Читать книгу Convenient Houses, With Fifty Plans for the Housekeeper - Louis H. Gibson - Страница 14

During recent years there is more of a disposition to live all over the house; one reason for this is the improved heating arrangements. The terms sitting-room, parlor, reception-room, mean less in a distinctive sense, and are used largely for the purpose of classification. We will consider the parlor and the sitting-room in the same connection. The parlor has lost the awful stiffness of times past. It is now a reception-room.

In a house where there is a reception-hall in front, and the sitting-room to one side, both having a distinct front view, as is shown in many of the plans, a lady may occupy the front room and have her children and work around her, if desirable. A caller may be received in the reception-room; these, however, are matters of individual preference. The vestibule may be planned so that it will have an entrance to both reception-room and sitting-room.

In some instances the arrangement of sitting-room and reception-hall are reversed. The hall is the sitting-room, and the other room the parlor. If doors are used between hall and sitting-room, they should be sliding; the effect is better, and the separation of the rooms as complete as necessary. Such doors should always be hung from the top. The sitting-room should certainly be as good a room as any in the house; as well located. There should be a closet on the first floor, and, if possible, it should communicate with this room; if not that, with the dining-room or reception-hall next to it. Certainly the sitting-room should always be provided with a grate.

A window-seat in the hall, parlor, reception, or other room, is really a great addition in more ways than one. It is not only attractive, but it adds to the availability of a room. Where there is space for three or four people to sit, in case of necessity, it is like seating that number of people outside of the room. They are comfortable, and the room has that much added to its seating capacity. A bay window arranged in this way is pleasant indeed.

Wall space is of great importance in these rooms. In planning a house, the piano, pictures, lounges, book-shelves, book-cases, bric-à-brac, etc., should be in mind. In a house of moderate size, it is, ordinarily, not necessary that the reception-hall, parlor, or sitting-room should be wider than thirteen and a half feet, and from fifteen to eighteen feet in length. However, this is not wide enough for those who entertain largely. A room thirteen and a half feet, with much furniture in it, is not wide enough for dancing.

A house arranged with a reception-hall, parlor, sitting-room, dining-room, etc., is used when it is desired to entertain a great deal; but for those who are living economically, whose means are limited, one of these rooms may be omitted. In many of the modern houses the number of rooms on the first floor has been decreased and their size increased. Oftentimes there is a reception-hall, a small library, and a dining-room only, as belonging to the living part of the house on the first floor. An arrangement of this kind belongs more particularly to a house which is occupied during only a part of the year; say as summer cottages in the North, and winter houses in the South. Modern ways of living make a larger number of rooms less desirable.

When it is possible, it is pleasant to have a little room off from the library as a study, or for a doctor as a reception-room or office. Where one does work at home, it is advantageous to have a private room that insures isolation, be it never so small. Often the library, so called in an ordinary sense, is not a library at all. There may be a few books in it, but it is used as a sitting-room or passage, and has no distinct necessity or use.

Additional rooms require more work than the same amount of floor space in a less number of rooms. The addition of rooms multiplies corners, windows, doors, etc., and adds more cost and labor, than does mere additional space. The availability of a room is not always dependent upon its size. A good deal depends upon the arrangement of wall space. A room may be large and still have no room for the furniture that is to go into it. It may be small and still have room enough.