Small country houses; their repair and enlargement; forty examples chosen from five centuries

Front matter

THEIR REPAIR & ENLARGEMENT

LAWRENCE WEAVER

SMALL COUNTRY HOUSES

Preface

THE welcome given to Small Country Houses of To-day would seem, if I may believe my correspondents, to have been due in no small measure to the seven chapters (out of forty-eight) which described old houses repaired and enlarged. This suggested that a second and uniform volume, dealing wholly with the treatment of old houses, whether cottage or farm house or small manor house, would be useful to the increasing number of people who like the atmosphere of age in their homes. A real responsibility rests on those who undertake the alteration of an old fabric, for our buildings are an essential part of our national history. This is no less true of the cottage than of the palace. Our building traditions are as much, indeed more, a heritage from forgotten craftsmen, as from William of Wykeham, Master Yevele at Westminster and John of Gloucester, who was King’s Mason at Windsor. Of such nameless folk we may use Solomon’s words, with but a single change : “ a poor wise man, and he by his wisdom built the city ; yet no man remembered that same poor man.”

To those who appreciate all the skill and subtlety of touch which were the outcome of the wisdom of old builders, this record of the treatment of their handiwork is dedicated.

I have to acknowledge the kindness of Mr. Basil Oliver, who has lent me the photographs for Figs. I, V, VI, and the plan in Fig. 47 ; of Mr. Batsford, for his permission to reproduce that plan from Mr. Oliver’s Old Houses and Village Buildings in East Anglia; and of Mr. H. Avray Tipping, for allowing me to incorporate the substance of two articles by him in Chapters VIII and XXVI.

Lawrence Weaver.

A FIT SUBJECT FOR REPAIR

Small Country Homes : Their Repair and Enlargement .

xi.

Introduction

The clangers of fashionable archaeology. The delusiveness of conjectural “ Restorations.”

Making things look old. The need to preserve all traditional work. Eclecticism of the nineteenth century. “ A plea for reverence.”

The removal of plaster from beams. Old buildings on new sites. The use of old fittings. Mr. William Weir and the “Anti- Scrape.” Amateurs in architecture. The risks they run. Wise limits of enlargement -------- - i

Chapter I. — The Old Court House and The Mound, Long Crendon, Bucks

Two examples of Tudor buildings repaired bv Mr. Austin Gomme. The beneficent activities of the National Trust. Curious history of the Manor. The Mound a good type of a group of cottages joined to make one house.

Clever treatment of difficult site - - i

Chapter XVII. — The Grove, Mill Hill

Mr. Stanley Hamp’s reconstruction of an Elizabethan timber house. From cottage and tuck - shop to Master’s hostel. Lack of passages in early houses. A garden pavilion.

The Public School boy and education in architecture. Montaigne on the critic’s vocabulary ------ - 100

Chapter XVIII. — Old Castle, Dallington, Sussex. A name justified by the site’s history

“ Traitors’ Town.” Jacobean core of the present house. Mr. Ernest Newton’s repairs and additions ------ X05

Chapter XIX. — Combelands, Pulborough, Sussex

An old dishonoured building renewed bv Professor Prior. Concerning proportion in architectural design. The outcome of fitness.

Professor Lethabv quoted - - - no

Chapter XX. —The Cottage, Charlton, Onon

Mr. F. E. Smith’s hunting box and its enlargement by Mr. Alan James. A new building sandwiched between two old cottages.

The planning of alterations based on compromises. William Morris on Cotswold building. Oxfordshire building traditions - 115

Chapter XXL -Barton Hartshorne Manor, Bucks.

Sir Robert Lorimer adds a considerable house to a fragment of 1632. Progressive accretions. A late Jacobean staircase. Lord Thurlow’s lead cistern. The S.P.A.B. and the “ antique 121

Chapter XXXIV. — Two Squash Racket Courts

A new court at St. Clere, designed by Mr.

Godfrey Pinkerton. Standard dimensions for courts. Materials for walls and floors. Old barn at Liphook converted into court by Mr. W. T. A. T. Carter. Methods of artificial lighting ------ 195

Index xiv. Small Country Houses : Their Repair and Enlargement .

