The Construction of the Small House / A Simple and Useful Source of Information of the Methods of Building Small American Homes, for Anyone Planning to Build

TYPE I

All small houses may be classified into four types, according to their construction. The first type is the commonest and is the wooden frame structure. This has exterior walls and interior partitions built of light wooden studs, and the floors and ceilings framed with wooden joists. The exterior walls may be covered with clapboard, shingles, stucco, brick veneer, or stone veneer. The roof is generally covered with wooden shingles, although slate, tile, asbestos, and asphalt shingles are often used. These houses are the most numerous, because the cost of wood in the past has been so much less than other materials that they appealed to the average builder’s financial sense. However, the cost of such dwellings to the country as a whole has been very high, for they are extremely dangerous when attacked by fire. More than twenty-two millions of dollars are wasted by fire each year in these houses. They also cost us a great deal in up-keep. It would be interesting to see what was the total cost per year to repaint them and keep the roofs in order. It certainly would run into the millions. Although wood increased from about $30.00 per thousand board feet to about $85.00 in the Eastern markets from pre-war days, and is now dropping below $55.00, yet the wooden house is still listed as the cheapest, for the cost of other materials has also increased, as brick from $10.00 per thousand to $23.00 until very recently, and cement from $2.00 to $3.25 per barrel. In any comparison of cost the wooden frame building is taken as the base or cheapest type of construction, although it is the most expensive in up-keep and fire-hazard of all. Until the price of wood increases in excessive proportion to other materials, there is no doubt that this type of house will be the commonest. However, there is much that can be done to make them more fire-resisting, and, although we cannot look to the speculative builders to use such methods, since they increase the costs slightly, yet the architect should not overlook them.

TYPE II

The second type of dwelling which is next in vogue has exterior walls of stone, brick, concrete, or terra-cotta, and interior floors, partitions, and roof of wooden frame construction. These are very slightly more fireproof than the wooden frame structure, and as a class they are more costly in the beginning, but require less expense in up-keep. They resist attack from external fires better than the wooden frame building, but if the fire starts within, they will burn just as readily. Although the fire loss per year of this class is not nearly as great as for the first type, yet it must be appreciated that there are not so many of them. The chief advantage of the masonry house of this second type lies in the lowered cost of up-keep, longer life, and saving of heating-fuel in the winter. A great deal of literature has been circulated by brick, cement, and hollow terra-cotta tile manufacturers by which the public has been educated to believe that this type of structure is much more fire-resisting than it is. Of course this campaign of education was intended to stimulate interest in their product, and it had no unselfish motive back of it. The result of this propaganda is evident in the public belief that such houses are fireproof houses, while as a matter of fact they are not.

TYPE III

The third class of dwelling is quite rare, and very few small houses are built that could be classified under it. Some builders call them fireproof houses, although this is erroneous. These buildings have walls, roofs, floors, and partitions built of incombustible materials, but the finished floors, the trim, windows, and doors are of wood. The exterior walls are of masonry construction, and the construction of the floors and roofs consists of steel beams with terra-cotta arches or concrete floor slabs, spanning in between them, and the partitions are of terra-cotta, gypsum, metal lath and plaster, or other similar materials. They may also be built of reinforced concrete throughout, or any other combination of these materials. There have been very few examples of this kind of construction used in the small house. It is an unfortunate condition that it is more adaptable to the costly mansion than to the average house of the middle-class citizen, for the high cost of construction of this character, in most cases, permits it to be used only by the wealthy man. Examples where such houses have been built generally show an investment of $30,000 or more, or, if they were built to-day, $50,000 or more. Those attempts to use this form of construction in the small house have been made by large building corporations, and have been chiefly represented by concrete houses of very ugly design.

TYPE IV

The fourth and last type of dwelling is the ideal fireproof house, but it is so costly that very few examples exist. This type can be termed fireproof with accuracy, for all structural parts, including doors, windows, and trim, are of incombustible materials. Metal trim is used or wood that has been treated to make it fire-resisting. This latter class of construction is so out of the reach of the average home-builder, on account of its cost, that its value cannot be thoroughly appreciated. Practically the only examples in existence are large mansions, built by wealthy clients.

Cost Does Not Indicate Fire-Resistance.—In this classification of buildings it would almost seem that the cost of a building indicated its fireproof qualities. This is not true, however. There are many expensive dwellings which are just as great fire-traps as the less expensive ones. In both cases the fire hazards are the same, if they are built of the same type of construction. In fact, we could build a $60,000 dwelling according to Type II, and also a $10,000 one according to Type II, and make the latter more fire-resisting than the former by using certain precautions of construction in which the spread of fire is retarded.

Except in unusual cases, the construction of the ordinary dwelling will be either according to the first or second type, and any fire precautions that are desirable must be applicable to them. Most comparisons of relative costs are made between the dwellings included under these two types, and the difference will be mostly a difference in the kind of exterior walls used in the construction. In fact, if any comparisons are made between different kinds of buildings, as to their relative costs, it is essential that only one feature be made variable and that all others be kept the same.

The Question of Costs

Ever since the closing of the war the problem of knowing the cost of the construction of the small house has been a very intricate one, and no sure estimates could be made, until the plans were completed and let out for bids. Previous to the war, when costs were somewhat stabilized, it was possible to predict with a reasonable amount of accuracy the cost of the dwelling when the plans were still only roughed in.

