are bordered into exact squares by hedges, even though the buildings within may be laid out in different shapes, so as to make the entire plan symmetrical and harmonious. ”

“ As each house is complete within itself in all its arrangements, those disfigurements called back premises are not required. There is a wide space consequently between the back fronts of all houses, which space is, in every instance, turned into a garden square, kept in neat order, ornamented with flowers and trees, and furnished with playgrounds for children, young and old. ”

“ A space, perhaps forty feet square, has been cut down fifteen or twenty feet, perhaps originally twenty-five or thirty feet, and the whole of the rock removed, leaving the sides regular and smooth, like the walls of a house. Parallel to the south side, and at the distance of eight or ten feet, a graduated road has been made fifteen or twenty feet wide, on a moderate descent, which brings it down near the south-east corner, to nearly the same level with the floor within. A noble archway is hewn through this wall, wide enough to admit three or four men abreast. ”

“ Then you will get both the size and the design of the tiny courtyard round which one of these big dark houses is built. The central square may be perhaps ten feet every way, but the balconies that run inside it overhang, and seem to cut away half the available space. To reach the square a man must go round many corners, down a covered-in way, and up and down two or three baffling and confused steps. "Now you will understand," say the Police, kindly, as their charge blunders, shin-first [Pg 225] into a well-dark winding staircase, "that these are not the sort of places to visit alone." ”

“ A room twenty feet square would afford sufficient space for a dozen people to eat, drink, work, trade, and sleep; while the streets of their towns and cities are so narrow, that it is quite possible to touch each side of the way with the hand as you pass along. ”

“ One cubic mile alone will afford measurement of space for over 15,000,000 rooms 20 feet square, and the entire square of the city would afford about 50,625,000,000,000,000 rooms of similar dimensions. ”

“ It is just like a passer-by looking at some of the new streets in Paris, where all the houses are built by one and the same building company, and resemble one another externally; or at the grand avenues in New York City, or the long strassen in Karlsruhe, spread out round a central square in the shape of a fan. ”

“ In the centre of the village is an open space, or public square, 150 feet in diameter and circular in form, which is used for all public games and festivals, shows and exhibitions. The lodges around this open space front in, with their doors toward the centre ”

“ There can be nothing in the world more charming than the way the Square receives its friends. Let it number amongst its guests a Duchess, that is no reason why it should scorn "Colonel Harry" or "Mouldy Jim," the singer of hymns. Scorn, indeed, cannot be found within its grey walls, soft grey, soft green, soft white and blue—in these colours is the Square's body clothed, no anger in its mild eyes, nor contempt anywhere at its heart.
The Square is proud, and is proud with reason, of its garden. It is not a large garden as London gardens go. It has in its centre a fountain. ”

“ The space to be occupied by the stairs is divided into nine equal squares, of which those in the corners represent the landings, while the intermediate ones are occupied by the steps; the middle square is the "well-hole." ”

“ The streets are very wide, paved, and built in straight lines forming small squares at intervals, each house having its garden, and though they are built low, yet they are in general convenient and well finished. The river is conveyed by small canals into the gardens, and the chief square, which is in the centre of the town, has a magnificent fountain. ”

“ They are unlike our college buildings, being constructed with an imposing façade, through whose centre is an arch, under the second story, opening into an enclosed quadrangle. These quadrangles vary in dimensions, from one hundred to one hundred and fifty feet square, and the students' rooms open into them. Out of the quadrangle nearest the street, similar arches may often lead into other quadrangles in the rear of the first, or at its sides; so that the establishment may be extended, in a series of buildings, without losing its primal characteristics. ”

“ Among the small open spaces which we must hope to see thrown open to the people in the time to come in a greater or less degree are the squares. Of course I know that the ground in the square gardens is the property of the freeholder, and that with the leases of the surrounding houses are granted certain privileges with regard to the gardens, which neither can nor ought to be arbitrarily withdrawn. ”

“ This square is surrounded by an iron railing and divided into beautiful walks, planted on either side with gaudy flowers, and shadowed by oranges and palms, while a grateful air of coolness is diffused around by the playing of a copious fountain into a large stone basin, surmounted by a marble statue of Ferdinand. Public squares, parks and gardens, are the lungs of great cities, and their value increases as the population becomes dense. ”