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.

Coloured Frontispiece : The Mound, Long Crendon.

Otley Hall, Suffolk.

i. Paycocke’s : Before Alteration, ii. ,, After Alteration,

in. The Guildhall, Lavenham : Before Alteration.

iv. ,. , , After Alteration.

v. An East Anglian House : Before “Restora-

tion.”

vi. ,, ,, After “ Restora-

tion.”

vii. The Town Hall, Watlington : Before

Repair.

viii. ,, .. As Repaired.

ix. Woolston Grange, Before Enlargement.

x. ,, And as Altered.

xi. Dining Hall in Old Oast House.

xii. Converted Oast House at Hildenborough.

xiii. A House at Wittersham — -

xiv. Formerly an Oast House.

29. 3°- 31- 32*

jj'

Ouennell House, Plaistow, Sussex.

Old Sussex Tile-hanging.

A Typical Sussex Homestead.

Plans of Ground and First Floors.

From the West.

From the North-east.

South-west Angle.

First-floor Landing.

Sitting-room Fireplace.

Nethergate House, Clare, Suffolk.

Entrance Front.

Garden Front.

A Carved Beam.

Hall.

Ground-floor Plans.

Staircase of 1644.

Library.

Garden-room.

A Panelled Bedroom.

An Old Cottage at Peaslake, Surrey.

The Old Court Long Crendon

House and The Mound,

\\Test Corner.

Plans of Cottage.

I . Old Court House : Timber Roof in Court Room

Entrance from the Common.

Added Studio M ing.

Sketch Plans.

In the Studio.

o-

Court Room.

From the East.

From the South-west.

Living-room.

Paycocke’s, Coggeshall, Essex.

Road Front.

Street Front from North-west.

The Mound :

Ground-floor Plan.

Big Doorway.

Way in from Road.

Garden Side.

Cloister Stairs.

Beams in Hall.

Looking Down on Forecourt.

Ground-floor Plan.

Panelled Room.

From the North-west.

Garden Front from the East.

A Bedroom.

Vann, Hambledon, Surrey.

1 3-

Stables.

Forecourt and Well.

From the South-east.

Pergola.

Pond and Paved Walk.

Plans of Ground Floor, Garden,

Terrace from the North.

Floor.

*7-

Corridor.

From the North-east.

Library.

Hall.

Porch.

List of Illustrations .

xv.

Vann, Hambledon, Surrey ( continued ).

56. Music Gallery in Barn.

57. Parlour and Stairs.

58. Corridor Leading to Barn.

58A Parlour Fireplace and Ceiling.

Little Lodge, Chailey, Sussex.

60. North Front.

61. Ground and First-floor Plans.

62. South Side.

63. Living-room.

64. Corridor Upstairs.

The Old House, Aspley Guise.

65. Western Chimney-stack.

68. Great Chamber.

70. Parlour.

71. Attic Workshop and Laboratory.

72. Cabinet in Black and Gold Lacquer.

The Wharf, Sutton Courtenay.

73. Barn and House from the Backwater.

74. Barn from Lawn.

75. Sitting-room in Barn.

76. Bedroom in Barn.

77. Oak and Brick

King John’s Farm, Chorley Wood.

79. East Corner of Inner Court.

80. North-east Side.

81. From the North-west.

83. Outer Door of Great Parlour.

84. Staircase.

85. Upstairs Corridor.

86. Room where William Penn was

Married.

Old Bell House, Ludford.

87. From the Road, Looking North.

88. House, from Lawn.

89. House and Mill from North-west.

90. Garden Plan.

91. Staircase Corner of Hall.

93. Drawing-room.

94. Ground Plan Before Alteration.

95. ,, ,, as Altered.

96. Hall.

97. Old Mill Wheel.

1 13

Il8.

IX9.

125. 126.

Little Pednor Farm, Chesham.

Dovecote and Motor-house.

Entrance Door from South-east.

From the North-west : Before Alteration.

,, ,, After Remodel-

ling.

Pool and Sunk Garden on East Side.

South-east Corner.

Plan of Ground Floor and Forecourt.

