The American Architect and Building News, VOL XXXIV
Copyright, 1891, by Ticknor & Company, Boston, Mass.
No. 826
Entered at the Post-Office at Boston as second-class matter.
OCTOBER 24, 1891.
Summary —Summary —
Possible Prohibition of Lofty Buildings in Chicago. —Pile Foundations in Holland. — A Floating Cellar.—The Begin
nings of the Piazza del Duomo at Milan.—Mengoni’s Victory —Carelessness on a Railroad.—The Absorbing Interest of Balloons.— The Importation of Foreign Building
stone. — More Portraits on Buildings................................................45 Libraries. — III...................................................................................................47 Theatrical Architecture. — II.................................................................50 Letter from Canada......................................................................................53 Letter from Chicago..................................................................................................54 Letter from Paris........................................................................................................56 Letter from London...................................................................................................57 Illustrations : —
House, No. 125 Twenty-second Street, Philadelphia, Pa. — Ltroehill Castle, Peebles, Scotland. — Castle Fraser, Aberdeen, Scotland.—Details of the Same.—Castle of Edzell, Forfar, Scotland. — Fyvie Castle, Aberdeen, Scotland. — Front of the Same. —New Young Men’s Christian Association Building, San Francisco, Cal.—The Walker Building, Boston, Mass. — Colonial Cottage.
Additional: Villa at Roquebrune (Var), France.— Side Facade and Section of the Same. — Plans of the Same. — Buffer s Wood, Chislehurst, Eng.: Entrance Front, (Two Views).— Drawing-room in Same House. — Staircase in Same House.
— Trinity U. P. Church, Pollockshields, Glasgow, Scotland. 59
Communications : —
Screening Casement-windows. — Portraiture in Architectural
Carving. — Wanted: a Motto..........................................................60
Notes and Clippings.............................................................................. . . 60 Trade Surveys..............................................................................................................60
THE city government of Chicago, where the fashion of extremely lofty buildings has, perhaps, reached its most advanced development, is considering the question of limiting the height of buildings for the future by ordinance, and, in anticipation of such a regulation, it is said that an unusual number of applications for permits for many-storied structures have been filed. It will be remembered that the Chicago Odd Fellows recently voted to proceed at once with the erection of a building to be thirty-four stories in height, and architects will probably think that the movement for placing restrictions on that sort of construction has come none too soon. There will be a question, however, whether an ordinance of the kind proposed can be enforced. New York passed, several years ago, a law limiting the height of apartment-houses, but the enforcement of the law was resisted in the courts, and we believe that it was declared unconstitutional and void, and that the Building Bureau was compelled to approve plans in which it was violated, but which were otherwise unobjectionable. In Massachusetts, last winter, a law was enacted limiting the height of all buildings to one hundred and twenty-five feet, and, so far as we know, the question of the validity of the law has not yet been tested. In Chicago, where high buildings are much more common than in Boston, any restrictive regulation would probablj be at once carried into court; and, if the New York precedent should be confirmed, there would he, practically, no further attempt anywhere in this country to prevent land-owners from building as far into the sky as they chose.
MR. CUYPERS, of Amsterdam, the distinguished architect of many of the finest buildings in Holland, contributed an interesting paper to the recent Congress of Hygiene, at London, on pile foundations. As these are universally employed in Amsterdam, as well as in most other towns in Holland, the Dutch architects may be regarded as good authority on matters relating to them. It is hardly necessary to inform architects in any country that pile foundations must be constantly moist, or they will rot; but the exact degree of saturation is not settled here. Our architects usually suppose that if the piles are submerged once a day, by the rise of the tide, they are safe, and this is probably true; but Mr. Cuypers says that where the tide is depended upon to keep the piles wet, a succession of unusually low tides, such as often occurs in the autumn, will sometimes leave the top of a pile foundation exposed to the air long enough for rot to commence, and the destruction of the upper portion is then assured. The only
remedy in such cases is to saw off the top of the piles at a lower level, and underpin with masonry. Many old buildings in Holland, Mr. Cuypers says, have perished from this cause; and our architects would do well to make sure that all wood in their foundations is placed so low that it can never, by any possibility, become dry.
