House and Garden 
The Garth' 
AT 
KaVERFORD -PeNNA 
designed DY 
WlLsTOM ELyr.e • 
THE PLAN OF U THE GARTH 
The Seat of Ernest Zantzinger , Esq. 
connecting the stable and its balancing build¬ 
ings with the house. 
A garden was the most suitable and indeed 
the only proper connecting link. But here 
is a garden serving an architectural purpose 
and yet in quite a refreshing un-architectural 
way. The extreme simplicity of the build¬ 
ings and the desire to retain the local char¬ 
acter of the place called for no high degree 
of formality, and the design which has been 
executed in the 
manner the il- 
lustrations 
show is rustic 
and more “ nat¬ 
ural ” than are 
similar schemes 
attempted in 
this country. 
What may be 
called the En¬ 
glish style (for 
want of a better 
term) has evi¬ 
dently weighed 
in the sobriety 
of the design, 
resulting large¬ 
ly from the em¬ 
ployment of 
natural growths 
for architec¬ 
tural ends and the use of rustic 
work wherever structural features 
were necessary. The greatest im¬ 
portance has been attached to the 
value of a lawn when well placed 
and enclosed. There are two such 
lawns at Strafford, and Irom them 
it is obvious that “The Garth” 
has derived its name. 
Two fine nettle 1 trees stood 
resolutely in control of the situa¬ 
tion beside an old wall upholding 
the irregular edge of a terrace. 
The architect, apparently unan¬ 
noyed by their preventing him 
from laying out his garden with 
the usual plethora of right angles, 
proceeded to put down his paths 
to the accommodation ot these 
existing points. As the plan 
shows, the garden lies upon two 
axes which meet in an obtuse angle and en¬ 
closing the two lawns. A walk skirting one 
side of the garden leads from a piazza at the 
rear of the house, and has its vista ended at 
the tool house, whose quaint low arch ol 
brilliant white is not yet entirely hidden by 
the ambitious vines. Along the walk runs a 
rustic trellis, which curves considerately out 
of its way in deference to an old arbor-vitas 
1 Celt is accident alls or hackberry. 
THE STABLE OF THE GARTH 
