34 



AMERICAN HOMES AND GARDENS 



January, 1907 



For the average bedroom, say for instance 14x18x10, 

 or 2,500 cubic feet, a fireplace opening 3 feet wide, 2 feet 

 6 inches high, and i foot 8 inches deep will be found of good 

 proportions. It should have a terra-cotta lined flue of about 

 100 square inches of inside area, or the flue known in 

 the trade as an 8 x 1 2 inch. An excellent section for its throat 

 is given in illustration 6. For the average bedroom fireplace 

 the 8 X 12-inch flue is quite sufficient, for the larger openings 

 of very generous rooms a 12 x 12-inch, while for the smaller 

 needs of the laundry stove an 8 x 8-inch suffices. In 

 the larger living rooms, in the dining-room, library, or above 

 all in the living halls of country houses, one should attempt to 

 procure openings slightly larger than 4 feet, or of dimensions 

 4 feet 2 inches by 3 feet 6 inches by 2 feet deep. A cord 

 of wood is 4 feet wide and It is both pleasant as well as a 

 saving in labor to be able to throw on the fire the whole 

 unsplit or unsawn log. 



The success or failure of a fireplace depends, at least to 

 the average house owner, more upon its draft than upon its 

 design. If it draws well it is a delight, if it constantly smokes 

 it is a misery. The shape of the fireplace, the size and course 

 of the flues, and the conditions surrounding the chimney all 

 affect the draft. 



I have already mentioned good proportions for the fire- 

 place and flues. The course of the flues must, from the vary- 

 ing conditions of superposed stories and rooms, often become 

 tortuous and intricate. A chimney stack often contains from 

 four to eight flues each, each one from a different fireplace, no 



3 — French Mantel of Simple Restrained Outline 



two of which have vertically superimposed masonry. The 

 flues are obliged to dodge each other through the various 

 floors, and yet at the end of their journey come out orderly 

 side by side, above the roof. The extent and turns and 

 twists a flue can take without refusing to draw is astonishing. 

 I have seen a fireplace draw properly, whose flue, after rising 

 to the ceiling, crossed the whole width, running practically 



horizontally for twenty feet, and then just vertically, coming 

 out of the roof the opposite side of the house from the fire- 

 place. Generally speaking, however, a flue should not be 

 slanted over 60 degrees. A slight slant to the flue is pref- 

 erable to a perfectly vertical course when a dowfi draft 

 often affects the fire. The flues rising from fireplaces In lower 

 stories than the one in question should, if coming on the sides 



4— A Louis XV Mantel 



of our opening, always have four inches of brickwork between 

 them and the fire, if behind our opening, eight. 



Run the flues, to a reasonable extent, as far back In your 

 wall as is possible. The broad projections of the chimney 

 breast lessen the size of the room much more than one imag- 

 ines. The bulky proportions of the huge chimneys of Cluny, 

 St. Germain, and Blols were due to the fact that the builders 

 ran their flues in front of their walls, not yet having learned 

 to place them in chases and recesses. We, on the other hand, 

 often go to the other extreme, and riddle our walls with so 

 many flues that we seriously weaken the carrying strength of 

 our masonry. 



The exit of the chimney from the house should also have 

 forethought. It should never be lower than the Immediately 

 surrounding roofs or gables, but preferably from three to 

 four feet higher. It should never be adjacent to a high wall. 

 In New York City one constantly sees the ridiculous instances 

 where high apartment houses have been built beside the old 

 low residences, whose chimneys on the apartment side will 

 no longer draw. Long arms of tin pipe, twenty, thirty feet 

 high, carry the mouths of the flues up and away from the 

 overshadowing wall that choked their drafts. The high wall 

 of the apartment had been acting as a windbreak, throwing 

 the smoke of the fireplace right back in the room as soon 

 as it rose. 



