books:

	Turn-of-the-Century House Designs: With Floor Plans, Elevations and Interior Details of 24 Residences William T. Comstock Dover Publications, 1994 - 96 pages average customer review:based on 3 reviews view larger image
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- Nineteen different architects contributed the various designs, so the book showcases a wide variety of styles. Even the presentation varies from one design to another. Each architect gives an elaborate description, pointing out the specific advantages and features of his design, sometimes even telling a story about its history.

- There's a sixteen-page primer entitled "Suggestions On House Building" that describes 19th century house design and construction in remarkable detail. It gives the rationale for the placement of every fixture, including gas outlets and electric lighting, and even debates specific construction techniques like plastering and sheathing.

- The book is bound sideways, so that it must be held with the binding at the top instead of at the side. This makes the book rather inconvenient to browse.

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End-of-the-19th-Century Suburban Homes

A reprint of Comstock's 1893 publication SUBURBAN AND COUNTRY HOMES, 24 architect-designed houses are shown with drawings showing plans and at least a general perspective view. Sometimes additional exterior elevations are shown as well as an ocassional interior detail view. A short text accompanies each along with an estimate of the cost to construct, usually around $5,000. Perhaps to keep construction costs down, most of the houses are all-wood. Influences of the movement that came to be known as the Shingle Style are indicated along with the influences of the Arts & Crafts style, and the Colonial Revival. Although the intent might have been to showcase the work of the architects, the book could also have been used as a jumping-off-point for speculative builders and contractors who took the minimal design information and went on from there (just like home plan magazines of today). Manhattan architects are William A. Lambert, E.G.W. Dietrich, Manly N. Cutter, George Martin Huss, Frank W. Beall, Creighton Withers, A.L.C. Marsh, Stanley S. Covert, John Brower Jr, and E.R. Tilton. Brooklyn architects are E.L. Messenger and Otto J. Gette. Also included are Newark, NJ, architect Charles P. Baldwin, and Montclair, NJ, architect Theo. Hopping. Other areas of the country are represented by architects A.W. Cobb of Winthrop Highlands, MA, L.S. Buffington of Minneapolis, MN, McCurdy & Pulis of Denver, CO, and John Calvin Stevens of Portland, ME.

This book also includes two articles with home-building advice. "Suggestions On House Building" by A.W. Cobb follows the manner by which an architect would advise his client during the process of designing a house, interesting as well as largely applicable today. "How to Plumb a Surburban House" by Leonard D. Hosford is more interesting from a historic point of view.

As each of the houses was actually built, it would have been most interesting to follow up with photographs both period and current (if still extant) and to have a bio on each of the architects. Perhaps these comments would inspire Volume II. But as is, this book is a handy and economical reference for preservationists looking for documentation of home building during this period.

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