Hall : Fireplace End.

Once Barn, now Hall.

Stonewall Cottage, near Tunbridge Wells.

East Side.

Oasthouse from the East.

Entrance Front from North-west.

Cottage from South-west Before Alteration.

From South-west After Enlargement.

Hall.

Upstairs Corridor.

Sitting-room on First Floor.

Plan of Cottage and Outbuildings Before Alteration.

,, of Cottage Before Alteration.

,, as Enlarged.

The “ Priest’s House ” and The Manor House, West Hoathly.

“ Priest’s House ” : Before Repairs.

,, ,, Plans.

,, ,, Fireplace in

“ Sussex Room.” ,, ,, Sussex Furniture.

,, ,, Museum on Upper

Floor.

,, ,, As Repaired.

Manor House and Church.

,, ,, from the South.

,, ,, Plans.

,, ,, East Side.

,, ,, On the First-floor Land-

ing.

,, ,, Early Seventeenth Cen-

tury Staircase.

Wolverton Court, Stratford-on-Avon.

Entrance Front from the South.

New Connecting Wing.

From the North.

Plans.

Entrance Door.

Hall.

Dining-room.

Dining-room Fireplace.

xvi. Small Country Houses : Their Repair and Enlargement .

Rake House, Milford, Surrey.

From the South-west.

Plan Before Enlargement.

New Lodge.

New Porch and Old Chimney.

South Side.

Ground-floor Plan of Rake To-day.

Entrance Front from Across the Lake.

East Front.

New Drawing-room.

Dining-room.

Entrance Front.

Plans of Ground Floor and First Floor.

From the North-east.

Garden Front.

Summer-house.

Garden from the Summer-house.

One of the Sitting-rooms.

192. 193- 194. 195 •

The Court House, Broadway, Worcestershire.

Garden Front from South-west.

From the Road.

South Front.

West Side.

Ground and First-floor Plans.

Drawing-room.

West End, Broadway.

New Entrance Front.

Old Road Front Before Alteration.

The Same Front Reversed and Rebuilt.

Ground-floor Plan.

Hall Fireplace.

Drawing-room.

Music-room.

From the South-east.

Old Castle, Dallington, Sussex.

West Side.

Plans.

Entrance Front from the North.

From the South-east.

From South-west, Showing Old Castle Wall.

In the Hall.

COMBELANDS, PULBOROUGH, SUSSEX.

Entrance Front from the East.

Ground-floor Plan.

Looking Eastward.

South Front.

The Orchard Farm, Broadway.

Entrance Front from the Road.

North End of Garden Front.

Garden Front from North-west.

Ground-floor Plan.

North-west Side of Music-room.

South-west Side and Paved Court.

North-west Terrace.

Bird’s-eye View.

Big Music-room ; Once a Barn.

Hall.

Briglands,

Kinross-shire, and Dunfermline.

PlTTEN-

Dining-room Fireplace.

In the Library.

Briglands : From North-east. -

On the Stairs.

,, From the South-west.

Basin and Statue.

Cottage, Charlton, Oxon.

Terrace and Stairway.

Entrance Door.

Plan of Principal Floor.

Steps to Terrace.

The Long Gallery.

Garden Front.

Pittencrieff House :

Street Front.

Three Rooms on

Ground-floor Plan.

First Floor.

Thatched Garden Shelters.

End of Long

A Yew Garden in the Making.

Gallery.

Hall.

Long Gallery.

Library.

An Old Ceiling.

Plan.

ion Hartshorne Manor, Bucks.

West Front and Steps.

Aspley House, Bedfordshire.

Entrance Front.

Garden Wall from Road.

In the Garden : Looking Eastwards.

Entrance Front.

From the South-east.

Garden Front.

Ground-floor Plan.

Ground and First-floor Plans.

Old Stairs.

Staircase.

Dining-room.

Gate-leg Table, circa 1720.

List of Illustrations .

XVII.

Aspley House, Bedfordshire ( continued ).

226. Settee, circa 1720.

227. Two Chairs ; Part of a Set.

228. Oueen Anne Chair.

229. Needlework Armchair.

Morton House, Hatfield, Herts.

