Parts of the House. Roof

Transcription

1 Parts of the House The five major parts of a house include: roof, windows, walls, chimney, and foundation. Three other parts are also important: house shape, stories, and columns. Roof Roofs consist of several distinctive aspects. The shape of roofs determines the amount of space available in the attic and the appearance (or "feeling") of a house, from angular to "soft". The pitch of roofs determines the slope--low, normal, or steep. The materials of roofs vary over time and by the wealth of the owners. Roof shapes are probably the most noticeable feature of houses. They give clues to house styles, the date of construction, and "feeling" of houses. Gable roofs are the most common shape not only in Eau Claire but also in all houses nationally. The least common, and most unusual, shapes are flat, mansard, and gambrel. The frequency of each roof shape has varied over the last 110 years. Whereas roof shapes largely vary with fashion over time, complex shaped roofs reflect social class -- today and in the past. Gable This very common roof shape is noticeably less important from 1890s-1910s and 1960s- 1970s. During these decades other roof shapes were relatively more popular: gambrel and hipped, respectively. Flat Flat roofed houses are found in Italianate, Art Deco, and International styles.

2 Mansard Mansard roofs are a 19th century feature of houses. Contemporary apartment buildings use the mansard roof to obtain a "homey" look. The style reappeared in the 1970s as a way of differentiating suburban houses. Hipped Hipped-roofed houses were found in the 1920s on bungalow style houses and in the 1950s. Gambrel Fifty-eight percent of all gambrel roofs were built in the s. According to A FIELD GUIDE TO AMERICAN HOUSES, about 10 percent of all Colonial Revival houses in the U.S. have gambrel roofs. In the 1940s the Cape Ann style houses also used gambrel roofs.

3 Pitch of the Roof After shape, the most striking feature is pitch, the angle that roofs make with the horizontal. Both gable and hipped roofs have low to steep pitches. Mansard and gambrel roofs always have steep sided slopes. Flat roofs, of course, have no pitch! Steep slopes have a pitch of more than 45 degrees. Houses in the s generally had steep roofs, although the base was rather narrow. In the 1980s, steep roofs began to reappear on much wider houses, making the roofs appear more massive than in the 19th century. Medium slopes range from 30 to 45 degrees. Low slopes have a pitch of less than 30 degrees. The pitch of roofs decreased from the 1920s to 1950s, culminating in the ranch style. Roof Materials Although historically many different kinds of roofing materials have been used, such as thatch, sod, stone, and metal sheeting. By the late 19th century, the variety of roofing materials had been reduced to only a few. The overwhelming materials in Eau Claire are asphalt shingles, yet they vary in shape and color by decades. The oldest houses have wooden shingles, often the wooden shingles have been covered over by newer asphalt ones. Red tiles are found on Mediterranean style houses and natural slate is a feature of expensive houses, usually of the 1930s. ASPHALT SHINGLES 1920s-present The distribution of shingles is very even, a little less than 10 percent in most decades. But in the 1920s and 1950s, these types of shingles were relatively more frequent. The sample on the left is the standard used since the 1920s and the sample on right is a decorative styles used since the 1990s. 1920s-Present asphalt shingles 1990s decorative asphalt shingles

4 WOODEN SHINGLES 1860s-1940s In the 19th century wooden shingled roofs were used as the roofing material. However, by the 1930s, they were used to make houses look expensive. TILE 1920s-30s Tiled roofs are associated with a few distinctive house styles: Spanish Colonial, Mediterranean, and French Colonial. Tile roofs come in many forms, as in this tiled-roofed Spanish Colonial home. SLATE 1920s-30s Slate is an expensive roofing material. It is found on large and elaborate houses, such as Tudor or French Revival styles. Notice that 53 percent of all slate appeared during the 1920s-1930s. A composite roofing material, which looks very similar to actual slate, was also used during these decades.