In order to show the fluctuation in prices, an example of a seven-room frame house of Type I can be mentioned. This house was practically 30 by 34 feet, and had a cubical contents of about 29,100 cubic feet and an area of 2,640 square feet. In 1914 this house cost $5,529.00, but at the peak of prices in 1920 this house cost $12,815.00, which was an increase of 131 per cent. In the spring of 1922 this same house cost $9,502.00 to build, which was about 71 per cent over that of pre-war prices.

With a heavy pressure of needed construction in dwellings, the cost of materials seems to be settling down to a very gradual decrease in cost, so that the present rates show a more stable curve of decline than those of the latter part of 1920 and during 1921. The unfortunate factor which is noticeable is that certain building interests believe that a building boom is inevitable, and therefore that it is the time to hold up prices again. Wherever this has happened a building boom has been headed off.

Cubic-Foot System of Estimating

The average client, in spite of the difficulties above mentioned, insists upon securing from the architect an approximate idea of how much of a house he can have for $12,000.00, etc., or whatever sum he has been able to save for his small home. In order to approximate this figure, the architect must use the cubic-foot system of estimating. Now under changing conditions of prices this system is rather inaccurate, so that it should be used with great care. Any figures which are given here are bound to be only approximations, due to the fact that they are more or less of a local nature and must be given at this time of writing. The only satisfactory way of using the cubic-foot system of estimating is to secure prices from one’s own locality on work recently finished.

If the approximate cost of a house of Type I is desired, observe some recently erected house of that same character, secure its dimension, and calculate its cubical contents and then its cost per cubic foot. In order to be consistent, the method of computing the cubage must be the same in all cases. The following is recommended as a uniform basis:

Prices per Cubic Feet Near New York for Two-Story Dwellings,
June, 1922

Factors Influencing the Selection of Materials

From what has been previously stated, it will be noticed that, as a rule, the architect in selecting the kind of material with which he will build his house is limited on account of expense to the first two types of construction—namely, the frame dwelling and the masonry house with wood interior. The latter two fire-resisting types are better fitted to the larger mansions, where expense is not so important an item. Undoubtedly the comparative costs between the various kinds of exterior walls will have much to do with the selection; but more often the local conditions will outweigh these considerations. In some places a house built of stone will be the best and most economical; in others, where there is an abundance of good sand, the cement house will be suitable, while those located near brick centres will find this material adaptable.

The ideal method, of selecting a material of construction purely from an æsthetic point of view, is not always possible. But, after all, is not the most abundant local material the most harmonious to use for any one locality? Nature adapts her creations to the soil and the scenery into which she places them. All her animals are marked with colors which harmonize with the woods or fields in which they live. In fact this harmony is their protection, and in the war we imitated it in our camouflage painting. It is astonishingly evident, in the New York Museum of Natural History, how far more beautiful are animal tableaux which are set in painted scenery, representing accurately their natural habitat, than those which are exhibited alone in the cases, without a suggestion of their surroundings. Their marks and colorings seem ridiculous when they are separated from their natural surroundings. The same principle holds true in selecting the material for the small house. A stone house, built of native stone, in a stony, rugged region, is the most harmonious of all. A cement house in a flat, sandy country always seems in accord with the scene. A brick house in hills of clay most certainly appears the best, and a wooden house, near the great outskirts of the timber-land, is a part of the inspiring picture. Why are so many of the old colonial houses so charming? One of the reasons is the careful use of local materials.

Some Principles of Economical Design

In the first architectural studies of the house, since this problem of cost is ever with us, it is well to be familiar with some of those broad and general principles of economical design.

The lower we keep our house to the ground, the less will be the expense of labor, for, when work must be done above the reach of a man’s hands, it means the construction of scaffolds and the lifting by special hoists of the materials. This is not so important a consideration with the light wooden frame building as it is with the masonry house. Wherever we have brick, stone, or concrete exterior walls, for the sake of economy they should be built low. Mr. Ernest Flagg has found this to be so very true that, in houses which he is constructing at Dongan Hills on Staten Island, he has carefully limited the height of all walls to one story, and starts the construction of his roof from this level. Of course, at the gable end of the house, it is necessary to carry them up much higher. Now, the starting of the roof from the top of the first floor makes all the second floor come within the roof, and this heretofore has been impracticable, on account of the great heat generated under the roof and the inability of dormer-windows to ventilate the rooms properly. Mr. Flagg has solved this problem by inventing a simple roof ventilator which is located on the ridge of the roof, and serves the purpose of both lighting and ventilating. So successful has this been, that the space which in most houses is called the attic, and is wasted, has been made available and livable. What he has accomplished by these ventilators is the ability to start the roof at the top of the first floor, and thus lower the exterior walls and set the attic in the place of the second floor and make it very livable. Not only does this principle of design save considerable money, but it follows one of those great laws of beauty, so prevalent in nature. It makes the house low and nestling in the landscape, thereby harmonizing it with the surroundings. The house of the uncultured speculator stares blatantly at you and is proud of its complete isolation and difference from the landscape; but the house of those who have taste is modestly in harmony with the surroundings. The ugly house thrusts into the air without close connection with the ground, while the comely one cuddles in nature’s lap. Is it not strange that this principle of economy is a law of beauty?

There are other features of economy in design which should be observed. The simpler and more straightforward the design, the cheaper it is and the more beautiful it can be made in the hands of the good artist. Simplicity is the highest art, as it is also the most economical thing. Likewise the cost of a house can be reduced by shaping as nearly to a square as possible, and reducing the outside walls to the minimum. The semi-detached house in the group plan accomplishes this in the best manner, and gives to the whole structure that low, long skyline that is so very pleasing. This also makes one soil-line and one chimney do for both houses, a great point in economy. Some architects believe these group houses are the only economical solution of the problem of the small house.