TALKATIVE HOUSES, THE STORY OF A NEW ARCHITECTURE IN THE WEST, TOLD BY THE WOMEN'S CLUB BUILDING AT LA JOLLA.

There is a delightful Russian folk story of a little house that lived at the edge of the woods, a cozy, sociable little thing that dearly loved a pleasant chat with passersby. It was greatly interested in the doings of its neighbors and of the world at large, yet, like any human, preferred above all things to talk about itself. This talkative little house, though modest indeed, kept no secrets, entered into no subterfuges. Through doors, windows, roof, walls and chimneys, the truth about its life, ideals, age, strength and weakness were constantly proclaimed. Sometimes it walked a little way through the woods or over the sunny hills, so that the memory of cool shadows and reflected lights was woven into its speech as well as tale of storm and score of years.

But why should we quote legends to prove that houses have personality and speak eloquently of all that has entered into their life and growth? Is there any doubt that houses have no secrets from those who stop for a chat with them? Their height and breadth, the shape and thickness of their walls, reveal the history of man's development, of his struggle first for personal comfort and then for civic beauty.

Interesting indeed is the story of architecture as told by some of the new houses built in the West. Take the Woman's Club House, recently added to the community group of buildings at La Jolla, the gift of Miss Ellen Browning Scripps, that includes the Bishop's School for Girls, a beautiful little church and a municipal playground. This structure plainly says with Walt Whitman that it is "an acme of things accomplished, an enclosure of things to be." Back of its severe lines stands the whole history of man's struggle with the three great architectural principles, the square, the circle and the line, from the time the might of these powerful forces dawned upon his understanding up to his supreme use of them in the ancient Greek temples. Memories of the Moorish and Spanish efforts to relieve the uncompromising basic structure of the square with the gracious curve of the circle, of the Italian's delight in an unadorned flat wall, that it may be frescoed by the passing of time, the sunshine and shadow of days, of our own Indians' skill in the erection of a house modeled to fit unobtrusively into its environment, are all stored up in these walls waiting to be revealed to whoever cares to listen to its wordless speech.

This club house, which is yet too new and bare of vines for a just estimate of its beauty to be reached, was designed by Gill and Gill, those fearless San Diego architects, who over and over again have dared to defy the dictates of architectural preachment and, discarding every applied ornament, relied solely on the classic beauty of the horizontal line, the impressive stability of the square and the supreme grace of the circle for the enduring beauty and worth of their design. These men, like the builders of old, hover over every constructional detail, personally supervising the mixing of the concrete, constantly subjecting it to tests, that their work may be as perfect and lasting as skill, experience and watchfulness can make it. Their theory is that though such constant supervision, with the use of the best material seems costly at the start, it is more than balanced by permitting the use of less cement and reinforcing material. Because concrete walls are usually made much thicker than is needed to allow for possible poor material, there is always great waste, while carefulness and insistence on good workmanship, it is unnecessary to say, safeguard all building to a notable degree.

The walls of the Gill club house were built in a new and practical method; they were first formed in a horizontal line, the metal doors and windows set while in this position, and the whole thing tipped up into place as shown in one of the photographs. The corners were then securely tied; this method saves great expenditure of labor and material, vastly reducing the cost, as proved in the fact that this entire building was erected for two thousand five hundred dollars.

The floors throughout the club are cement, colored in mottled tones of light red and reinforced enough to prevent cracking; treated with an oil finish and waxed, they make an excellent dancing surface. The interior walls in their usual soft gray color scheme, have been surfaced so that both walls and ceiling reflect the colors of the sky and garden from the outside and the colors of the hangings from the inside. This gives the rooms ever-shifting, ever-moving opalescent tints that are far more beautiful than the ordinary dull opaque one-tone effect. The walls, glowing and changing with every hour and mood of the day, are ethereally lovely. To live in such rooms is like living inside of a bubble or in the chalice of a morning glory; delicate pastel colors come and go upon the walls with the witching elusiveness of desert mirage, phantom garden-colors impossible to describe.

The plan of this club house is distinctly original. The building faces the sea, only a garden between. Entering from the street, the walk is through a rich green lawn in which young palm trees have been planted. A large porch, made wide enough for dancing, runs across the front and partly along each side, ending in a spacious clubroom on the east and a lunch room on the west. On either side of the vestibule are small committee rooms. At the end of the large assembly room, which is in the center of the building, is a stage equipped for amateur performances. Dressing rooms, a property room, a kitchen and the living rooms for the caretaker and his wife at the rear of the garden take up the whole end of the building. By means of large rolling partitions at the side of the assembly room, these three rooms can be thrown into one, making a dancing space fifty by eighty feet. The picture possibility of dancers moving from shadow to bright light, with a background of palms, arches and flowers is one of the chief motives for the generous arrangement. The Californian's love of color and gaiety and beautiful pictures never ceases to enter into the plan of house-building and garden.