5 Windows Window types refer to the kind of window and they help identify particular styles and ages of houses: Dormers appear with 1.5-, 2.5-, and 3.5- story houses and were built from the 1910s to the 1940s and essentially associated with Cubic, Bungalow, and Cape Cod styles. Picture windows were a feature of the late 1940s and early 1960s, when suburban Ranch style houses were popular. Bay windows were popular during the 1960s. Windows are called "casement" when they swing out from their side mounts and typically opened by use of a hand crank on the inside base of the unit. Steel sashes were common in the 1930s Art Deco houses, and wooden sashes were common in the s International Style houses. Windows are more commonly "double-hung" allowing the bottom half of the window to be opened. Windows are "fixed" when they cannot be opened. Windows also are made in many shapes, reflecting the tastes of particular groups during certain historical eras.

6 Walls Walls of houses have two functions: supporting the roof and screening the interior from the weather. Because Eau Claire was settled in the last half of the 19th century, house construction used the balloon-frame system, first used in Chicago during the 1830s. The principle supports are closely spaced two-by-four studs in both the exterior and interior walls. This method of construction was cheaper because it used standardized and smaller pieces of wood and was faster to construct. Balloon frame construction was modified during the early 20th century by platform framing. Instead of studs going continuously from the foundation to the roof, floors are built on top of shorter studs. Platform framing is both simpler and more rigid than balloon framing. The four most widely used methods of wood-frame construction over the past two hundred years are braced-frame, balloon frame, and platform frame, and lightweight wood truss construction. Braced-Frame Construction In the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, the first large wood-frame buildings constructed along the East Coast, which still stand today, were of braced-frame construction, sometimes called "post-and-girt" construction. This type of wood-frame structure has a braced framework of vertical timbers called "posts," which are positioned at each of the four corners of the building, and horizontal timbers called "girts," which are found at each floor level. These large timbers reinforce the entire two-by-four-inch wood-frame structure and are connected together by mortise-and-tenon joints. (The large timbers and the mortise-and-tenon joints are indicators of braced-frame construction.) The ends of the horizontal timbers are cut down to fit mortise openings which are cut through the vertical timbers. Balloon Frame Construction As the population moved westward in the nineteenth century, the need for housing increased, and cut and finished large timbers and skilled craftsmen became scarce. A lightweight, quickly assembled wood structure, which needed no large timbers, called "balloon frame construction" replaced the older Eastern braced-frame method of constructing wood structures. To erect a balloon frame structure, four wood exterior walls are constructed flat on the ground. Two-by-four-inch wood studs, extending in one piece for the full height of the wall, form the enclosing walls; the four walls are then lifted upright from the ground and connected like a box at the corners. The advantage of this type of wood construction is speed and the absence of large timbers. The drawback is a vertical void between the wall studs, which extends from the foundation sill to the attic cap and allows hidden fire and smoke that penetrate the wall space to spread vertically for two or three floors. This

7 unobstructed opening between each stud in the exterior wall, extending from the foundation sill to the attic cap, is an indicator of balloon construction. Platform Construction The platform construction method builds a structure one level at a time. One complete level of two-by-four-inch wood enclosing walls are raised and nailed together; the floor beams and deck for the next level are placed on top of these walls. The next level of two-by-four-inch wood enclosing walls are constructed on top of the first, and the floor beams and deck for the next level are placed on top of these exterior walls. Lightweight Wood Truss Construction Lightweight wood truss construction is the most common type of wood construction built today. Sheet metal surface fasteners are used to connect the truss members. The photo to the right shows a burn truss with remaining sheet metal fasteners. The burning truss floors and roof can collapse within 10 minutes of the arrival of the firefighters. It is not possible to extinguish a fire in the concealed spaces of lightweight wood construction. Easy and inexpensive construction results in more dangerous buildings for fire fighters than platform construction, which in turn are more dangerous than solid stone and brick houses which are no longer built in the U.S.A. Insulation (yellow) where the roof and the wall join; white is base for stucco; and lower down, bricks. Brick veneer over a wooden frame as shown in the overhand with lighting fixtures. The most common kinds of sidings are: wide wooden clapboard thin wooden clapboard aluminum siding Less common materials include: stucco rough cement block cutstone yellowish brick reddish brick wooden shingles Secondary wall materials are less dominant yet represent an important feature for dating houses. A brick house, for example, might have a stone facade under a picture window, or cut stone is used on the corners and around windows. The most commonly used materials are: aluminum, yellow brick, and red brick. Other materials used are: cutstone, wooden shingles, and wide clapboard.