230. Street Front.

231. The Garden Front : Before Restoration

233. Hall and Staircase.

234. Plans : Before and After Alteration.

235. Study Fireplace.

236. Attic Chapel.

237. Looking Out from Dining-room Loggia.

The Road Farm, Churt, Surrey.

238. From Entrance Gate.

239. From South-east.

240. Entrance Front Through Stable Gate-

way.

241. Pergola and Pools.

242. View from Garden House.

243. Lhrder Pergola : View from Gardenhouse.

244. House and Garden from West.

245. Ground Plan.

246. Garden Plan.

Saxby’s, Chislehurst, Kent.

248. In the Drawing-room.

249. From the Road.

A House in an Oxfordshire Wood.

253. Looking into the Loggia.

254. South Front.

258. Library.

259. New Stables.

260. Stable Court.

261. Dining-room Bay from North-east.

2 77

Aswardby Hall, Spilsby, Lincolnshire.

Garden Front.

From the West.

Porch.

Staircase Window on West Side.

Drawing-room Fireplace.

Main Corridor.

Plans.

Point Hill, Rye, Sussex.

Entrance Front.

South-east Front.

Loggia and Terrace.

A Natural Rock Garden.

Porch.

Plans of Point Hill.

From the South-west.

Dining-room Fireplace.

Lyne Grove, Virginia Water.

New Loggia from South.

From the South-east.

Under the Loggia : Looking South.

Ground-floor Plan.

Terrace.

In the Study.

Upstairs Corridor.

Two Squash Racket Courts.

St. Clere : New Arch to Forecourt.

,. Site Plans.

,, Section Through Roof and

Window.

,, In the Squash Racket

Court.

,, Two Weather-vanes.

,, Squash Racket Court from

the Garden.

Liphook : Barn Converted into Court.

,, Games-room with Screen and Gallery.

OTLEY HALL, SUFFOLK.

A fourteenth century moated house, remodelled by Mr. P. Morley Horder.

Small Country Houses : Their Repair and Enlargement .

xix.

INTRODUCTION.

The Dangers of Fashionable Archeology — The Delusiveness of Conjectural “ Restorations ” — Making Things Look Old — The Need to Preserve all Traditional Work — Eclecticism of the XIXth Century — “A Plea for Reverence ” — The Removal of Plaster from Beams- -Old Buildings on New Sites— The Use of Old Fittings — Mr. William Weir and the “Anti-Scrape” — Amateurs in Architecture — The Risks they

Run — Wise Limits of Enlargement.

THE possession of an old house with a history, however simple or humble, brings manifold pleasures, which extend to repairing and enlarging it. Those who have a feeling for old things find in such work three chief sources of satisfaction. They like to live with work done in traditional ways, and to mark the irregularities and odd devices which show the unaffected workmanship and nimble minds of long dead craftsmen. They are affected by the sense of continuity and enduring usefulness, and join themselves in thought with owners of bygone centuries, though nothing may remain but their names, and often not even such slight knowledge. They please themselves in the endeavour to make the additions to the handiwork of the old men in a spirit of reverence for their achievement, and of a single intent to do nothing unworthy of their example. The problems involved are often of peculiar difficulty. We ask, and with reason, that we shall not be hindered from taking advantage of modern advances in hygiene and comfort by the demand that old work shall be left absolutely intact as a monument of bygone days. On the other hand, the antiquary has the right and duty to plead that history shall not be obliterated by any modernising process.

If the middle of the nineteenth century may fairly be called the Age of “ Restoration,” some name will need hereafter to be found for the present time, when people are busy either in undoing that “ restoration ” work or in making repairs and enlargements in a different and more knowledgeable spirit. The crime of the Gothic revivalists was in their destruction of the work of periods which their mediaeval zeal held in abhorrence. They were so certain of their absolute rightness of view that Renaissance work was resolutely destroyed and its place taken by lifeless Gothic imitations, which sufficiently confessed their own modernity. The situation to-day is altogether different. Architects are far more clever in catching the old spirit when additions have to be made, but this very cleverness will make problems for the antiquary of the future. Archaeology has become a fashion, not always well informed, and the craze for making everything look old is likely to become as delusive as the zeal of sixty years ago was destructive. In the course of describing many examples of repaired and enlarged houses in the following chapters, I have dealt in some detail with the right and wrong ways to set about such work, but some xx. Small Country Houses : Their Repair and Enlargement .

typical cases of the modern sort of restoration, carried too far, will also be considered in this Introduction.

