Hubert Savage, Architect (1)

 

Eventfulness of form

 

 

December 2008: cross-gabling makes for an impressive frontage

 

When architect Hubert Savage designed a bungalow for personal use back in 1913, he was following his Arts and Crafts instinct by building it over a shallow crawl space. This also allowed him to avoid damaging the site's natural contours, instead making them into a part of the building itself. As a result, the house feels like it has grown directly from the site it stands on. His decision to minimize the depth of the crawl space also fitted the structure to its land in a way that houses back in town - laid out in arbitrarily defined subdivisions, on typically narrow lots - couldn't. It's true that his choice also trimmed the considerable costs of a concrete basement from his bottom line (typically, ten percent of total costs at that time; more if, in order to excavate a basement, bedrock had to be blasted and hauled away). But Savage's choice was consequential beyond just sparing expenses: it allowed him, for example, on the garden (or west-facing) side of the house, to design a building sitting more or less directly at ground level. In Savage's eyes that was a positive outcome, something he was aiming for.

 

Bungalow crawlspace being constructed, USA somewhere, undated 

 

 

The photo above shows a bungalow crawlspace under construction (photo from Old Craftsman Style Homes, a social media group). It reveals how simple this method of construction was relative to excavating a basement and pouring concrete foundations (just think of the equipment and material complexities that go into developing a basement on a rocky site like Savage's). The photo above shows how brick piers were used to support the sills and floor joists of the house. If this all appears somewhat rudimentary now, that's because it was a technique that was under-conceptualized at the time (its purpose was to enable getting on with construction while saving money). Certainly it made for quicker and cheaper building, but this sometimes came at the cost of convenient access to the underside of the building, as well as to more-thorough proofing against undesirable environmental factors, like rodents. Note, for example, how the brick piers shown above appear to rest directly on the ground, either with only skimpy footings or without any at all. Moisture penetrating the crawlspace due to drainage issues would tend to be wicked up by bricks sitting in direct contact with ground - causing them, over time, to shift and to spall. Savage's builders employed a similar technique in making his crawlspace: brick piers supporting sills and floor joists, coupled with curtain walls made of stone to close up the perimeter. At some point, more posts were added, resting on precast cement footings, in order to provide more vertical support for the building.

 

 

Bungalow under renovation, built over a low crawlspace, in the USA  

Reverend J. F. Cole's bungalow, on a low plinth, with liveried servants

The shallow depth of the crawlspace certainly reinforced a horizontal aesthetic, resulting in a building sitting near the ground in true bungalow fashion (cf. photo above). Traditional Indian bungalows, which the British 'borrowed' from the rural suburbs beyond India's teeming cities and then gradually modified, invariably came built on a low plinth, giving it distinct horizontal lines. As a result, bungalows today still appear most natural when sited near the ground. And Savage obviously wanted just this look for his own bungalow: a low building, beneath a sheltering roof projected well out over the walls, designed so as to emphasize its proximity to ground. It was both fashionable, and rather exotic, to design that way back in 1913 - a method too of differentiating the contemporary bungalow from houses that were more markedly Victorian - houses that tended to be taller (multi-storey homes with ceilings reaching as high as twelve or thirteen feet, versus eight feet and a few inches for bungalow ceilings).

 

1911 ad for Garden City: note the price-creep in the subsequent ad 

 

Garden City backers hoped the new electric railway would trigger growth

 

But whatever led the Savages to build their house way out in what was then still a part of the boonies? Certainly it didn't hurt that parcels on quarter acre lots were advertised as coming with city water and electric lights, as well as the promise of sidewalks and graded streets (see first ad, above, but note that these claims have disappeared from the 1912 version). The real answer to this question undoubtedly had to do with the cheapness of quarter-acre parcels in Garden City, a suburban enclave comprised of mostly cleared land with a smattering of choice upland parcels (like the holding acquired by the Savages). The investors backing this real estate development play hoped that Garden City would build out rapidly, courtesy of a new electric railway (cf. the ads above, featuring an Interurban railway line that became operational in 1913). The Savages' land purchase allowed them to build a new home within walking distance of a stop along the new Interurban line. A location within walking distance of Marigold Junction made commuting downtown, where Savage's architectural office was located, entirely feasible. It also meant that the Savages could inhabit a ridge-site dotted with mature oaks, at a comparatively short distance from downtown (roughly five kilometres). The opportunity cost of their purchase was unbelievably cheap relative to today's inflated land prices - if we assume the Savages bought two premium upland parcels, which they could have done for no more than $1200 (ultimately, enough land to subdivide into three generous parcels, plus a leftover chunk that was added to Marigold Park). Their cost of purchase, rendered in 2024 dollars, would have been just under $38,000 (if they paid full price based on the ads). Now that a single RS-6 lot nearby sells for $800,000 (in 2023) their purchase price was a true bargain.

