Category: architecture

The Sunday porch: conversation

Cindy at enclos*ure9 Comments

1941 porch in Mobile, Alabama, by C.W. Cushman“Porch of old house at Monroe St., Mobile[, Alabama],” taken November 4, 1941, by Charles W. Cushman.*

The atmosphere of this porch is still and quiet, but I think there’s something urgent about the conversation.  The expression of the young woman in pink is serious; the woman across from her has stopped on her way (in or to her own house?) from the grocery store.  They all listen intently to the older woman in light blue.

Cushman was an amateur photographer who began documenting his travels in 1938, using expensive, (then) little-used Kodachrome film.  He continued taking color pictures for 32 years, ultimately bequeathing 14,500 slides to his alma mater, Indiana University.

NPR has an interesting audio/slide show on Cushman and his work here, and here is a series of color photos of New York City that he took in the early 1940s.

*Used with the permission of  the Charles W. Cushman Photograph Collection, Indiana University Archives.  I originally posted this image in November 2012.

The Sunday porch: Oxford, Ohio

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The Flower family, probably in Ohio, ca. 1905, via Miami University Libraries Commons on flickr“Flower family on porch, ca. 1905,” by Frank R. Snyder, via Miami University Libraries Commons on flickr.

Impressive porch foliage . . . and in the photo below, by the same photographer.

Mrs. C.E. Kumler family on front porch, by Frank Snyder, via Miami University Libraries Commons on flickr“Mrs. C. E. Kumler family on front porch, not dated,” also by Frank R. Snyder, via Miami University Libraries Commons on flickr.

Snyder was a successful photographer working in Oxford, Ohio, in the early 20th century.  After his death in 1958, his family donated his archive of 4,000 negatives to Miami University.

Garden Bloggers’ Foliage Follow Up is the 16th of every month. Check out more beautiful leaves at Digging.

Life in gardens: Cornusson

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You’ve made your garden; how will you live in it?

Une ronde a Saint Edmond, via flickr, Bibliotheque de Toulouse Commons“Une ronde à Saint Edmond, Cornusson, [in the Pyrenees, France,]” c. 1900, by Eugène Trutat, via Bibliotheque de Toulouse Commons on flickr.

[T]he significance of the garden cannot be restricted to the domain of the aesthetic. That the garden affords sensory pleasure and invites the exercise of taste is, to be sure, an important dimension of the significance that gardens have for many people, but not one that even begins to exhaust the place that these same people afford to the garden within a wider conception of ‘the good life’.

— David E. Cooper, from A Philosophy of Gardens

Life in gardens: Lisbon

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library-garden-Jardim-França-Borges-in-1949A library garden (Biblioteca de jardim) in the Jardim do Principe Real, Lisbon, Portugal, in 1949.*

Wonderful.

Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to find out anything about Lisbon’s library gardens.  A comment on the flickr page said that they had been abolished in 1980.

Jardim do Principe Real is also called Jardim França Borges in honor of a Republican journalist, whose bust was placed there in 1915. The 2.9 acre (1.2 ha.) park in the Mercês parish was landscaped in a romantic design in the mid-19th century.

library-garden-Jardim-França-Borges-in-1949Reading under the cedar of Buçado, above, in the Jardim do Principe Real, Lisbon, Portugal, 1949.

The cedar† and the pretty iron structure supporting its 78′ (23 m.) diameter still stand in the park.

Library Garden Julio de Castilho, 3 the Mirador de Santa Luzia, in 1949.Above is the Julio de Castilho library garden  at the Mirador de Santa Luzia, overlooking the Tagus River in Lisbon, also in 1949.

He who has a garden and a library wants for nothing.
― Cicero

*All photos here taken by Estúdio Mário Novais, via Art Library Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian Commons on flickr.*

†One source called it a Mexican white cedar.

The Sunday porch: Santa Barbara

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Vhay house, Santa Barbara CA, 1934, HABS, Library of CongressThe north porch of the Vhay House, 835 Leguna Street, Santa Barbara, California, April 1934, by C. A. Fletcher for an Historic American Buildings Survey (HABS), via Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division.*

Vhay house, Santa Barbara CA, 1934, HABS, Library of CongressThe Rafael Gonzalez House, which was owned by Louise and David Vhay at the time of these photos, was built in 1825.  It is a typical adobe townhouse of the Mexican California period, with walls over 2′ (.61 m.) thick.

Gonzalez was a soldier and landowner when he built the house for his Italian bride. He became mayor or alcalde of Santa Barbara in 1829.  His daughter, Salome, inherited the home in 1866 and lived there until 1923.

The Vhays restored and enlarged the house.  It is now occupied by Randall House Rare Books.

Vhay house, Santa Barbara CA, 1934, HABS, Library of CongressAbove: bougainvillea above and calla lilies below, along the north porch, by C. A. Fletcher.

Vhay HABS, 1934, Library of CongressAbove: north porch, by C. A. Fletcher (cropped by me).

Vhay house, Santa Barbara CA, 1934, HABS, Library of CongressAbove: south porch from the southwest. Photographed April 1934, by H. F. Withey.

Vhay house, Santa Barbara CA, 1934, HABS, Library of CongressAbove: detail of south porch, east end, by H. F. Withey.

Vhay house, Santa Barbara CA, 1934, HABS, Library of CongressAbove: 1934 drawing by Frederick C. Hageman (also the small plan above).

2010 photo by Dilly Lynn, via Wikimedia CommonsAbove:  2010 photo of the Rafael Gonzalez House, now a rare book store, by Dilly Lynn, via Wikimedia Commons.  There’s also a nice painting of the house in 1953 here.

The house was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1970.

.    .    .    — for a sec
he even sees the calla lily’s furl
in the gesture of voilà!

— Farnoosh Fathi, from “Sympathy“

*All photos and drawings here, except the last image, via Vhay House HABS, Library of Congress.