It seems safe to lay down the general principle, that all work which was done up to the beginning of the nineteenth century has its own interest and character. About the year 1800 the continuous development of tradition ceased, and building became the sport of eclectic fads in favour of one style or another. A house built first in Elizabeth’s reign may be more and not less interesting if, in William and Mary’s reign, sash windows took the place of the original casements. The year 1700 is no less vital in English history than 1600, and we are defacing history if we take out the sashes of 1700 and replace them by casements of 1914 in the vain hope that we are renewing the atmosphere of 1600 in the process. It may be suggested that logic demands a like respect

for the work of 1850, that we have no more right to deface Victorian history than Georgian history. It may be said that my argument would make sacrosanct some hideous Victorian addition to an Elizabethan house, and that we ought not to replace it by something more in harmony with the original building. Such an attitude, however, would ignore my main contention, that it is traditional building w h i c h demands our respectful preservation, and that it does so because it was representative of the life of the people. The domestic builders of 1650 and of 1750 were like those of 1450 and 1550 in one essential thing — they built as they did because they knew no other way. They did not sit down and consider whether they wanted to be Gothic or classical, picturesque or formal ; they knew nothing of the battles of the styles. Their manner of building was one of the artistic outcomes of the life and thought of their time, and was therefore representative of them, not less certainly because they were not conscious of it. With the work of 1850 it was otherwise. It would be absurd to suggest that a Gothic house with plate glass windows was representative in any credible way of the banker for whom it was built, or that the Italian villa of 1830 and the “ Oueen Anne ” house of 1870 revealed, either in more or less degree, the aesthetic growth of that banker’s uncle and nephew. The houses of 1830,

Introduction .

xxi.

1850 and 1870 alike may have an interest of their own by reason of the skill which went to their design, and I should protest as vigorously against the ill-treatment of a fine typical building by Pugin, Sir Charles Barry or Norman Shaw as against the loss of an eighteenth century house. But it would be for a different reason. They worked in an atmosphere not of tradition, but of eclectic effort. Their houses were good, when they were good, not because of the power of a good and authentic tradition, but in very spite of the lack of any tradition or coherent stream of tasfe during the nineteenth century. The outcome of this argument is the principle that where an old house, say, of the sixteenth century is to be “restored,” and it contains features of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, it is wholly wrong to remove the latter and to replace them by imaginary reproductions of their sixteenth century originals, even if there remain enough clues to establish the form of the original features with comparative certainty.

I come now to some examples which will emphasize this argument.

In Chapter V Paycocke’s,

Coggeshall, is illustrated, and two pictures also appear here in Figs. I and II. Fig. I shows the house as it was before its late “ restoration.” It is more 11. — paycocke’s after alteration.

than probable that i t s

original builders fitted the front with oriel windows, but at some date (possibly as early as Charles II’s reign, certainly not later than the middle of the eighteenth century) they were replaced by flat frames with mullions and transomes. Paycocke’s, as it was, revealed a typical building tradition of East Anglian villages in the late seventeenth and in the eighteenth centuries. Fig. II shows its present condition, with conjectural “ restorations ” not only of oriel windows, but also of oak shafts, brackets and figures. If it be assumed xxii. Small Country Houses : Their Repair and Enlargement .

III. — THE GUILDHALL, LAVENHAM, BEFORE ALTERATION.

that it was proper to wipe out the traces of eighteenth century occupation, it must be admitted that the modern translations of the first windows of about 1500 have been well done, but I find it impossible to approve what amounts to a falsification of history.

