A to Z of Period Properties

[DaveBrigg]

I'll confess to having turned to Wikipedia more than once, having been baffled by references to Quirks or Vermiculite. As a team, can we compile a dictionary of common (and not so common) terminology, as a source of reference? Starting with 'A', each week could be devoted to a new letter, with 'Z' completed on March 27th 2010. I'll try to start off with a couple of ideas. Please add your own too.

 

[DaveBrigg]

APETHORPE
A major Northamptonshire country house, with state rooms built to receive James I. Subject to compulsory purchase in 2004, it has received £4 million worth of remedial work by English Heritage. It is now on the market for anyone looking for a restoration project. Limited public access, in the form of pre-booked tours, has now finished for the year, but further public access is a condition of sale. There have been no takers so far. See English Heritage for further details.

 

[DaveBrigg]

ATTIC
noun From the Greek 'to store old junk'. Traditionally the room built in the roof space, often used to accommodate servants but now more commonly used for students or Yuppie flat conversions. Before turning your attic into a 'desirable living space' consider:
a) Fire regs. If someone is to sleep there, two means of exit must be provided, and conversions must conform to building regulations.
b) Floor strength. The original builders may not have anticipated the additional stresses caused by adding a double bed, wardrobes, en-suite and a couple of grandparents. Speak to a structural engineer!
c) Light. If your property is listed, or in a conservation area, your conservation officer will probably have something to say about adding velux roof lights.

Alternatively, if your attic is stuffed full of grandad's medals and your great-aunt's china, that you would like to flog for the cost of a two week break in Benidorm, the BBC is looking for more contestants desperate for cash.

 

[JoceAndChris]

:lol:

Lovely plan, can we agree some rules? For example, If I wanted to talk about Acro props would it be permissable to go backwards in the alphabet? How about if we were on "c" and somebody wanted to go back to "b"?

Is it period properties, general building work (e.g. French drains), or both?

And, heaven forbid, what if we're so excited about this we race through the entire alphabet before March 27th 2010?

 

[Moo]

what if we're so excited about this we race through the entire alphabet before March 27th 2010?

It wouldn't really matter, if we adopted the rules you suggest, would it? Knowing this forum, there'd be an endless stream of people popping in with new items (and arguments about the veracity/spelling/grammar of some of the entries). The whole thing would be an on-going source of innocent amusement and useful facts.

Now, how should it be set up - as a separate section of the forum, or the longest thread in the history of the internet....?

 

[JoceAndChris]

I don't know how it should be set up Moo. I rather think it might become the Longest Thread Ever!

ARCHITECTURAL ANTIQUES

These old relics fom the past will become a sudden expensive lure once you have moved into your period property. You can say goodbye to any remaining weekends you may have after DIY as you trawl round Lassco or Bygones searching out those missing andirons to complete your fireplace, and Salvo web will eat up any remaining time on the computer. www.salvo.co.uk

But, before you give in to the temptation to wash your face in a font or line your path with Victorian gas lamps you may wish to consider the following three things when shopping for architectural antiques:

1) Was it nicked?
2) Is it appropriate to the house?
3) Is it right to fill the house with fakery that will utterly bamboozle the occupants of 2050, or better to instal honest modern plastic?

 

[DaveBrigg]

ARSON
One of the most serious threats to listed buildings, which may surprise some considering the number of properties which suffer from damp. Recent victims include the Crumlin Rd courthouse, Belfast, Oxney Grange near Peterborough, Westwick obelisk in Norfolk and Haven Lodge in Coventry. For more details look under P for 'Property developers'.

 

[MdB]

ARTEX

A swear word.

Also a material than can be used to turn beautiful ceilings into ugly monstrosities.

(I wouldn't want to be a balloon in this room..)

 

[jocelyn plummer]

Acanthus Leaf. a widely used classic architectural motif found on corinthian pillars, enthusiastically incorporated into later designs--i.e William Morris.

 

[Nigel Watts]

We should at least TRY to start at the beginning. How about:

AACHEN: Site of Charlemagne's palace, an eighth century wonder fusing Byzantine and Roman styles.

AALTO, ALVAR: One of the few acceptable practitioners of that beastly MODERNIST style responsible for so much destruction and ugliness. Scandinavian, so a bit of a wood fetishist. Designed some quite good 60s ish furniture, if you like that kind of thing.

 

[Gareth Hughes]

ARCHITECT: Long-suffering drudge, held at the mercy of unscrupulous clients, and frequently undercut by people advertising "Architectural Services" in the local paper.

 

[Nigel Watts]

ABACUS: Flat slab forming the top part of the capital of a classical column upon which the architrave rests. The architrave should always be set back from the abacus and never overhang it, a rule of classical architecture frequently abused by present day perpetrators of the mock Georgian style.

right:
http://www.travelblog.org/Photos/3535286.html
wrong:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/property/3353873/Living-in-the-past-with-all-mod-cons.html

 

[Michelle73]

ASBESTOS: from the Greek meaning inextinguishable.
Can be nasty stuff if the fibres are disturbed. Best left well alone or to specialists if removing.
Can be found in eaves gutters and rainwater fall pipes, fire blankets, garage and shed roofs, linings for walls, ceilings and doors
insulation panels in some storage heaters, bath panels, central heating flues, Ironing boards and oven glovea.

