bruce price goes diagonal

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In a seeming break with the previous two Price projects that were relentlessly symmetrical and modular.  This project would seem to diverge – seem to.  The reality is that this cottage is just as systematic as the previous two, but its symmetry is diagonal rather than axial, and its modularity is only shifted one half bay to turn a regular square plan into a rectangular one.  The ground floor is all ashlar cut stone, while shingles cover nearly everything else.  A large tower takes up one corner, where the ashlar rises up into the second story, even to the third at a small circular corner column – see wormseye axonometric below.  Rounded corners abound – a continuous wrapping surface of shingles consumes the rigid geometry.

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a bay window

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A bay window topped with a full-width gable, leaving small triangular soffits at the eaves.  I noticed this feature on my way to a site meeting in South Los Angeles, and since then have seen it recurring throughout my library – Richardson, Bruce Price, Peabody & Stearns, et al.  So here’s my version: covered in shingles throughout, battered stone walls at grade, four-square windows, the gable becomes a full pediment, and the big reveal – a rounded interior wall.

a beach cottage

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Taking cues from Shingle Style residences mixed with a fair amount of Richardson (red mortar on Flemish-bond brick and rough-faced ashlar masonry much?) and a bit of my own preferences for industrial sash windows and rigid geometries, this little cottage is organized around a nine-square plan, with cramped interior rooms and no central ‘Hall’, thereby favoring the large screened porch at the rear.

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