dutch gable – frame

a house of opposites

2017⋅07⋅272017⋅07⋅27 NS ColemanLeave a comment

This is a simple, ‘shotgun’ home, with two porches flanking either side, and a large central room in the middle, accentuated by the ‘dutch’ gable of the roof. The ‘opposites’ so named in the post’s title indicate that the ground floor has open porches on the ends with a solid middle, while the semi-enclosed basement has the opposite: enclosed ends and an arcaded middle. This came about through a simple drawing, shown above, where the same parti could easily be rendered in either formation – so why not do both? That hybrid elevation is below, where the opposition of the two systems results in a ‘checkerboard’ pattern, not too dissimilar from Lutyens’ own, larger, experiments.

more dueling hearths

2017⋅01⋅252017⋅01⋅25 NS Coleman1 Comment

Following the last post, this long hall also features two heaths, though here they’re in the form of the modernist cone fireplaces popular in the 60’s, and are placed along the length of the structure rather than at its ends. The most defining characteristic of this project though are the long roof rafters that are extended past the walls but without carrying any projecting eave of the roof itself. This was taken from a derelict barn building I drove past over the winter break, where the eaves had been completely bereft of their roofing, leaving only bare joists.

a richardsonian cabin

2016⋅11⋅012016⋅11⋅01 NS ColemanLeave a comment

Continuing last week‘s Californian agricultural experiments, this small structure (which I’m titling a ‘cabin’, but really is a programless form) is square in plan with a pitched roof running in one direction, terminating in a dutch gable at the far end over a colonnaded porch and a large circular window in the gable face, and cantilevering over the entry portico, where two identical doors reference the four-square floor plan. The language owes much to Richardson, filtered through the vernacular, with a shingle roof, clapboard walls, and a flemish bond brick base.

turrets and gables

2016⋅10⋅13 NS ColemanLeave a comment

No program here, just form, where circles and squares meet, compete, and transform into one another. Four cubic pavilions are set at the corners of a large conic square hall (the roof form echoes a very early post, a form which I’ve been interested in for some time). The whole sits under a dutch gable roof, with a central skylight, and circular turrets on top of the square pavilions.

a dutch gable folly

2016⋅08⋅162016⋅08⋅16 NS Coleman1 Comment

Part gable, part hip roof: the dutch gable. This small pavilion is a simple post-and-beam structure, on a four-square plan, with shingled walls set in antis to the columns on two sides, all beneath a large square dutch gable roof. The roof is inherently directional, always favoring one axis of the other, even though the eaves remain constant. The bottom drawings attempt to subvert this, making the dutch gable diagonally symmetrical, similar to the roof of a small cabin I featured some weeks past.