The Architecture of Colonial AmericaEberlein, Harold Donaldson
History
The Architecture of Colonial America
Eberlein, Harold Donaldson
Architecture -- United States; Architecture, Colonial
Cliveden, the third member of the second group, was built in 1761 by
Chief Justice Chew. Its solid and heavy masonry is of carefully dressed
Germantown stone, and at the peaks of the gables and corners of the roof
are great stone urns. Back of the house are two wings, one semi-detached
and the other entirely so, used for servants’ quarters and domestic
offices. All the features and detail about Cliveden are thoroughly in
keeping with the same characteristics as in the other two houses already
described.
The windows are broad and fill a great part of the wall space in the
façade, and the doorway is an essential feature that has been made the
most of by the architect. Both indoors and out the strongly classic
feeling has been emphasised in pillar and pediment, pilaster and
entablature. Triglyphs, guttæ and every other detail of classic
embellishment have been wrought with the nice precision due a worthy
subject.
Comparing Whitby, Mount Pleasant and Cliveden with the former houses of
the first Georgian type, certain differences at once strike us. The
whole aspect is changed by the greater breadth of windows and doors. The
houses look wider awake. This change in the size of the windows means,
of course, that the rooms within in most cases were lighter and more
cheerful than before. Then, too, the Palladian window has appeared. Both
Mount Pleasant and Cliveden afford good examples of it, Cliveden’s being
placed at the side while at Mount Pleasant it forms an important feature
in both the east and west fronts.
At Mount Pleasant and Cliveden we see, too, that the door has become a
subject for elaborate treatment, quite in contrast to the extremely
simple and unassuming manner of dealing with the same feature in the
earlier houses. At Mount Pleasant the severity of the roof line is
tempered by a balustrade and the effective management of the chimneys
while, at Whitby and Cliveden, urns embellish the peaks and corners.
Within we find that acanthus leaves and thistles have begun to grow, the
rose has blossomed, other conventional flowers and foliage have budded
and egg and dart mouldings have appeared. In other words, carving as a
mode of embellishment has attained an established vogue. The moulding
profiles have lost some of their trenchant boldness and, though the
ornamental detail, both indoors and out, is still vigorous, and at times
massive, there is generally visible an air of delicacy and refinement
not present before.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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