Bristol Residences
Stair Parts. Fig 220. House at Bristol
Bristol still retains many interesting old houses, some dating from the early seventeenth century, and bearing witness to the wealth of its inhabitants at that period. These are to be found within a short distance of the quays, where the trade of the town centred. As the town spread further out more good houses were built, and there are still to be found in the outlying parts of the old town such houses as that shown in Stair Parts Fig. 220. It has a handsome, substantial front treated with more than usual richness; but if the pediments over the windows and the pilasters were removed, the residue would resemble one of the ordinary plain brick houses of the time. That is to say, the ornamental features are merely applied, and have no vital connection with the structure. The house is set a little way back from the street, thus leaving a narrow forecourt, which is enclosed by a railing abutting at each end on a handsome stone pier ; two similar piers carry a pair of elaborate iron gates in the middle of the front. The piers lend an air of dignity to the whole. In some instances, where a good house was built in a crowded street, it was set back some sixteen or twenty feet, thus forming a forecourt ; and high walls were built at the sides of the court from the house up to the street, thus providing screens to mask the ends of the adjoining houses, which were built on the actual street front. There is such a case in Eastgate, Gloucester, but the forecourt is now filled with a shop, above which can be seen the front of the house and the screen walls. Nearly all our old towns retain relics of ancient grandeur such as this, but they are gradually disappearing before the march of modern improvements.
Use of Stair Parts Design in London Houses of the Period
Stair Parts Fig. 221 Houses at Bedford Square London 1780
Stair Parts Fig. 222 Houses at Finsbury Square London Circa 1780
Stair Parts Fig. 223
Planning of London Houses
London, as may well be supposed, has innumerable examples of late eighteenth-century houses in such districts as Bloomsbury and Piccadilly. Bedford Square was built about 1780, and presents to the world some inoffensive, although not very exciting fronts. The central feature of one side is shown in Stair Parts Fig. 221 ; there is nothing of striking dongive a little interest to this rather dull though highly respectable square. Contemporary with this is Finsbury Square, which was laid out by George Dance, the younger, between 1777 and 1791.A part of it is illustrated in Stair Parts Fig. 222. By simple expedients the designer has imparted variety to his front, and has emphasised the principal floor, where, according to custom, the drawing-room is placed. The difficulty attending on the ornamenting of a row of houses with architectural features such has stair parts is illustrated here by the fact that one of the pilasters, which belongs in common to two houses, has been painted of two colours, which meet in a vertical line down the whole length of the pilaster-an effect certainly not contemplated by the architect. All these London houses have their kitchens in the basement, which is lighted from a sunk area between the house and the pavement. The plan generally adopted consisted of two rooms on each floor, one lighted from the front, the other from the back. Alongside the front room on the ground floor was the entrance passage, and next to the back room was the staircase with carved stair parts , with its gangway of communication from flight to flight (Stair Parts Fig. 223). On the first floor the drawing-room occupied the whole of the front, behind it was a bedroom ; the other floors repeated the arrangement. Sometimes the drawing-room included the space elsewhere devoted to the bedroom, thus making a large L-shaped room. This plan was used for houses of fair size and also for artisans' dwellings ; it is still the staple plan for houses in the long streets which make up the modern extension of growing towns, with the important exception that the kitchen and scullery are not in a basement, but on the ground floor, occupying the back room and the annexe. Of the London examples here illustrated this arrangement applies only to the houses in Finsbury Square ; the others are double-fronted. It is said to have been brought from Holland with William III., and this at least is tolerably certain, that no plan of this type is to be found in any collection of English drawings before this period, although there are plenty of plans with underground kitchens and offices. Thorpe has some plans for small houses in the city, with four rooms on the ground floor, one of which is a kitchen ; he also has a house occupying the space of " three ordinary tenements," from which we gather that an ordinary tenement had a frontage of 17 ft.