The Uniformity of Modern Floor PIafns 
A VERY FEW TYPICAL ARRANGEMENTS COMPRISE PRACTICALLY 
ALL PLANS OF THE MODERATE-SIZE HOME BUILT TO-DAY 
BY P. A. Huntington 
Numbered diagrams by the Author 
J F you have ever given the matter a passing- 
thought you probably have marveled at the 
infinite number of possible arrangements by which 
living-room, hall, dining-room and kitchen are cor¬ 
related in a convenient and economical whole. 
Nor is it always an economical one. largely because 
of a necessity for too much hall and passage space. 
But perhaps you have occasionally wondered at 
the ingenuity of the architectural profession in 
turning out,- year after year, the infinite number 
of these plans, each unlike any of the others. 
Well, the truth of the matter is that the plans dif¬ 
fer only in minor features. Broadly speaking, 
nearly every floor plan falls into one of a com¬ 
paratively few types. 
It is but natural, when you consider the matter. 
The most common low-cost 
first floor arrangement 
The simplest type with a 
pantry, icebox alcove 
and front porch added 
that this is so, for after all the needs 
of one family of four differ but little 
from the needs of another of like 
size. After a plan has been devel¬ 
oped to fit these needs it persists as 
a type and appears again and again, 
varying from its predecessors only 
in the non-essentials. 
It seems hardly necessary to call 
attention to the fact that two houses 
having identically the same floor 
plan may show no resemblance what¬ 
ever in exterior appearance. Not 
only does this dissimilarity come 
from the employment of different 
wall materials or color schemes, if 
the houses be of wood, but the char¬ 
acter of the roofs may be utterly un¬ 
like, the disposition and shape of the 
windows and doors may contribute 
to the dissimilarity, and the location 
and character of the dormer win- 
may result in two houses that would 
Doubt- 
dows-—or lack of them 
never for a moment be suspected of being alike in plan, 
less it is largely for this reason that the 
prevalence of a very few type plans has not 
been generally recognized. 
To take the simplest plan of all first, there 
is the inexpensive dwelling built approxi¬ 
mately in the form of a square—the most 
economical shape for a house in that it en¬ 
closes more area for a given amount of out¬ 
side wall space. A house of this type con¬ 
sists of entrance and stair hall, living-room 
or parlor, dining-room and kitchen. In its 
bare essentials it is illustrated in Fig. i. 
The usual modifications to this plan, giving 
it a pass pantry and space for refrigerator, 
are embodied in Fig. 2. The house has but 
a single chimney, in the centre, into which 
are run the smoke pipes for the furnace and 
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L-R- 
kitchen range, with occasionally a third flue serving 
a fireplace in living-room or dining-room. 
More common in the better class of homes built 
to-day is the so-called double house, where the en¬ 
trance hall is in the middle of one side of a 
rectangle, flanked by living-room and dining-room, 
with the kitchen and pantry in the rear of the lat¬ 
ter. As shown in Fig. 3, this type in its simplest 
form needs but the one chimney, serving furnace, 
range and living-room fireplace. The plan is an 
economical one to build for this reason, and be¬ 
cause it has no excrescences or ells to increase the 
area of the outside wall. It has also an appearance 
of far greater spaciousness upon entering. Upon 
this type the great majority of modern homes, cost¬ 
ing from six to ten thousand dollars, are based. 
It provides the large rectangular living-room that we demand 
to-day, with an exposure of three sides; it gives us the desirable 
isolation of dining-room and kitchen from the living-room: and 
it permits of expansion 
more readily than does 
the square plan of Fig. i. 
Although Fig. 3 may 
represent this type, in its 
simplest form, the ma¬ 
jority of such houses 
show a modification of it 
in the shape of a short 
ell, extending either to 
the rear or to the side 
and containing part of 
the service department. 
This it will readily be 
seen is brought about by 
the need of a larger din¬ 
ing-room, leaving too little 
rectangle to give a satisfactory kitchen, or again, by the desirabil¬ 
ity of a cross draught through the latter room. 
If we were simply to extend the kitchen to the rear of the din¬ 
ing-room, keeping it the same width, the resulting plan would 
show considerable waste room in our wide 
hall. The natural development, therefore, 
is some such arrangement as that shown 
in Fig. 4, where a den. a reception-room, a 
library or what not is included. Any de¬ 
parture from the type as shown in Fig. 3, 
whereby the kitchen and living-room are 
no longer adjacent one to the other, means 
the addition of a chimney, for in these days 
of fireplace appreciation the living-room is 
hardly worthy of the name without that 
feature. It is apparent, therefore, that by 
adding an ell only, let us say, four by thir¬ 
teen feet, we have gained a convenient 
library or den and a dining-room fireplace, 
but we have lost our pantry and have added 
considerably to our cost by the additional 
type, where one chimney serves 
furnace, kitchen and living-room 
for 
remaining space in the original 
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Expanding Fig. 3 to a two-chimney plan 
and gaining an extra room at the rear 
(28) 