“ Seeing that she was passing through a very mean street, she hoped that Ulick's rooms were not too Bohemian, and felt relieved when she found that the street she dreaded led into a square. A square, she reflected, always means a certain measure of respectability. And the faded, old-fashioned neighbourhood pleased her. Some of the houses seemed as if they had known more fashionable days; and the square exhaled a tender melancholy; it suggested a vision of dreamy lives—lives lived in ideas, lives of students who lived in books unaware of the externality of things. ”

“ The market square is a wonderful, big open place to have in the middle of a town. It had got set aside years ago to be a park some day, and while it was a-waiting for parkhood, the town used the edge of it for a market and wood-yard. ”

“ Let me confess at once that we are a bit supercilious in our attitude toward the sister Square far to our West, across the Alps of Broadway. Our Square was an established center of the social respectabilities when the foot of Fifth Avenue was still frequented by the occasional cow whose wanderings are responsible for the street-plan of Greenwich Village. Our Square remains true to the ancient and simple traditions, whereas Washington Square has grown long hair, smeared its fingers with paint and its lips with free verse, and gone into debt for its inconsiderable laundry bills. ”

“ So when the great square was filled with people, come to see the race, insomuch that the men swarmed like ants, and the windows and roofs were all as full as an egg, Lightning came out and took his station at the top of the square, waiting for the signal. ”

“ I wandered at hazard through the solitary streets, whose chalk-coloured walls, pierced by a few windows, scattered far apart, and closed by means of wooden shutters, gave them a completely African appearance, until, I will not say without meeting a human being, but absolutely without seeing a living creature, I reached the great square, which is exceedingly picturesque and quaint. ”

“ Now a broad red wall is one of the most dreary objects of modern civilisation, and, indeed, the side of a square, broken only by rectangular windows, as exhibited in London squares, has doubtless had a depressing and injurious effect on the duration of human life. Russell Square and Bedford Square are familiar instances of this; and how unfavourably they contrast with old Lincoln’s Inn buildings, in the same city, the engraving will show, yet the same architecture that prevails in Lincoln’s Inn would abundantly serve all the purposes of a London square of modern times. ”

“ There are fashionable squares, all alive with the sound of carriage-wheels and the chaste accents of a thousand flunkeys; there are city squares, dull, dark places, with old red-brick houses, and a stunted, smoke-dried shrub or two in the middle. ”

“ N. B. Then a number of Squares or Areas unappropriated, and in situations proper for Colleges and Academies, and of which every Society whose object is national may be accommodated. Every house within the City will stand square on the Streets, and every lot. even those on the divergent Avenues, will run Square with their fronts, which on the most acute angle will not measure less than 56 feet and many will be above 110 feet. ”

“ What would real wealthy people be willing to give for a perfect picture only one-half inch square, in which the artist had clearly defined every field and tree, the rivers, houses, roads, railways and all the beautiful landscape contained in a vast area of many square miles? ”

“ In the public streets there are, on each side, booths and shops of every description. All the allotments of ground upon which the habitations throughout the city were constructed are square and exactly on a line with each other; each allotment being sufficiently spacious for handsome buildings, with corresponding courts and gardens. ”

“ New York knows little of Our Square, submerged as we are in a circle of slums. Yet for us, as for more Elysian fields, the crocus springs in the happy grass, the flash and song of the birds stir our trees, and Romance fans us with the wind of its imperishable wing.
The first robin was singing in our one lone lilac when the Bonnie Lassie came out of the Somewhere Else into Our Square and possessed herself of the ground floor of our smallest house, the nestly little dwelling with the quaint old door and the broad, friendly vestibule, next but one to the Greek church. ”

“ To get an idea of what the city is like, fancy an area of about thirty square miles crowded with houses as thick as they can stand, every house jam up against its neighbors, with only walls between--no room for yards or parks or driveways--and these houses dense with people! ”

“ The houses formed a square, as if the British square so famous at Waterloo for its dogged resistance to all the forces of the universe had immortalized itself in buildings, and they stared upon a severely railed garden of hardy shrubs and gravel to which the tenants had the inestimable privilege of access. ”