Figs. Ill and IV show the Guildhall, Lavenham, Suffolk, before and after “ restoration.” In its present state there are seven new oriel windows, copied from the only original one remaining (the lower one to the right of the photographs). There is little doubt that such windows existed ; but if new frames were needed to replace the flush-framed windows shown in Fig. Ill, which were comparatively modern and of no interest, the latter could have been renewed with flat oak frames of better proportion or with windows of oriel form, but sufficiently different in detail from the one original oriel to proclaim their modern making.

The photographs reveal another mistake. Nothing could have given the building a more modernised appearance than the unnecessary oiling of external timberwork and distempering of the plaster-faced spaces. This was done because the building was said to be “ patchy ” ; but the inevitable result has been to give it a dull and unpleasant uniformity. This example

Introduction . xxiii .

brings to a sharp issue the Gothic Revival practice of replacing missing features with conjectural imitations as opposed to the more conservative manner of doing only that which is absolutely essential for structural security or adaptation to meet modern requirements.

The case for doing the minimum rather than the maximum of obvious repair to old buildings was admirably put in a paper entitled “ A Plea for Reverence,” by the Master of the Charterhouse, the Rev. Gerald S. Davies : ‘‘I have often wondered what would happen to us — any of

us, I mean, who are still young enough to have a living mother — if after an absence we were to come back and find that someone had persuaded her to have herself made beautiful for ever by a Bond Street Restorer, who should have dyed her silver hair into the colour which it bore when she was a girl, and smoothed out all the kindly wrinkles which time and the length of days had wrought there, under a plaster of enamel and powder and paint. ‘There,’ says the Restorer, ‘that’s your mother. You liked her as she was, we know, but she was old and rather surface-worn. Now we have done her up for you, and she’ll last ever so long like that.’

IV.— -THE GUILDHALL, LAVENHAM, AFTER ALTERATION.

xxiv. Small Country Houses : Their Repair and Enlargement

Figs. V and VI show another East Anglian house, in which the process of conjectural “ restoration ” has been carried a good deal further. A simple plastered house with two gabled dormers has been stripped of its plaster, its sliding sashes replaced by bays and casements, its verges tricked out with carved bargeboards and a wholly new porch provided for an entrance door moved from its original position. 1 am not concerned to enquire what evidences there were that the house had once looked somewhat as it does now, but this much at least is clear : Fig. V shows a building honestly and typically East

Anglian, not “pretty/' if barge-boards and exposed timbers are the sole test of “prettiness,” but frankly a product of a definite tradition. Fig. VI reveals a house of no authentic age or time, a piece of solid scene-painting, which pretends to have stood in just that fashion for several centuries.

It may be useful in this connection to utter a warning against indiscriminate removal o f plaster. It is not the case that internal beams a n d partitions w ere always intended to be exposed, or that it is always reasonable to strip off the plaster and show the timbers.

Generally speaking, the workmanship o f the woodwork gives a clue.

If it is very rough it may be assumed that it was originally plastered. If the edges are moulded in any way, restoration.” that is good enough

proof that they should

be exposed to view. I have, however, seen many examples of repaired cottages where beams and studding are of such rough-and-ready workmanship that a concealing coat of plaster was an obvious kindness.

External plastering should not be removed and the timbers exposed unless there is clear evidence that it has been added later, and not even then, if the plaster is East Anglian pargetting. The Moot Hall, Thaxted, Essex, was not long ago cleansed of its flush-panelled pargetting, which must have been done at least two hundred years ago, and marked one of the most definite and characteristic manners of craftsmanship that the Eastern Counties practised. It must not be forgotten that pargetting was for protection, and the buildings which have lately been skinned in a wild desire to show the striped effect of the vertical timbers are likely, in consequence, to have their lives shortened considerably.

-AN EAST ANGLIAN HOUSE BEFORE

Introduction .

xxv.

So much by way of warning against the present tendency to “ fake ” the exterior of old buildings. A like caveat must be entered against a delusive use of interior fittings. A large trade is done not only in old staircases, fireplaces and panelling, but even in ornamental plaster ceilings, which can, with care, be cut out of old buildings in sections and refixed elsewhere. When old buildings, by reason of their hopelessly inconvenient position or for some other cogent cause, must be removed, it is obviously desirable that they shall not be destroyed. Sometimes they can be rebuilt on a site in the same neighbourhood — Crosby Hall, moved to Chelsea from the City, is a good example of this treatment — but present practice often goes further. I know a case where a little timber house was taken down and rebuilt a hundred miles away, adjoining a fine stone house of altogether different character. In the result each of the two dissimilar fabrics made the other look ridiculous.