The court at the north with the large pergola is a tea garden, and the rose garden runs all along the south. The garden and pergola walks are red brick laid in herringbone pattern. The pergola columns are concrete with redwood top beams. This same idea of numerous open courts and patios and wide pergolas was carried out in the Bishop's School for Girls, part of this community plan, and was described in The Craftsman of September, nineteen fourteen. This of course is in accordance with the Californian demand for outdoor living facilities; in the case of the school building, the pergolas and courts were used as gymnasiums, outdoor study and recitation rooms; in the club house, they are the tea, reception and conversation rooms, for people remain indoors as little as possible out in this flowery, sunny land.

Whoever speaks of Irving J. Gill's work or that of his associate, Louis J. Gill, must dwell upon his radical views of designs well as of construction. Architects more than any other creative workers, perhaps, are forced to work somewhat within traditional limits. Their designs must be governed by consideration of practical things, such as cost and endurance of material, size of lot and the personal wishes of the owner. Their work must be beautiful and original in design, permanent in construction, able to withstand fire, time and the elements. Without the tremendous cohesive force of imagination, these herculean tasks could not be performed. Desiring to do his part toward creating a new domestic architecture, Irving Gill threw aside all the conventional standards of known styles and began with the three first principles, the square, the circle and the line. Working with these fundamental powers and ridding his mind of all accepted standards of ornamentation used to cover up defective lines, he saw that plain diverging horizontal lines were full of fine classic beauty, that arches not only made but framed pictures, that the design of a building must reckon with lights and shadows as well as forms, and that Nature must be taken into partnership and entrusted with the rich task of adding the final beauty to his work. So against the plain walls and simple arches of his designing, he plants creepers that embroider incomparable patterns over the arches and around the pillars, crowd into the corners, delicately outline windows and cornices and mass at irregular intervals along the eaves or the top of walls. The broad sweep of green lawn seems to touch with caressing fingers the walls of this building, drawing them close into the very heart of the garden. And this is done so informally and so graciously that, looking over the building and its surroundings with fresh unprejudiced mind, one could not fail to realize that the richest and most intricate carving or man-made ornamentation of any kind would fail in beauty if compared with the decorative tracery of the green vines. On every side the long sweeping lines of the architecture seem inspired by the gracious curve of the California landscape, fitting in admirably with the low swell of the surf and the gentle range of hills. And the result is an architectural beauty that is neither Italian nor Greek, Spanish nor French, but distinctly Californian, belonging to a new civilization with a new instinct for home building and a new belief in the value of Nature as an architectural aid. As a matter of fact, it is not too much to say that the Gills have in less than a decade achieved the miracle of a new architecture at once practical and satisfying.

(Photo Captions)

Below is the Front View of the Club House at La Jolla That is the Latest Addition to the Community Group of Buildings Given By Miss Ellen Browning Scripps, Which Includes Also the Bishop's School For Girls. A Municipal Playground and the Little Chapel Shown at the Left: The Chapel was Built in Memory of the San Diego Mission But a Few Miles Away, the Façade of Which Has Been Almost Strictly Followed; This Club House Represents the New Type of Architecture Which is Being Worked Out in California. Namely, the Strict Adherence to the Three Great Architectural Principles of the Square. The Circle and the Line, Free From all Applied Ornaments. Ornamentation to be Supplied By Vines For Scrolls and Flowers For Color.

At the Left May Be Seen the Court Through One of the Arches: Every Building Designed By Lewis (sic) J. Gill Has Been Planned With a View to Pictures Seen Through Arches: An Arch is Always Placed So that it Will Center Some View, an Easy Matter in California: The Beauty of Both this Arch and the One Seen Below Cannot Be Appreciated Until the Creepers, Which are Planted as Soon as the Builders are Out of Sight. Take Possession of the Walls and Trace Their Softening Patterns Upon Them.

In Nearly Every Case, the Ficus Ripens is Used About the Arches Because it Sends Out Green Fingers which Trace Delicately Rather Than Provide Masses of Green: Part of the Value of Arches in California Buildings Lies in Their Ability to Make Effective Shadows: There Contrasts of Shadows and Bright Sunlight are Always Carefully Reckoned with; In Walls, Doors, Windows, Pergolas, the Concrete Arch Can Be Depended Upon To Make a Frame a Picture that No Architectural Feature Surpass.

Two Views of the Inner Court of La Jolla Club House: These Courts are Made Unusually Wide That They May Be Used as Tea Rooms, Study Rooms, Outdoor Recitation Rooms and Promenades: The Walks are to Ordinary Red Brick, the Pillars Concrete, the Beams of Redwood: No Idea of the Beauty of this Can be had Until the Vines Have Taken Possession of Them.

The Walls of This Club Room Were Built Horizontally, Metal Windows and Door Frames Put in Position and the Whole Tipped Into Place and Fastened Securely at the Corners: Such Construction Materially Reduces the Cost of the Building, While Making it Almost Impervious to Time and Weather.