8 Chimney Houses need at least one chimney. Additional chimneys are needed for fireplaces-- fireplaces upstairs and downstairs would use different flues within the same chimney. Number Multiple chimneys are necessary for several sources of heating and/or cooking. Besides functional reasons, the number of chimneys also gives houses different appearances, especially if they have central or end locations. Central furnaces with hot water pipes became commonplace in the 1920s, when onechimney houses were particularly common. They were also common in the 1950s when forced air furnaces were used. In these two decades they accounted for 32 percent of all such houses ever built. Larger houses with several sources of heat--fireplaces and furnaces--need several chimneys. This was typical of the late 19th century. Almost all houses after the 1920s only needed one chimney because central furnaces had become the standard way of heating. Multiple chimneys were used when houses were heated with iron stoves which were connected to masonry flues. This is the pattern of late 19th century houses. In the 1930s expensive houses sometimes had separate chimneys for trash burning in the basement! During the energy crisis of the 1970s additional chimneys -- usually on the outside -- were added for wood stoves. Location Chimneys are frequently located in the center of houses because furnaces are centrally located in basements for most equal-distance distribution of heat. End chimneys are commonly used for fireplaces. New England Colonial house styles, historically, had two end chimneys, which allowed major room, downstairs and upstairs, to have a heat source. Revival versions of this style frequently still have two end chimneys, although one is for looks only! Chimneys were located at the end of houses when fireplaces were the only sources of heating and cooking. With the uses of furnaces this location was retained more for appearance than function necessity. In fact, some house styles have two end chimneys: one functional, the other decorative to create a symmetrical appearance. Central-chimney locations are very common because of the central location of furnaces in basements. During the 1920s and 1950s the predominant house styles had central chimney locations. The two locations of chimneys are rather evenly distributed over the decades, varying more by house styles than heating technology. End chimneys were a bit more common in the 1870s, 1920s, and 1950s-1960s. Central chimneys appeared in larger numbers during the 1920s and especially 1950s.

9 Shape Chimneys have a very functional purpose to get the smoke and heat away from fireplaces and/or furnaces in basements. They are mostly simple structures, although during the late 19th century chimneys had elaborate tops, called corbling. The two types of corbling, elaborate and simple, are shown together on this map. Large percentages are found in the late 19th and early 20th century sections of town as well as in the s suburbs. The newest houses of the 1970s and the 1980s lack corbling because chimneys are commonly metal pipes covered with house siding. Yet some very expensive houses in the 1980s have elaborate corbling once again! Very elaborate corbling is associated with expensive mansions of the Victorian era (1870 to 1890s). During the s simple versions appeared on more expensive suburban homes. Materials Chimneys require masonry construction to conduct heat and smoke from furnaces and/or fire places. Essentially bricks and cement blocks are used to construct chimneys, the core of which consists of squarish glazed tiles--usually exposed at the very top of chimneys. Examine other chimney materials: Reddish brick is the most common chimney material. About 80 percent of all chimneys in Eau Claire are faced with reddish bricks. Darker shades of red were popular in the 1920s- 1930s, and lighter reds and thinner bricks were in fashion during the 1950s. 19th century red brick is different in shade and texture from the 1920s brick. Yellowish brick characterized the 1950s and the early 1960s. These bricks were frequently used as facades in the front of houses, particularly under large picture windows. Likewise, these light colored bricks were used for chimneys. Rough cement block Portland cement came into use just at the end of the 19th century and this resulted in the use of cement blocks by the late 1900s. The large number of rough cement blocks in the 1870s-1890s on the graph can be accounted for because students who surveyed the Eau Claire houses mistook cut stone for rough cement blocks in these older houses. So, be careful when you identify rough cement blocks. Look for other building materials and architectural details to verify your answer. And if at all possible, take a closer look at the chimney materials themselves but look out for trespassing on private property!! Cut stone was characteristically used in 1950s houses whether for walls or chimneys.

