Tag: porch

The Sunday porch: interiors

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More well-furnished porches in Queensland, Australia. . .

5 Queensland porch interior, late 19th c., StateLibraryQueensland“Verandah at The Hollow, near Mackay, Queensland, about 1875,” photographer unidentified (all photos here), via State Library of Queensland Commons on flickr (all photos here).

I love the office setup on this very deep porch with an adjoining fernery or bush-house. There is also a sewing machine on the table between the two women.

These photos are not very clear, but you can click any thumbnail in the gallery below to scroll through larger versions.  There are four additional pictures there too.

7 Queensland porch interior, late 19th c., StateLibraryQueensland“Unidentified family on the verandah of a Cairns residence, ca. 1895.”

What a beautiful plant collection.

2 Queensland porch interior, late 19th c., StateLibraryQueensland“Furniture on the verandah of a Queenslander home, ca. 1925,” photographer unidentified.

The white chairs on the left with the extended armrests are “squatter’s chairs,” typical to Queensland porches. There are two more examples here.

“Verandah of Gracemere Homestead, near Rockhampton,” ca. 1940.
“Furnishings on a verandah of a Queensland home, ca. 1925.”
“Verandah at ‘Fairseal,’ the residence of W.C. Hume at Torwood, Brisbane, 1890.”
“Invicta, the home of the Kingsfords in Cairns, ca. 1888.”
“Verandah at The Hollow, near Mackay, Queensland, about 1875.”
“Unidentified family on the verandah of a Cairns residence, ca. 1895.”
“Furniture on the verandah of a Queenslander home, ca. 1925.”

Additional links:
Gracemere Homestead 1940 photo,  Rockhampton, Gracemere Homestead in 2001, GracemereHomestead history

W.C. Hume short biography, Brisbane, squatter’s chair

The Kingsfords, Cairns

The Sunday porch: tea party

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Tea on porch, 1887, State Library of Queensland, Australia“Group of women having a tea party in Queensland, Australia,” ca. 1887, photographer unknown, via State Library of Queensland.

Beautiful Platycerium or staghorn ferns on the wall and columns. These could be Platycerium superbum, which are native to Australia. The one on the left seems to be supporting another plant — maybe a coleus.

How quiet it is, how silent,
like an afternoon in Pompeii.

— Louise Glück, from “A Summer Garden“

The Sunday porch: Struan

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Struan, Arden, North Carolina, via Library of CongressGrape vines over the porch of an old outbuilding at Struan, Arden, North Carolina, 1938, by Frances Benjamin Johnston, via Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division.

Struan, Arden, North Carolina, cropped, via Library of CongressDetail of the above; note the potted plants on the old ladder.

By the time Johnston photographed the old plantation of Struan for her Carnegie Survey of the Architecture of the South, the property had been a school for boys, Christ School, for 38 years.

The Sunday porch: relay station

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Baltimore stoop, J. Vachon, Library of CongressThis photo was among  a set of 1938 photos of Baltimore, Maryland, by John Vachon, via Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division (all four pictures).

Dover, DE, Library of Congress“Resident of Dover, Delaware,” July 1938, by John Vachon.

Mail, Omaha, NE, Library of Congress“Morning mail, Omaha, Nebraska,” November 1938, by John Vachon.

Store porch conversation, Library of Congress“On the porch of a general store in Hinesville, Georgia,” April 1941, by Jack Delano.

And this.

The Sunday porch: Mount Toxaway

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2 The Sunday porch:enclos*ure -- Lake Toxaway, c. 1902, Library of CongressThe Lodge on Mount Toxaway, Sapphire, North Carolina, ca. 1902, by William Henry Jackson, via Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division (all photos here).

The Lodge was part of the Toxaway System of Hotels, created by a group of Pittsburgh entrepreneurs who began to built resorts in the Sapphire area in the 1890s.

By 1903, they had dammed the Toxaway River — creating the 640-acre artificial Lake Toxaway — and constructed the luxurious 500-guest Toxaway Inn.  After 1904, when the Southern Railroad opened a depot on the lake, the area was known as “Switzerland of America.”

1 The Sunday porch:enclos*ure -- Lake Toxaway, c. 1902, Library of Congress

The Lodge was presented in a 1905  company brochure as a “nature kindergarten” for “children of the city” to learn about trees, flowers, and birds. Farm animals and poultry were also available for study.

4 The Sunday porch:enclos*ure -- Lake Toxaway, c. 1902, Library of Congress

At an altitude of over 4,500 ft., the views from the wrap-around porch and the lookout tower were particularly good. Guests from the other Toxaway hotels would spend the night in the house to see the sunrise or sunset over the mountains.

It was also used as a hunting retreat for wealthy industrialists.

3 The Sunday porch:enclos*ure -- Lake Toxaway, c. 1902, Library of Congress

The Lodge no longer exists — although it  was still there in 1920, four years after severe flooding caused the company’s dam to burst. (Some homes were destroyed, but only a mule perished.)

Lake Toxaway disappeared, and the Toxaway Inn emptied out as well. It never re-opened after 1916 and was demolished in 1947.

In the early 1960s, another group of investors rebuilt the dam. The lake re-filled, and a golf club and hotel were opened. The property around what was once The Lodge is now  Preserve at Rock Creek, an “exclusive” real estate development.

To scroll through larger version of the photos, click on ‘Continue reading’ below and then on any thumbnail in the gallery.

My mind was once the true survey
Of all these meadows fresh and gay,
And in the greenness of the grass
Did see its hopes as in a glass. . .

— Andrew Marvell, from “The Mower’s Song“