November, 1909 
AMERICAN HOMES AND GARDENS 
The house before the alteration 
for generations where the cost of a true stone or concrete 
wall was prohibitive. 
If you have made up your mind before building your 
little cottage to stucco its exterior walls, do not permit your 
builder to make the framing braced. On the contrary, you 
want a balloon frame, with as few and as short horizontal 
studs as possible. Next, the sheathing had best be nailed 
horizontally, it takes but little additional trouble and means 
much in later cracks. Then, whatever you are covering, 
an old building or a new house, take care that there are 
around your door and window openings proper members of 
sufficiently wide projections to receive the total projection 
of furring, lath and stucco. If there are trims around the 
Hl Hi ea 
outsides of openings, they must project at least two and one- 
half inches. If you propose carrying your stucco around 
and inside the openings, back to your frames, and save the 
expense of the trims, your sill and frames must be heavy 
enough to take the finishing stucco. 
On a new building, cover your diagonally nailed sheathing 
with two or three thicknesses of roofing-paper. On these, 
as well as directly on the old siding of the old building, 
should be nailed wooden furring strips. [hese should have 
a beveled section “A,” and should be run horizontally. The 
wooden surface nearest the lath and plaster has purposely 
been cut as small as possible, giving the least wooden sur- 
face for the absorption of water from the stucco and con- 
The house after the transformation 
