Of essentially Georgian character, the house is still more strongly
reminiscent of many plantation mansions of the South. It has an entrance
front to the north and a river or garden front to the south, while the
kitchen arrangements are well concealed. Between two semicircular bays
that project from the ends of the building on the entrance front, six
Ionic pilasters support a broad and elaborately ornamented pediment, its
chief features being the notching of the shingles, the circular window
and the frieze with groups of vertical flutings in alternation with
large round flower ornaments. A broad paved terrace three steps above
the drive extends across the front from one bay to the other and gives
approach to a round-arched central doorway with handsome leaded fanlight
beneath a segmental hood supported by round engaged Ionic columns. This
doorway leads into the hall.
On the river front a lofty pedimental-roofed portico centrally located
and supported by six great smooth pillars is of distinctly southern
aspect. Another round-arched doorway flanked by two round-topped windows
opens directly into an oval-shaped ballroom. The beautiful Palladian
windows on either side of this facade and recessed within an arch in the
masonry are among the chief distinctions of the house. An examination of
them indicates as convincingly as any modern work the delightful accord
that may exist between gray stone and white woodwork, and draws
attention to the masonry itself. The use of relatively small stones has
resulted in an unconventional though pleasing wall effect, due to the
prominence and rough character of the pointing which has been brought
well out to the edges of the stones.
A word may well be said in passing in regard to the stable at The
Woodlands, which, while rightly unassuming, lives in complete accord
with the house, as every outbuilding should. A hip-roofed structure with
lean-to wings, it is essentially a Georgian conception. Its walls are of
ledge stone like the house, broken by a symmetrical arrangement of
recessed arches in which the various doors and windows are set, and
further embellished by a four-course belt of brick at the second-floor
level.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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