 

 

Garden City Hall, built in expectation of rapid development, circa 1921

 

As a credentialed British architect with Arts and Crafts values, Savage was determined that his new bungalow do minimal damage to the natural landscape (he knew how rare his opportunity actually was). This was in sharp contrast to the way things were done back in town, where the natural context wasn't permitted to suggest the orientation or design of a new house. The principal facts for consideration there were the adjacent homes, sitting on streets of uniformly platted lots. But out in pristine countryside, in the newly minted Municipality of Saanich, on a large lot with abundant natural features, nature could be allowed to play a more formative, even a defining, role. Working in concert with the scenic possibilities, rather than disregarding them in favour of houses packed onto long thin lots like tinned sardines, gave Savage the opportunity to design a structure that could be compatible with its surroundings, which meant gaining a better outcome. Savage's interest in building unobtrusively in the landscape, and making the existing scenery and natural contours serve as context for his new building, just happened to align with the natural hollow paralleling the ridge on which the bungalow came to be built. This physical feature, coupled with Savage's preference for benign methods of construction, led him to utilize the natural hollow for his crawl space.

 

 

Modern building site: cleared and levelled, emphasizing convenience 

 

 

Following the design-lead offered by the hollow also enabled him to orient the building optimally for light while taking advantage of the views. All Savage had to do, given the physical structure of the site, was limit the length of his building to the hollow's extent. Given that he was aiming to design a small, artistic bungalow anyway (a structure of less than 1600 square feet, all of it on a single floor) the limitation on building length did not involve major sacrifice. Of course, there was a significant consequence of siting a building so organically: a remarkable proximity to ground along the bungalow's western and northern edges. But as we will see, there were also other advantages that flowed from his way of siting a dwelling.

 

 

Small crawlspace door that inhibits easy access

 

 

While the shallowness of the crawlspace was aesthetically desirable for the overall look of the bungalow, Savage's choice of location for the access made getting under the building a chore (cf. photo above, noting how small the opening actually is). Placing it in a cramped location, between the building and bedrock that's rising, and right up against one of those supporting brick piers (to the right, photo above) complicates entry and exit. Some bungalows on crawlspaces dealt with this problem by providing for access within the building, by means of a panel of flooring that could be lifted, and which was placed in a corridor or even in a substantial closet. Savage however, for reasons that are unclear, preferred entry from the outside, yet shied away from locating the door where the stone foundation was deeper (towards the southeast corner) where the entry door might have been bigger, thus simplifying getting underneath; clearly, Savage the architect was keen to minimize the size of the access, which he succeeded brilliantly at! As a result, the opening is barely large enough for a full-sized adult to get through. Worse still, because the door is located where bedrock is rising towards the sill plate, one has to enter feet first, on the stomach, in order to be properly oriented once inside (the crawlspace floor deepens quickly once you are fully in, but as the ground falls away sharply, backing-in is necessary; plus, these problems have been complicated by the more-recent addition of a cast-iron sewer pipe that impinges, with the effect of further constraining entering). It's almost as if Savage felt he wouldn't have to ever go down there himself. But of course, one does have to get under the building for access to the plumbing and electrical systems. I cursed that small, awkward entry point (door-less when I first moved in) through three-and-a-half decades of living otherwise quite comfortably in the Savage bungalow, because it turned getting under the building into a big chore. And not least in an emergency, such as when, in the dead of winter, in the middle of the night, a pipe under the building bursts due to a cold snap, and then has to be shut off, manually - something that actually happened during my first winter there. I subsequently had the plumbing system under the building reconfigured to have shut-off valves within easy reach of the crawlspace door, in case something bad should happen at night.

