Aprit 12, 1872. THE BUILDING NEWS. 289
THE BUILDING NEWS. i LONDON, FRIDAY, APRIL 12, 1872.
PLANNING.
pp eee cannot be a more opportune
moment than the present for directing
the attention of readers of the BumLpine
News to the important subject of planning.
The decision of the judges in a competition
instituted by the editor of this journal, where
excellence of plan was to be the main recom-
mendation for the prize, has just been given.
This circumstance recalls the fact that a
number of designs, unprecedentedly large, con-
sidering the money value of the prizes offered,
has testified to the importance justly assigned
by English architects and architectural
students to the credit of producing a good
plan. The report of these judges brings into
prominence the fact that certain defects were
foundin many of the designs sent in. Even the
premiated designs cannot be pointed to by them
as model plans perfectly free from defects and
full of nothing but excellencies ; and questions
suggest themselves, rising out of all this,
which it is wiser to face than to ignore, and
which bear upon modern practice in the most
forcible manner. We cannot forbear asking,
Ts planning properly understood? Are its
difficulties properly appreciated ? Are its prin-
ciples properly studied ? and is it sufficiently
practised as an exercise by students? We
are even tempted to inquire whether archi-
tects themselves know in what a good plan
consists, and how closely it is allied to the
very essence of their profession ; and we are
doubtful whether the reply, if fairly given,
would be quite satisfactory. A plan is to the
intended building what the skeleton is to the
whole animal—it is the basis of everything.
Its preparation is in some respects the
most architectural part of an architect's
work. In designing elevations, and in
working out details, the artist may easily
forget his building and concentrate his
whole attention on a drawing, and perhaps
the result may not be very much the worse in
consequence. But in designing a plan the
architect who forgets that he is at work on a
building loses himself entirely, and produces
work which at best is on a level with the
patterns for a floor-cloth or the arrangement
of a Chinese puzzle. In performing this work,
the principal considerations are to make a fit
provision for the purposes of the intended
structure, wisely to divide the space at
command, and to provide at once for useful
occupation, for sound construction, and for
artistic effect. This done, a tyro can make
elevations and sections which will be at least
respectable, and a genius has a foundation
upon which to design a superstructure that
shall be a true work of art.
We have said that a principal consideration
in planning is to make a fit provision for
the purposes of the structure — that is
to say, the plan-maker has to provide rooms,
or a room, or galleries, or halls, or whatever
else is wanted for the private or public uses
of the proposed building, and to provide good
access, good communications, good lighting.
Now, where requirements are multifarious,
this is a difficult matter. Ina large build-
ing —such, for example, as a hospital or
courts of justice—the very varied uses of the
different parts of the structure; the very
strictly-defined and often conflicting require-
ments of each portion, and the necessity for
good communications, and for oneness in this
multiform structure as a whole, render the
plan a perfect study, and the preparation of
it a work of great labour, requiring the
highest practical skill.
The just distribution of space is a second
and very essential point to attend to. In
small buildings it is especially important not
to make one portion usurp too much of the
narrow frontage-or small plot which has to
be dealt with; and in larger ones the need
for watchfulness is nearly as great; while
through the whole work the building, as a
solid, must ever be present to the mind. The
true architect, as he draws his lines, can
imagine a wall standing upon them; as he
puts in his windows can appreciate the pro-
portion of voids to solids, the possibility of
grouping or of regular repetition, and the
degree in which his rooms will be lighted.
Each room will have a well-proportioned
shape, not merely because a rectangle of
(say) 15 by 20 looks pleasanter on paper
than one of 18 or 19 by 20, but because the
little rectangle of this shapeis to be reproduced
in large on the floor, and on the ceiling of
the completed room, and will govern, too,
and that in a subtle manner, the proportions
which the wall space at the sides will bear to
that at the ends of the apartments.
Perhaps there is no branch of an archi-
tect’s work on which he will do more wisely
to avail himself of the work of those who
have gone before him as far as he can;
though it must be confessed that in the
majority of instances that work is only an
approximate guide. If a structure (say, for
example, a house) is to be built, and one of
the same size and style can be found
thoroughly conyenient, there is more wisdom
in starting with the plan of the existing
house and making small improvements, than
in beginning from the commencement to
contrive a new one. ‘This is what specula-
tive builders constantly do, and it is a matter
of notoriety that their plans are frequently
found to be compact and convenient; in
short, it is the one merit which causes their
houses to be bought or rented. Now, if a
body of men, not trained to design plans,
but depending solely upon their own shrewd-
ness, and the hints they pick up from one
another’s mistakes, and from what the pub-
lic ask for, can so far advance the art of
house-planning by this method as to produce
very compact results, what might not edu-
cated and experienced men accomplish, fol-
lowing the same method ?
