DESIGN 177 



more than one section during the era with which we 

 are dealing. 



The house was of course the most important thing 

 in the system, in one way the keynote, so to speak - 

 but every building had its use and was a necessary 

 part of the industrial life of which the house was the 

 centre and the object. Unless the requirements of 

 an estate are such, therefore, that a group system is 

 convenient and practical, it is hardly necessary for me 

 to say that any old garden design which has been de- 

 veloped as a result of such a system, is inappropriate. 

 The choice of an old design is not merely a choice of 

 a shape for a flower garden; it is a choice which must 

 consider the entire place and be governed by the con- 

 ditions prevailing, which will continue to prevail. 



All farms may be said to require the group system 

 of buildings. The old Dutch bouweries with their 

 helter-skelter placing of the offices, yet with the 

 garden still rigidly exact in position and design, af- 

 ford one treatment of this requirement; the stately 

 plantations of Virginia, whereon the great house stands 

 in fine dignity flanked by its two groups of dependent 

 serving-houses, deal with it in another way; while the 

 models of the middle ground, with dwelling and offices 

 ranged on either side of a level court, or on either side 

 of a long and usually low connecting wing that makes 

 them into one building, show still another. All three 



