SITTING-ROOM AND PARLOR IN FRONT.—A CONNECTING VESTIBULE.—A CENTRAL COMBINATION STAIRWAY.—GOOD ROOMS IN THE ATTIC.
When we say that the sitting-room should be in the front part of the house, it does not necessarily imply that the parlor should be disturbed. As shown in Plan [No. 10], they may both be in front. The vestibule, which is large enough for a hat-rack, and for the occupants of the house to stand while putting on their overshoes and wraps, is in front of both parlor and reception-room, but yet in a way so as not to disturb the view to the street from either of these rooms. We cannot have all of the rooms in front. The kitchen we do not want there. The dining-room is convenient if placed immediately in the rear of the sitting-room. Thus we have two rooms in front and two in the rear. This is practically a square house. The old habit has been to place the stairway along one side of the parlor in the hall which served as a passageway from the front to the rooms immediately in the rear. This distribution of halls is what has thrown the sitting-room back of the parlor. In the plan here given the change has been made so that the hall has relatively the same position that did the sitting-room in the past, though it is by no means as large. It is essentially a stair-hall, and incidentally a passage. As placed, we may enter it from the parlor, sitting-room, dining-room, or kitchen. Its position is central. There are two doors between this stair-hall and the kitchen. The central position of the stairway has other advantages than those just stated. It makes long halls on the second floor entirely unnecessary. As will be seen by looking at the floor plan, it gives two good bedrooms in front.
The dining-room is immediately in the rear of the sitting-room. There may be sliding doors connecting these two rooms. One door, three and a half feet wide, usually makes a sufficiently large opening for the dining-room connection. There are sliding doors between the parlor and sitting-room, and dining-room and sitting-room, as shown. The kitchen has the advantage of a certain amount of isolation from the rest of the house, for the reason that there are two doors between it and any other room. The pantries are arranged with reference to their most convenient use. In the kitchen-pantry there are places for a refrigerator, flour-bin, bread-board, and cupboard. The dining-room pantry is a china-closet, with glass doors above and closed doors below. The doors connecting the dining-room pantry or passage should be hung on double-spring hinges.
In the plan of this house it is shown how we may go from the kitchen to the same landing that is used for the main stairway, and thus avoid the necessity for a distinctively back hall and back stairway. However, if it is so desired, it is easy to place a stairway in the rear, and thus have them entirely independent. In that event a room may be placed over the pantry, and be used by the servant. This part of the house could be cut off from the front rooms and the bath-room on the second floor by a door. But to take the house as it is, we have a combination stairway, there being two doors separating the kitchen approach from the common landing in the main stair-hall.
On the second floor there is a hall about fourteen feet long from which we pass to two bedrooms in front, two in the rear, the bath-room and the store-closet. Each room is independent. They may be connected one with the other as family necessities suggest. The store-closet is accessible from the hall, as such a closet should be. This makes it available from any of the rooms. The bath-room is directly over the kitchen.
In each bedroom there is a place for a bed, a dressing-case, and a wash-stand, which is not always the case in bedrooms. If there is a place for these things, if the dressing-case bears its proper relation to the sources of light, if it is so placed that the light from the window or from the gas shines in the face of the user, if the wash-stand is conveniently disposed, and there is room at the side of it for a slop-jar, if there is a large closet, then the architect has done his full duty in the arrangement of the bedroom. The room that is called the family room should be especially well cared for in the matter of closets.
A hundred dollars would lath and plaster the entire attic of this house, and provide a room in the front part which could be used by the boys or the servant. There is no objection to this except in the necessity for climbing an extra pair of stairs. The mere mention of a bedroom in the attic is distasteful to many people. It arouses memories of hot, dusty, and uncomfortable places in which they have passed the night. All this depends on the attic. The roof in this house is pitched at an angle of forty-five degrees. The house at the narrowest point is 29. feet wide. This would make the attic at the highest point 14½ feet. We can stud down from this and have a nine-foot story and at the same time a large room, one which would have none of the disadvantages of a half-story room, and which would have all the advantages of a well-ventilated, comfortable bedroom, for summer or winter. The plastering of the attic suggests neatness. Having it well lighted by dormers exposes all disorder. Cost, as per schedule “B,” $2,600.