Perhaps the distinguishing point of a
good plat is that it has a leading idea to
start with. The architect may, possibly, com-
mence by designing his principal apartments ;
he may have to begin by settling his main
communications ; or it may be a question of
aspect, or of site, which is the keynote of his
arrangement; but until some one idea has
been started little progress can be made.
The first scheme roughed out upon the basis
suggested by this leading idea, the next step
isto get good forms and good sizes for all
the rooms, staircases, corridors, &c. No
unshapely form should be allowed to remain
on a plan, and no disproportionately small
or large rooms ; nor should ill-placed or un-
suitable openings be tolerated. The last
step, and one that often tasks the ingenuity
of the artist, is to compress what he has de-
signed with the necessary compactness, and
yet to preserve roominess. No loss of space
is ever tolerated by a good planner, but no
unduly cramped spaces are to be ever found
in his buildings, and a dark passage or a
cramped staircase will cause him to rub half
his work out and begin again.
Tn all buildings of more than one story it
is the plan of the principal floor—whichever
that may happen to be—which should govern
the rest and should be first designed. Next
in importance to this, and, in fact, sometimes
hardly second to it, is the plan of the roofs.
The shape of a building is as much defined
by its roofs, and the effect of it made or
marred by the skyline, as by anything else,
and no architect should go far in the design-
ing of a ground plan without, at least, an
idea of how it can be roofed
Of the method recommended for producing
successful plans, the use of squares is one of
the best known. Ona paper set out in squares
it is often possible to design a plan of which
the walls and spaces shall largely correspond
to the lines and centres ofthe rectangles,
and it is needless to add that a vast amount
of regularity is the result. The same end is
often attained in buildings where vaulting
occurs, by the necessity for providing points
of support for regularly divided vaults, and
even in less solid structures, by the positions
of roof-trusses, girders, and other such sub-
dividers of space. Most clever planners are
fond of prolonging some of their lines of
walls; and all of ranging the centres of their
openings on lines of as great extent as pos-
sible ; the first method helps to provide for
simple roofing ; the second for good internal
effects and good communications. There are
many expedients by the use of which an ar-
chitectural character can be given to parts of
a plan which threaten to be unruly, such
as, for example, the introduction of circles,
hectagons, and octagons; and those who wish
to know to what an extent these expedients
can be carried, had better examine a volume
of engraved plans of Paris dwelling-houses,
or of those at Vienna.
Tf it be understood, as it ought to be, that
designing the plan is really designing the
building, we can readily see that no detail is
too small to become of importance in this
work. Anything forgotten in the plan is
forgotten in the building; anything carelessly
or ignorantly planned will tell its story, when
built, by failing to answer its purpose ; and,
on the other hand, a plan, fully studied and
thought out in its every detail, cannot fail to
result in asuccess. In no respect is this more
true than in the disposition of light. If
an arrangement in every other way con-
venient be hit upon, but involving a dark
passage or portion of a room, and be not found
out till built, no remedy will be possible short
of an outlay which, measured in money, will
be considerable, and in vexation, trouble, and
disappointment, incalculable. Perhaps an
hour’s thoughtful study, and the free use of
the indiarubber, would haye prevented the
whole trouble, had the architect only looked
carefully enough to his planning of his
windows. Again, in construction, a little
thought and care will enable him to carry the
principal part of his walls one over another,
and to avoid ‘ false bearings” and all those
unhappy expedients of slight structure,
which so often lead, if not to failure, at least
to discomfort and to unsightly cracks.
We are not about to conclude these remarks
on a subject which lies at the root of an archi-
tect’s success by pointing out a royal road to
planning, for the best of all reasons—namely,
that no such road exists. Nothing but down-
right hard work, with some basis of ingenuity,
experience, and observation to start from,
will enable any man to arrange a complicated,
or eyen a simple plan satisfactorily ; but
much of the practice of an architect's
earlier days, especially if he addict
himself to competitions, is of the sort
to improve this part of his practice ; and
through his whole career he will find an ample
reward for any special attention he pays to
the plans of his work in his immunity from
many of the constructional and artistic
failures, as well as mistakes in arrangement,
to which those who are more careless, or less
skilful, are found to be liable.
————— en
IMPROVING WORKMEN’S
INGS OFF THE FACE OF
EARTH.
V E have heard a great deal of late about
building improved dwellings for the
mass of the people ‘in London, but we hear
very little about the destruction of workmen’s
dwellings which already exist. When a new
block of buildings calculated to afford ac-
commodation for 200 or 300 peopleis finished
and ready for habitation, the company that
may have erected the said block call together
a meeting of philanthropists and others, with
a noble lord in the chair, to celebrate the
event. But when many blocks of buildings
calculated to accommodate as many thousand
DWELL-
THE