In cases where the remains o f demolished fabrics are used to enlarge or adorn other old buildings, it is desirable that some obvious record be made, by inscription or otherwise, to reveal to those who will come after us what precisely is the history of what they see. I would personally rather see an old fireplace in a new building, or a new fireplace in an old building, than an old fireplace taken from one old fabric to another.

The zeal of the collector has extended from furniture to mantel-pieces and panelling and so onwards to complete rooms. There are some historical houses to which old rooms, snatched from another fabric, have been added with such unpleasant skill that the forgery is revealed only by the distorted and unhistorical plan. Such methods are dangerous and delusive, in that they poison the wells of architectural history. The plea of everyone who loves the relics of antiquity in a sane way must be for honesty and for a recognition that modern architecture, even when concerned with old buildings, has the right and duty to leave its own mark. To the expert eye this mark will always be there to be seen, and the attempt to hide it seems superfluous. The true aim in the repair and enlargement of old houses should be to ensure that the new work is in the same spirit as the old, without

XXVI.

Small Country Houses : Their Repair and Enlargement.

being an imitation of it. The various methods of giving an old appearance to new materials used in works of reparation, with intent to make them look coeval with the original fabric, are insincerities which should be resolutely condemned.

Attention may be drawn by way of contrast to the conservative way in which such a building as Watlington Town Hall has been repaired under the supervision of Mr. William Weir (Figs. Vdl and VIII). His work is based on the principles laid down by the Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings. It is not only conservative in the preservation of every scrap of

old work, but eminent lv satisfactory in appearance.

For the needful repairs to the walls bricks were made locally of the same size as the old ones. The attitude of the S.P.A.B., familiarly known as the Anti-Scrape, is sometimes more rigorous in respect of the alteration of old buildings than some antiquaries can endorse. Its work has been of immense value, however, in forming public taste and in checking the vandalism which raged unhindered before the Society was formed.

A difficult point sometimes arises w hen a building of unquestioned antiquity i s found t o h a v e been changed so drastically in past years that its original charactei vii. — the town hall, watlington, befoke repair. has almost disappeared.

In such cases a greater

freedom seems permissible in the invention of new features. Woolston Grange, near Taunton, may be taken as an example. The original roofing and the window openings had been wholly altered (Fig. IX). Mr. Horace Farquharson was therefore quite justified in giving a more attractive character to the north front by adding a hipped bay containing a porch (Fig. X). Considerable latitude must also be given when a fabric, which has outlasted its original purpose, can be converted to new employments. Among such buildings oast houses may be cited. They have fallen into disuse in many parts of England, notably Kent, but as they are often stout buildings, it would be foolish not to

Introduction .

XXVll.

give them a new career. Mr. Reginald Blomfield, R.A., has turned one into a bothy at Godinton. Mr. Clough Williams-Ellis has converted another at Hildenborough into dining-room and dormitory for Princess Christian’s Farm Colony (Figs. XI and XII). A third at Moon Green, Wittersham, has become, with sundry additions, a charming little country house (Figs. XIII and XIV). The spire-like roofs were cut down, but the circular plan has been kept, and, by the addition of floors, four attractive round rooms have resulted. In the following chapters many examples are illustrated in which old barns, of all sorts of construction, have been turned into comfortable rooms.

I come now to a vexed question, on which it is desirable to write plainly, viz., the function of the amateur in the handling of old buildings. It may be presumed that no one buys a more or less derelict or inconvenient house, with intent to make it a comfortable home, without some enthusiasm for old things. He or she may be tempted to undertake the necessary repairs and additions in the light of their own knowledge, but it is a dangerous enterprise. The amateur in this employment is likely to fare no better than in law or medicine. An amusing picture of the self-approving layman (or rather lay woman) in such matters is given us viu. — the town hall, watlington, as repaired.