BO4, 
have, up to the present day, 
“lived only on the surface of 
the earth. Therefore it has ' 
‘been but natural that we 
should design all our struc- 
tures to be seen from the 
surface. Now, through the 
agency of aviation, our 
range of vision is vastly 
broadened and our point of 
view enlarged so suddenly 
that we can scarcely realize 
all at once the full measure 
of possibilities thereby 
opened up to us. It is al- 
most as though a new di- 
mension had been unexpect- 
edly brought within our ken. 
Some years ago appeared 
a work of fiction with the 
scene laid in a suppositious 
land inhabited by creatures 
capable of comprehending 
only two dimensions—length 
and breadth. Their world 
had only surface. Their 
outlook was latitudinal and 
longitudinal, but never up- 
ward or downward; in con- 
sequence they appeared in- 
capable of either elation or 
depression. Doubtless, 
under such circumstances, 
existence must have been de- 
cidedly flat. At any rate, the inhabitants themselves 
were pictured by the author as flat as pancakes and as thin 
as shadows. A line drawn on the plane on which they lived 
and moved, and had their being, opposed to them a barrier 
more insurmountable than the highest peak of the Himalayas 
would be to a baby of the three-dimensional order. Any- 
thing rising above the surface of their plane world disap- 
peared utterly as far as they were concerned and baffled 
their understandings as completely as some things do ours 
when they perversely roll off into the fourth dimension and 
become invisible. With our “surface outlook”’ at buildings 
and cities and the world in general we*hayesbeen in the past 
not altogether unlike the plane dwellers. Now aviation 
has entered a wedge to change all this. Our point-of view 
has gained ‘‘downlook”’ as well as the length and breadth 
and “‘uplook”’ it had aforetime. Hereafter we must reckon 
upon making our cities at least presentable, if not attractive, 
as seen from above. ‘This new phase of requirements“fs 
going to affect individual — 
buildings or groups of build- 
ings in the first place, and, 
in the second, towns and 
cities in the entirety of their 
plan. It is but a logical and 
fair demand that a structure 
should be consistently come- 
ly from whatever point we 
view it; that is to say, it 
should be honest throughout 
in form and material and not 
speciously contrived to de- 
ceive the observer who can 
see it from only one side. 
We all know, however, to 
our regret that many a build- © 
ing that presents a noble 
A “‘down-view”’ 
AMERICAN HOMES AND 
A bird’s-eye view taken from a dirigible balloon in Germany 
wi omy Dee ewer districts of New York 
GARDENS September, ¢g12 
front is commonplace and 
brummagem in the parts 
hidden from public gaze. It 
is right enough, generally 
speaking, to put the best foot 
foremost, but when it goes 
to the extent of having a 
“Queen Anne front and 
Mary Ann back,” nothing 
could be architecturally more 
reprehensible. 
The vantage point of the 
aviator unmasks the sham 
and dishonesty of all such 
buildings. He sees all too 
plainly their deceptions and 
pinchbeck economies and 
loses all respect for them 
when so deformed, because 
there is no sterling worth in 
them. He sees, moreover, 
the shocking backyards en- 
closed within blocks of 
houses whose street fronts 
are past reproach. Before 
his eye these household ge- 
hennas, that slovenly dwellers 
vainly flatter themselves are 
shielded from all beholders, 
are laid bare. At a glance 
he notes the boxes, the ash 
barrels, the garbage cans, 
and all the other unsightly, 
and quite unnecessary, rub- 
bish that the carelessness of the negligent permit to disfigure 
space that ought, of right, to be given over to becoming 
adornment. All these things and many more the aviator 
sees, and as we are all future aviators potentially, we must 
now look to it that these blotches and eyesores no longer 
give offence. Shame at the thought of having our short- 
comings mercilessly exposed, if not solicitude for beauty, 
should prompt our efforts toward remedy. 
Aviation will grievously disappoint our expectations if 
it fails to work a drastic change for the better in the appear- 
ance of city roofs. As they are now, or most of them, at 
any rate, nothing could be more depressing, more distress- 
ingly, than the view from a tower or high office building— 
or of course an aeroplane—over the weary expanse of roofs 
spread out below. It is a dreary desert for “tarry pebbles 
and tin,” broken only by an occasional skylight with its 
gleam of glass, or here and there an air shaft whose purple 
depths suggest bad ventilation and worse light. 
Now and 
again the round bulk of a 
water tank obtrudes itself, 
squatting in the midst of its 
own rectangular patch of 
slag or tin, or else painfully 
perched across the angle of 
the side walls carried up 
above the roof at one corner 
of the building. 
Could any prospect be 
more disheartening and sor- 
did looking? If the altitude 
of your position brings a 
sense of exhilaration, one 
glance downward at the dole- 
ful waste at your feet serves 
to dash your spirits to the 
depths. The only relief 
