12 
HOUSE AND GARDEN 
January, 1911. 
Wood rafters and floor joists, with a 
roof of tile or slate, give a good meas¬ 
ure of protection with the fireproof 
walls 
A pleasing variety of color and texture has been secured by inlaying 
the porch railing. The home of Mr. P. A. Tomes in Woodmere, 
architect 
tile on the uprights of 
L. I. Alfred Hopkins, 
A welcome return to the high-columned Colonial porch. The 
Martin House, Cynwyd, Pa. Mcllvaine & Roberts, architect 
A particularly successful surface treatment of colored tiles and 
marble panels set in stucco. Mann & MacNeille, architects 
because the contractors would have 
been so much afraid that their work¬ 
men could not handle the unfamiliar 
materials in an economical way. For¬ 
tunately, the more pressing need for fireproof construction in 
commercial buildings has paved the way and has paid the pre¬ 
liminary high price of this knowledge, so that to-day the small 
suburban or country home built of concrete or of hollow tile is 
as common a sight as a new building of wood. 
There are several ways in which a house may be built to 
withstand fire. One of these is the monolithic cement construc¬ 
tion. In this the walls are first built up as hollow forms with 
lumber, and into these the concrete is tamped in successive lay¬ 
ers. This method has already been practically abandoned for 
the reason that it is an expensive one and results in a wall that 
is apt to allow moisture to come through. Another method is 
the use of concrete blocks. Here the cost is very much less than 
in the monolithic system, but unfortunately the concrete block 
industry received a very black eye because the material, instead 
of standing on its own merits, attempted to imitate stone and 
failed. There is no doubt that this method would be in far more 
common use if someone 
had never thought of the 
familiar “rock-face” pat¬ 
tern for these blocks. The 
third method is the use of 
hollow terra cotta tile in 
several forms. These blocks 
are laid up very much in 
the same way that bricks 
are laid, and by reason of 
the rapidity of erection, 
the fire-resisting quality of 
burned clay and the suc¬ 
cession of dead-air spaces 
secured in the wall itself, 
the method has pushed its 
way into widespread use. 
It is familiar as the most 
common form of construc¬ 
tion in office buildings. 
In the first method pre¬ 
ferably, and in the third 
method necessarily, the . . , , . , 
,, • , . A special form of block is made for 
wall is covered on the out- the w i n( j ow jambs to bring the wall 
side with stucco. The sub- out to an even edge 
WOOD ROOD 
CONSTRUCTION 
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