10 Foundation Basement materials must be strong in order to support the structures above ground. Stone and cement blocks predominate; other materials--stucco and bricks--are added as veneer to "hide" the basement materials. Only the major materials are shown in the graph. See the frequency of veneer materials. When owners repair or "modernize" houses, the primary foundation materials are sometimes covered with stucco, bricks, or aluminum siding. Sometimes foundations may be faced with veneer materials only on the front facade and the underlying foundation materials, such as rough cement blocks are exposed on the rest of the foundation. Brick is used to cover the underlying foundation materials. When old houses are remodeled not only walls, but also foundations are covered with new materials. Houses built in the 1920s-1930s frequently used brick as veneer on concrete or cement block foundations. Stone -- Foundations were built out of locally available sandstone or limestone in the 19th century. About 80 percent of stone foundations appeared up to 1900, as in this photo that shows a sandstone foundation with red brick chimney and asbestos siding from the 1920s-1930s. Short, smooth cement blocks By the 1940s foundations were being built of short, smooth cement blocks. This type of foundation decreased after the 1950s because of an increase in poured concrete foundations. Rough cement blocks From around 1900 to the 1920s, long (24 inch) rough or "bumpily" cement blocks, which resemble cutstone, were used. During the 1930s they became short and bumpily and by the 1940s they were short and smooth. Poured concrete foundations began to appear in the 1920s.

11 House Shape Houses come in very few shapes and sizes because all houses are multiples of one-room cabins. There are four main house shapes: rectangular, square, irregular and L-shaped. The evolution of houses into different shapes and sizes comes from the addition of rooms. Rooms may be added beside, behind, or on top of previous rooms. Many houses have been expanded over the decades, but most reflect the evolutionary patterns over the last 110 years. Rectangular House Rectangular houses come in two different orientations to the street they face: parallel or perpendicular. The orientation is determined by the direction of the ridge pole of the house. In the 1920s-1930s the short sides of rectangular houses faced the streets (type A), but by the late 1940s and beyond, the long sides faced the streets (type B). The change in orientation was common as lot sizes began to grow after WWII. Square House Square houses have only four corners, but may be one or two stories high. As indicated on the graph, cubic style houses were popular during the 1910s-1920s. Cubic style houses commonly had two stories, and a pyramidal shaped roof, called a hip roof. In the 1940s square houses once again became popular with the Cape Cod style (1.5 stories).

12 L-Shaped House L-shaped floor plans were used in the 1970s-1980s, and again in the 1950s-1960s. Several house styles are associated with this shape: Upright and Wing, Queen Anne, and L-shaped Ranch. Irregular House Irregular floor plans were typical in the 19th century. Such houses may have 15 or more exterior corners! In part, this was the result of the addition of sections, but irregularly-shaped houses also appealed to 19thcentury taste.

13 Stories The number of stories reflects the size of the houses and number of rooms. The height or number of stories varies largely with time and by house styles. In the 19th century larger houses had 2 or more stories. By the 1920s multi-story style houses were out of fashion; instead 1.5 story houses became common. By the 1950s one-story suburban houses were the rule. During the 1960s energy crisis, multi-story houses became popular again because they are cheaper to heat than one story houses of the same size. Multi-story houses continue to be common. Columns