O
UR common method of completing pile foundations, by “capping” the piles with flat stones, and building up on these stones, is, M. Cuypers informs us, obsolete in Holland, where a “gridiron” of timber is now usually bolted to the piles, and serves as the general footing for the building. Although this system is not unknown here, it is not often used, and the reason why it is preferred in Amsterdam and Rotterdam may be that the marshy soil affords no firm stratum for the foot of the piles to rest on, and connecting them together by the timber gridiron helps to prevent the unequal settlements which would be likely to occur through the varied distribution of the weights upon the footings. It is needless to say that the gridiron, if used, must be subjected to the same conditions of saturation as the piles. A local curiosity of construction, which M. Cuypers describes, is a floating cellar, which is quite commonly constructed under the houses built in the Dutch marsh land. Supposing a house to be constructed without interior piers, which is, of course, the most usual case in the cities, the piles supporting the exterior and party walls form a sort of underground palisade, enclosing a little lake of mud. In this lake is formed a box, made with bottom and sides of heavy timbers, and planked inside, and this box is then lined with waterproof masonry of brickwork and cement. The weight of the brick lining causes the box to sink to a certain depth in the mud, and it is then only necessary to make sure that the sides are high enough to prevent the mud from running over the top of them. A liberal space is left between the top of the cellar-box and the under side of the first floor, so that, in case of unusually high tides, the cellar may not float -high enough to lift the house off its foundations; but this space may be enclosed by some construction which will not interfere with the movement of the box, and the cellars formed in this way, although exposed to many tons of water-pressure on the bottom and sides, are said to he perfectly tight, dry, and convenient.
P
ROFESSOR MELANI writes to La Construction Moderne an interesting account of the laying-out of the Piazza
del Duomo, at Milan, and the building of the Galleria Vittorio Emanuele, or, as we should call it, the Victor Emmanuel Arcade. It seems that the idea of clearing away the houses which had clustered about the cathedral, so as to give a better view of the building, was agitated at the beginning of the present century, and was adopted by Napoleon, who, however, only accomplished the construction of the new facade of the structure, without being able to carry out his intention of improving the territory around it. Thirty years elapsed before the matter was brought up again. In 1839, some projects were discussed, without result, and new projects were presented and talked over, at intervals, until 1859. In this year, the new kingdom of Italy had been securely established, and, in the general joy, the people of Milan thought it fitting to celebrate the occasion by a renewed effort to carry out their long-delayed plan. In December of that year, the king, authorized by decree the establishment by the city of a lottery, for raising money to clear and ornament a square in front of the cathedral. Meanwhile, the municipality had plans prepared, at a small scale, of the cathedral and the surrounding territory, and distributed copies to the citizens, inviting suggestions and criticism. In answer to this appeal, one hundred and seventysix plans were presented. A jury was appointed to consider them, and they were publicly exhibited. In 1861, the jury made its report. It recommended, as a result of its study of the plan, that the proposed square should be rectangular, and surrounded bv buildings with porticos, and advised, also, the construction of a covered street, leading from the Piazza della Scala to the new square, with shops on both sides. This feature seems to have been represented in at least one of the plans offered, for the report of the jury speaks of it with a definiteness which indicates that it had long been discussed.
Copyright, 1891, by Ticknor & Company, Boston, Mass.
No. 826
Entered at the Post-Office at Boston as second-class matter.
OCTOBER 24, 1891.
Summary —Summary —
Possible Prohibition of Lofty Buildings in Chicago. —Pile Foundations in Holland. — A Floating Cellar.—The Begin
nings of the Piazza del Duomo at Milan.—Mengoni’s Victory —Carelessness on a Railroad.—The Absorbing Interest of Balloons.— The Importation of Foreign Building
stone. — More Portraits on Buildings................................................45 Libraries. — III...................................................................................................47 Theatrical Architecture. — II.................................................................50 Letter from Canada......................................................................................53 Letter from Chicago..................................................................................................54 Letter from Paris........................................................................................................56 Letter from London...................................................................................................57 Illustrations : —
House, No. 125 Twenty-second Street, Philadelphia, Pa. — Ltroehill Castle, Peebles, Scotland. — Castle Fraser, Aberdeen, Scotland.—Details of the Same.—Castle of Edzell, Forfar, Scotland. — Fyvie Castle, Aberdeen, Scotland. — Front of the Same. —New Young Men’s Christian Association Building, San Francisco, Cal.—The Walker Building, Boston, Mass. — Colonial Cottage.
Additional: Villa at Roquebrune (Var), France.— Side Facade and Section of the Same. — Plans of the Same. — Buffer s Wood, Chislehurst, Eng.: Entrance Front, (Two Views).— Drawing-room in Same House. — Staircase in Same House.
— Trinity U. P. Church, Pollockshields, Glasgow, Scotland. 59
Communications : —
Screening Casement-windows. — Portraiture in Architectural
Carving. — Wanted: a Motto..........................................................60
Notes and Clippings.............................................................................. . . 60 Trade Surveys..............................................................................................................60
THE city government of Chicago, where the fashion of extremely lofty buildings has, perhaps, reached its most advanced development, is considering the question of limiting the height of buildings for the future by ordinance, and, in anticipation of such a regulation, it is said that an unusual number of applications for permits for many-storied structures have been filed. It will be remembered that the Chicago Odd Fellows recently voted to proceed at once with the erection of a building to be thirty-four stories in height, and architects will probably think that the movement for placing restrictions on that sort of construction has come none too soon. There will be a question, however, whether an ordinance of the kind proposed can be enforced. New York passed, several years ago, a law limiting the height of apartment-houses, but the enforcement of the law was resisted in the courts, and we believe that it was declared unconstitutional and void, and that the Building Bureau was compelled to approve plans in which it was violated, but which were otherwise unobjectionable. In Massachusetts, last winter, a law was enacted limiting the height of all buildings to one hundred and twenty-five feet, and, so far as we know, the question of the validity of the law has not yet been tested. In Chicago, where high buildings are much more common than in Boston, any restrictive regulation would probablj be at once carried into court; and, if the New York precedent should be confirmed, there would he, practically, no further attempt anywhere in this country to prevent land-owners from building as far into the sky as they chose.
