October, 19 lo 



AMERICAN HOMES AND GARDENS 



401 



The driveway end 



The Artistic Treatment of Fireproof Houses 



By Edith Haviland 



HE house with a plastered, or stucco exterior the extra outlay exacted by the careful construction of the 

 has always given artistic satisfaction, but tiles. Desirable, also, Is the feeling of permanence that 

 only within the last few years has it been material of such strength insures to its owners, 

 united with a fireproof construction. This The conservation of heat in the cold weather has, by 

 has been successfully accomplished by the scientific tests, been shown to be three times as great in 

 adoption of terra cotta hollow tiles (long the tile house as In one that is constructed of wood, and the 

 in use in chimney making) for walls and coolness of the house in summer, acting on something of 

 floors, covering them on the Inside with the ordinary hard of the same principle as the thermos bottle, is also no- 

 plaster, and, on the outside, with stucco cement. ticeable. 



While this reduces the danger of fire to a minimum, other Aside from these very practical claims of the tile house, 

 factors that are potent in making the home of comfort and its appeal to the lover of the artistic Is undeniable. Ex- 

 refinement are at the same time attained. periments In both directions have naturally been made by 

 That the hollow-tile house is interesting to the intelli- progressive architects and up-to-date builders, and, of re- 



gent home builder is 

 evident in every neigh- 

 borhood where one is 

 in process of erection, 

 as It Is carefully scru- 

 tinized from Its Incep- 

 tion to its completed 

 form, at first with a 

 skepticism that Is 

 gradually and effectu- 

 ally overcome as Its 

 many advantages over 

 ordinary wooden 

 dwellings become ap- 

 parent in concrete 

 form. 



Aside from its fire- 

 proof qualities the tile 

 house is also water- 

 proof and sanitary In 

 more ways than one. 

 Mice and vermin are 

 practically excluded 

 from making entrance. 

 With the exception of 

 the wooden trimmings 

 the expenditure for 

 outside repairs is very 

 s 1 i g h t — offsetting In 

 considerable measure 



One of the doorways 



cent achievements on a 

 large scale, the Kel- 

 logg-Green houses sit- 

 uated In Orange, N. J., 

 embody some qualities 

 of unusual merit. 



In the architectural 

 lay-out of the plot of 

 ground reserved for 

 this group of houses, a 

 peculiarly difficult 

 problem was Involved, 

 as Its length was con- 

 siderably out of pro- 

 portion to its width, 

 affording no outlet ex- 

 cept the entrance. In 

 their solution the 

 architects, Messrs. 

 Mann & McNeille, of 

 New York city, have 

 made a clever spacing 

 of the building lots 

 (some twenty-four in 

 number) adopting an 

 Irregular building line 

 and creating a variety 

 of house designs. 

 Some landscape gar- 

 dening with some or- 