 

[Gareth Hughes]

ABACUS: Flat slab forming the top part of the capital of a classical column upon which the architrave rests. The architrave should always be set back from the abacus and never overhang it, a rule of classical architecture frequently abused by present day perpetrators of the mock Georgian style.

right:
http://www.travelblog.org/Photos/3535286.html
wrong:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/property/3353873/Living-in-the-past-with-all-mod-cons.html

I even saw the wrong version at Poundbury last week :shock:

 

[Nigel Watts]

ADAM, ROBERT: Most famous member of a clan of scottish architects after whom a style of neo-classical decoration based on Roman models is named. In the words of John Summerson ".. Adam was not an academic. Impatient of English traditions, set forms, and official procedure, he aspired to be an innovator. Such, indeed, he became. He revolutionised the use of ornament; and the revolution was felt not only throughout the building trade but furniture, and even in textiles and pottery....Adam's houses - glamorous, gay (he was writing in 1945), original, full of affectations which, nevertheless, are rarely tedious... are not mere repositories of delicious ornament; the basis of their splendour is their minutely considered arrangement. The rooms in an Adam house are not a simple aggregate of well-proportioned and convenient boxes, but a harmony of spaces - a harmony in which many contrasts reside. The hall, the staircase, each room, each closet, fits into a counterpoint of living-space; every wall of every room has been caressed in the architect's mind and persuaded into some delicate discipline mutually enhancing that of the rooms before and beyond it". As Summerson goes on to say, "the tradesmen went mad over the Adam 'revolution' and brought it into every little street and every shop-front of Georgian London". The same can still be said today of the manufacturers of mantlepieces, plaster cornices and other architectural ornaments.

 

[Gareth Hughes]

ADAM, ROBERT (b.1948): Neo-neo-classical architect. Generally a far better writer than he is a designer.

 

[essexbearhunter]

ABACUS: Flat slab forming the top part of the capital of a classical column upon which the architrave rests. The architrave should always be set back from the abacus and never overhang it, a rule of classical architecture frequently abused by present day perpetrators of the mock Georgian style.

The problem is that columns designed to the srict Classical rules don't look right to the modern eye. From memory, the original idea was to get the load of the lintel - of which the architrave was the front face - over the centre of the column and covering the whole of the abacus would mean a massively wide and therefore heavy lintel.

Life moved on in construction and slimmer cast-iron columns with "I" beam girders changed the mechanics of the structure and allowing the Victorians to make their own rules. Porches with cast iron columns often have the whole column set further back and the architrave is little more than the relatively lightweight front/side panel on a covering.

This follows the natural aesthetic seen on many tables and baluster-legged chairs where a sharp protruding ledge below the seat rail/table top bearer would be uncomfortable for the user and expensive for the leg turner (unless added on afterwards).

Whether you want to view the overhung abacus as modern ignorance or an admission that the mechanics have changed and allowed us to develop the design further, is very much down to individual inclination.

As a final thought : Greek Stone-built temples were really trying to be remembrances of wooden ones (hence a lot of the purely decorative features echoeing wooden constructional details) but did not restrict themselves to copying only what would have been achievable in wood or we would not have the structures famous today.

 

[BMcD]

architrave
1 - The molding around a door or window
2 - The lowest division of the entablature in classical architecture . The main lintel or beam spanning from column to column. Concentric arch mouldings which make an archivolt are also considered architraves.

From this site here http://www.robertabarresi.com/architectureglossarya.html

 

[Gareth Hughes]

architrave
1.In classical architecture, the section of the entablature that rests on the columns
2. the moulding around a window or door

ashlar
Imitation block work scored into plain faced render

ASHLAR: also, the vertical section of wall below a sloping ceiling in an attic room; also, masonry dressed to a smooth face.
(ATTIC: the top storey of a multi-storey vertical classical elevation, above the main entablature, not comprised of rooms within the roof structure. From the ancient Greek province of Attica)

I don't think we'll be done with the "A"s before 2012

 

[Gareth Hughes]

ABACUS: Flat slab forming the top part of the capital of a classical column upon which the architrave rests. The architrave should always be set back from the abacus and never overhang it, a rule of classical architecture frequently abused by present day perpetrators of the mock Georgian style.

The problem is that columns designed to the srict Classical rules don't look right to the modern eye. From memory, the original idea was to get the load of the lintel - of which the architrave was the front face - over the centre of the column and covering the whole of the abacus would mean a massively wide and therefore heavy lintel.

Life moved on in construction and slimmer cast-iron columns with "I" beam girders changed the mechanics of the structure and allowing the Victorians to make their own rules. Porches with cast iron columns often have the whole column set further back and the architrave is little more than the relatively lightweight front/side panel on a covering.

This follows the natural aesthetic seen on many tables and baluster-legged chairs where a sharp protruding ledge below the seat rail/table top bearer would be uncomfortable for the user and expensive for the leg turner (unless added on afterwards).

Whether you want to view the overhung abacus as modern ignorance or an admission that the mechanics have changed and allowed us to develop the design further, is very much down to individual inclination.

As a final thought : Greek Stone-built temples were really trying to be remembrances of wooden ones (hence a lot of the purely decorative features echoeing wooden constructional details) but did not restrict themselves to copying only what would have been achievable in wood or we would not have the structures famous today.

The Victorians did not ignore -or change - those rules, even in cast-iron gasometers like the Kings Cross ones, we do, with the result that too many mock-classical facades look as if they're about to topple into the street. It doesn't help that, done properly, the correct relationship between the abacus and architrave necessarily involves the base of the column or pilaster projecting further than it otherwise would beyond the face of the building, which - if you're building a hundred of these monstrosities - means that you're occupying floor space on the pavement which you have to buy from the owner of the highway if your houses are backing the pavement.