The Coolidge examiner., 1936-06-12

, for a flower holder But it often
happens that one must assume the
dilapidations of the previous ten
ant, which may include repairs and
decorations of Importance. So it is
word to excite suspicion.
What the American adventurous
spirit asks of England for the sum-
mer is smallish house, even a cot
tage. But it must be under style.
name like Tudor, or more romantic
ally Elizabethan, or perhaps, Queen
Anne and the Georgian. either late
or early.
Hunting a Country House.
The hunt for the ideal takes on
the aspect of a tour. 1t is possible
to get about by commodious omni-
buses. They set you down on the
main roads, where local motor cars
with drivers can be hired.
Gradually you come to know the
districts not too far from London
where certain types of the ideal
house have sprung from the soil.
1t is a requisite of the ideal Eng
Hsh small house that it should look
as If it had pushed itself up from
Natures laboratory of the earth,
just as the shrubs, flowers, and trees:
have done. They are close kin.
Districts not too far from Lon
don contain an enhancing variety
of old styles. The house Of carved
interiors and scrolled gables is a
speciality of Kent; the thatched
roof hides beside the roads Of Hamp-
shire's New Forest; the cottage
of light-gray stone makes glad the
villages of the Cotswolds; and the
Georgian, or rather Eighteenth Gen.
fury houses, scatter their elegant
lines in all parts of the land. Tim
ber and plaster houses tempt one
almost everywhere with their Tudor
charm.
You come to one of the richest
of all districts for those who hunt
the ideal house when you arrive.
at the hills of the Cotswolds. Grad
ually its little stone houses catch
you in the spell of their beauty.
They spread themselves beside the
road, taking on almost human quail
tiles. They lift their gables with
dignity; they spread their mullioned
windows with frankness. Their SYM
metry seems of the highest art, yet
it is said these lovely houses were
built by simple artisans. They took
the warm, light stone of the land,
and even the roof tiles are made
of it. All seems a pearly gray, and
on this ideal color climb the bright
flowers Of the garden.
Many Enticing Places.
You linger long and drift from
road to lane, from village to farm,
drinking in every detail of these
houses-the Tudor ornament. over
the loaded windows, the lovely fiat
arch of the front door, the beau
ties of the back of the house, the
flowers and a cunning use of shrubs
and creepers piling one thrilling
beauty upon another against the
light-gray stone.
In Sussex and Kent, hunt out the
old farms and the ancient houses
of villages. They have beauty all
their own, with their bricks turned
to pink and softened brown. Many
have an end gable of stone fash
toned in the grand curves which
fascinatingly recall the Walloons
who brought with them their own
traditions of art when driven TO
England by religious prosecutions.
Those curvilinear gables have, too,
a Spanish flavor, late Renaissance
caper of free-drawn curves. Fascl~
mating interiors those WalloOn cloth
weavers constructed to make the
homes of their eXiles resemble those
they had left.
In Kent is found that enticing
structure. the house of timber ana
plaster, or timber and brick ingenl-
ouslv laid. 1t is eternally lovely, be-
wiIderingly fantastic. How did mod
est man fancy such house easy to
build. and practical? The beams,
black and exposed, seem to repre-
sent superhuman effort in the inter-
est of beauty. The curved ones, the
purely ornamental ones, fascinate
the eye. The overhanging second
story is a fantastic denial of archl-
lectures law of the large base.