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Fashionable
New York city architects and magazine editors, like the ones
quoted below, railed against country folks’ love of white
houses. But, farmers praised the benefits in their journals.
White paint was considered "neighborly" by continuing
the country tradition; it protected wood because it reflected
the sun; it extended the work day by brightening the door yard
at dusk. Because it was a simple mix of white lead and linseed
oil, new white paint usually matched the old. Extensions were
easy to finish, and homes could be repainted one side at a time
and the sides would match.
It
seems almost unnecessary to allude to the custom of painting
houses white, but the practice is yet continued with
pertinacity, as if the highest idea of beauty was reached in a
white house with green blinds. Riding along our village and
country roads, white houses, reflecting the rays of a bright
sun, will glare at us on every side, until the sense is
absolutely pained, and relief is sought by closing the eyes.
These places are often without a particle of shade of trees or
vines. To be sure, it takes time to raise trees, but many of the
houses could be absolutely transformed by the expenditure of a
single dollar for climbing vines, and affording them the proper
care in raising and training them. It makes no difference with
the seasons in regard to white houses, for if the sun shines
less brightly or is obscured by clouds in winter, it is probable
that, at the north, the ground will be covered with snow,
between which and the house there is no contrast, but all is an
unbroken field of white. There is no excuse for such shocking
displays of bad taste, and with all the attention that is being
given to art by our young people, it is to be hoped that this
feature of our early development will soon be lost.
Vick’s
Monthly Magazine, 1881
The
question of color is a most interesting one in any design for a
country house, and seems at present but little understood in
America, by far the greater number of houses being simply
painted white, with bright green blinds. By this means each
residence is distinctly protruded from the surrounding scenery,
and instead of grouping and harmonizing with it, asserts a right
to carry on a separate business on its own account; and this
lack of sympathy between the building and its surroundings is
very disagreeable to an artistic eye. Even a harsh, vulgar
outline may often pass without particular notice in a view of
rural scenery, if the mass is quiet and harmonious in color;
while a very tolerable composition may injure materially the
views near it if it is painted white, the human eye being so
constituted that it will be constantly held in bondage by this
striking blot of crude light, and compelled to give it unwilling
attention.
In some cases,
the house-painters themselves show a laudable desire to escape
from monotonous repetition; but, on the other hand, they are
often very troublesome opponents to reform in this matter. And
this is not to be wondered at; for a mechanic who has been
brought up on a chalk-white and spinach-green diet ever since he
was old enough to handle a brush, can hardly help having but
little taste for delicate variety, because a perpetual
contemplation of white lead and verdigris is calculated to have
the same effect on the eye that incessant tobacco-chewing has on
the palate: in each case the organ is rendered incapable of nice
appreciation.
Calvert
Vaux, Villas & Cottages, 1867
No
one is successful in rural improvements, who does not study
nature, and take her for the basis of his practice. Now, in
natural landscape, any thing like strong and bright colors is
seldom seen, except in very minute portions, and least of all
pure white—chiefly appearing in small objects like flowers.
The practical rule which should be deduced from this, is, to
avoid all these colors which nature avoids. In buildings, we
should copy those that she offers chiefly to the eye—such as
those of the soil, rocks, wood, and the bark of trees,—the
materials of which houses are built. These materials offer us
the best and most natural study from which harmonious colors for
the houses themselves should be taken.
Country houses,
thickly surrounded by trees, should always be painted of a
lighter shade than those standing exposed. And a new house,
entirely unrelieved by foliage, as it is rendered conspicuous by
the very nakedness of its position, should be painted several
shades darker than the same building if placed in a well wooded
site. In proportion as a house is exposed to view, let its hue
be darker, and where it is much concealed by foliage, a very
light shade of color is to be preferred."
The
Horticulturist, 1847
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