MR. CUYPERS, of Amsterdam, the distinguished architect of many of the finest buildings in Holland, contributed an interesting paper to the recent Congress of Hygiene, at London, on pile foundations. As these are universally employed in Amsterdam, as well as in most other towns in Holland, the Dutch architects may be regarded as good authority on matters relating to them. It is hardly necessary to inform architects in any country that pile foundations must be constantly moist, or they will rot; but the exact degree of saturation is not settled here. Our architects usually suppose that if the piles are submerged once a day, by the rise of the tide, they are safe, and this is probably true; but Mr. Cuypers says that where the tide is depended upon to keep the piles wet, a succession of unusually low tides, such as often occurs in the autumn, will sometimes leave the top of a pile foundation exposed to the air long enough for rot to commence, and the destruction of the upper portion is then assured. The only
remedy in such cases is to saw off the top of the piles at a lower level, and underpin with masonry. Many old buildings in Holland, Mr. Cuypers says, have perished from this cause; and our architects would do well to make sure that all wood in their foundations is placed so low that it can never, by any possibility, become dry.
O
UR common method of completing pile foundations, by “capping” the piles with flat stones, and building up on these stones, is, M. Cuypers informs us, obsolete in Holland, where a “gridiron” of timber is now usually bolted to the piles, and serves as the general footing for the building. Although this system is not unknown here, it is not often used, and the reason why it is preferred in Amsterdam and Rotterdam may be that the marshy soil affords no firm stratum for the foot of the piles to rest on, and connecting them together by the timber gridiron helps to prevent the unequal settlements which would be likely to occur through the varied distribution of the weights upon the footings. It is needless to say that the gridiron, if used, must be subjected to the same conditions of saturation as the piles. A local curiosity of construction, which M. Cuypers describes, is a floating cellar, which is quite commonly constructed under the houses built in the Dutch marsh land. Supposing a house to be constructed without interior piers, which is, of course, the most usual case in the cities, the piles supporting the exterior and party walls form a sort of underground palisade, enclosing a little lake of mud. In this lake is formed a box, made with bottom and sides of heavy timbers, and planked inside, and this box is then lined with waterproof masonry of brickwork and cement. The weight of the brick lining causes the box to sink to a certain depth in the mud, and it is then only necessary to make sure that the sides are high enough to prevent the mud from running over the top of them. A liberal space is left between the top of the cellar-box and the under side of the first floor, so that, in case of unusually high tides, the cellar may not float -high enough to lift the house off its foundations; but this space may be enclosed by some construction which will not interfere with the movement of the box, and the cellars formed in this way, although exposed to many tons of water-pressure on the bottom and sides, are said to he perfectly tight, dry, and convenient.
P
ROFESSOR MELANI writes to La Construction Moderne an interesting account of the laying-out of the Piazza
del Duomo, at Milan, and the building of the Galleria Vittorio Emanuele, or, as we should call it, the Victor Emmanuel Arcade. It seems that the idea of clearing away the houses which had clustered about the cathedral, so as to give a better view of the building, was agitated at the beginning of the present century, and was adopted by Napoleon, who, however, only accomplished the construction of the new facade of the structure, without being able to carry out his intention of improving the territory around it. Thirty years elapsed before the matter was brought up again. In 1839, some projects were discussed, without result, and new projects were presented and talked over, at intervals, until 1859. In this year, the new kingdom of Italy had been securely established, and, in the general joy, the people of Milan thought it fitting to celebrate the occasion by a renewed effort to carry out their long-delayed plan. In December of that year, the king, authorized by decree the establishment by the city of a lottery, for raising money to clear and ornament a square in front of the cathedral. Meanwhile, the municipality had plans prepared, at a small scale, of the cathedral and the surrounding territory, and distributed copies to the citizens, inviting suggestions and criticism. In answer to this appeal, one hundred and seventysix plans were presented. A jury was appointed to consider them, and they were publicly exhibited. In 1861, the jury made its report. It recommended, as a result of its study of the plan, that the proposed square should be rectangular, and surrounded bv buildings with porticos, and advised, also, the construction of a covered street, leading from the Piazza della Scala to the new square, with shops on both sides. This feature seems to have been represented in at least one of the plans offered, for the report of the jury speaks of it with a definiteness which indicates that it had long been discussed.