Lie 
AMERICAN HOMES VAND GARDENS 
May, 1906 
The Model House 
Some Successful Suburban Houses Costing From $6,600 to $7,700 
By Durando Nichols 
HE third and final article of the series of pa- 
pers on ““The Model House,” illustrates a 
class of dwellings which have been built in a 
more expensive manner than those shown in 
the first and second articles printed in the 
March and April numbers of AMERICAN 
HoMES AND GARDENS. 
The houses now illustrated are representative of the most 
economical and convenient planning, costing from sixty-six 
hundred dollars to seventy-seven hundred dollars. 
In the Colonial pe- 
riod men gave much 
thought and attention 
to the planning and 
building of their 
homes and their houses 
now generally termed 
as of the Georgian 
style, are some of the 
finest examples today 
of our domestic archi- 
tee tum e,, copies: OF 
which are being fre- 
quently made at the 
present time. Later 
the layman gave very 
little thought to the 
building of his house, 
and left it to the archi- 
tect, if he employed 
one, but more fre- 
quently placed it in the 
hands of the builder. 
Now the client wishes 
to rival his neighbor, 
and devotes much time 
to the arrangement 
and designing of his 
house, and the archi- 
tect is ever careful to 
carry out his client’s 
wishes and create a 
design which will not 
only be a credit to the 
client, but also to him- 
self. Today we are 
building in every pos- 
sible style and of every 
conceivable material, 
which permits of a very wide latitude; and when a home is 
completed, it represents, as it should, the outward and visi- 
ble expression of its owner. 
The accompanying illustrations show some good exam- 
ples of houses of the suburban type, and a careful study of 
them will reveal some of the fundamental principles of 
house-building, as well as many points that will be of prac- 
tical value to the prospective house-builder. 
A house should be built in a serious and dignified manner, 
as is, for example, the ‘““Chapel House” which is illustrated 
in Figure 1. In designing the exterior of ahouse, it should 
present an expression of all that is best in architecture, with 
|—The Porch is Chapel-Like in Design 
all the necessary materials and ornamentation, without be- 
ing superfluous, for it should contain no ornament or 
detail that does not mean something, and so with the in- 
terior; it should be designed and built in the same simple 
and elegant manner, and, if well executed, it should re- 
quire the least possible furnishing; in fact, a house 
should be so built, both on the exterior and _ interior, 
that it should not have one bit of ornament that is 
not necessary for the part it plays, whether in the ex- 
terior decoration or the interior furnishings. 
In the furnishing of 
a house, such as the 
“Chapel House,” and 
the same suggestion 
applies to the other 
houses in this series, it 
should be remembered 
that it is not, as has 
been charged against 
those who have insist- 
ed upon the expendi- 
ture of money, in buy- 
ing “things” for the 
home that makes it 
beawtt fiw) Pies 
thought. All too com- 
mon is the furnishing 
of a howsleliw ttm 
things—things bought 
without any considera- 
tion of their ultimate 
relation to each other, 
and how many, per- 
haps _ unwittingly, 
come under the dread 
“tyranny of things.” 
Whoever created that 
phrase never formed 
one with a_ better 
truth. We have been 
taught respect for our 
ancestors, but the way 
they meekly submitted 
to the tyranny of tidies 
and whatnots full of 
impossible j usneke 
known as_ bric-a-brac 
or dust-catching, in- 
sect - breeding, mi- 
crobe-sheltering plush furniture and hangings, and by exam- 
ple taught us the same submission, is enough to make us 
question—but there, respect for our elders prevents criticism. 
At all events, the houses of yesterday were enough to wring 
tears from the eyes of the family portraits compelled to look 
down upon them, day in and day out, from their gaudy gilt 
frames. 
The hopeful are keen to the hopeful signs, and the best 
of these is the teaching of ‘‘simplicity versus truck,” in the 
furnishing of a house by those of the best authority, whether 
it be a small suburban house or the large, stately mansion. 
The living-rooms of a house which are structurally inter- 