 

Accessible Remoteness 

Alan Gowans, author of The Comfortable House: North American Suburban Architecture, 1890 - 1930, notes that houses designed expressly for greater human comfort first arose in the new middle-class suburbs made possible by reliable forms of long distance transit (first by steam railroads in America). Later, electric streetcar networks, followed by the longer electric Interurban railway lines linking dispersed regional centres into networks, began distributing these residential enclaves as suburbs on the periphery of urban regions across North America. In addition to homes suddenly incorporating novel provisions for enhanced creature comforts (such as electric wiring, telephones, indoor plumbing, bathrooms, hot water, etc, which all arrived in the blink of an eye) Gowans says that these rural enclaves also gave rise to an entirely new form of dwelling - one designed expressly for these more-rural locales, with more-generous natural landscapes than was standard in cities. In the Grange Road bungalow, I think we see an example of this new dwelling-type as it emerges, built well out in pristine countryside, with access to its relative remoteness enabled by a novel form of electric rapid transit.

 

 

Tod Inlet station, a stop along the Saanich Interurban Line, ca 1919

 

Scale model, interior of an Interurban Line car, courtesy Aaron Lypkie

Downtown Interurban platform, across the road from Victoria City Hall

 

"The idea of a location far enough from the city to have rural qualities – open fields nearby, good-sized garden behind, and set off from the street by a front lawn – yet close enough for people to commute to the city to earn their living, was new." The rural lands opened to development by rail access is behind the novel house-type, a hybrid form that Gowans calls "a combination of country and city home," one having "a basically horizontal look...with the long facade facing the street". In this sense, Savage's picturesque intentions for his own bungalow just happened to mirror what was happening in rural suburbs right across North America. But being an architect designing a home for his own family's use, he could endow his version of the bungalow with bona fide Arts and Crafts attributes (for example, organic building placement, see first section above).

 

Artistic bungalow, gable-end facing the road, in Victoria (now stuccoed)

 

Savage bungalow, length turned towards Grange Road, rural suburb-style

 

 

Not only did the length of the new house-type face the road (in what would become typical suburban layout) but this novel form of placement stood in sharp contrast to similar buildings found in town, which were increasingly built with their main gable ends facing the road, on more standardized and narrower lots (see the top photo above). Having the length of the building turned towards the road in 1913 constituted a novel look in domestic architecture, one that derived ultimately from the relative cheapness of the rural lands now conveniently connected by rail corridors to the urban core. "Neither city nor country houses, they represented a really new kind of dwelling, designed for a new, suburban kind of place." I would contend that this is precisely the sort of dwelling Savage imagined out in the back of beyond in Garden City: an Arts and Crafts bungalow with all the modern conveniences of the day, a building on a single level with a sheltering roof form and emphatically horizontal lines, its long cross-gabled facade facing the road, perched remarkably comfortably in a minimally altered natural landscape.

 

 

The cover of Garden Cities Of Tomorrow (1901)

 

The Garden City idea, as elaborated by Ebenezer Howard in his Garden Cities of Tomorrow (1901) didn't quite fit the local vision for Saanich's Garden City, which might more accurately have been called a 'garden suburb' rather than a city. It was envisaged as a place to reside primarily, and in no sense was it intended to foster a complete community with industries and farms as part of its makeup (Howard's actual vision for Garden Cities). The people who lived in Saanich's version of Garden City were expected to commute daily to downtown in order to earn a living, retreating to their residential enclave at night. Which is exactly how the Savages used their new dwelling.

 

Government St. back in the day: note gable ends facing the road

 

 

 

Vancouver's West End, houses with gables facing the road, on narrow lots

 

The differentiation of suburban-style buildings  located in open countryside from their in-town counterparts was often further accentuated, Gowans notes, by the practice of designing markedly different facades for the front, sides, and rear of the house - an approach that further individualized a building, adding considerably to their visual appeal (usually these houses also came with enhanced linking environments, such as paths, verandahs and sleeping porches). Houses in town, built on narrower, more standardized lots, tended towards sidewalls similarly designed, with fewer windows in them due to the proximity of neighbouring residences. The Savage bungalow differs in every way from houses with similarly designed sidewalls, but here the process of differentiating facades was taken a step further, Savage ultimately creating a house with four unique ones. Of course, back when the Savages built their bungalow, there were no other neighbouring dwellings standing nearby - all of that was yet to come, but certainly they expected it to happen, because the people moving to Garden City believed that the new rail link would trigger rapid settlement (as did the entrepreneurs who invested so handsomely in building the Interurban line). That's not the way things played out ultimately, however: the new rail line came to be so starved for customers that by 1923 it had to be shut down, a victim both of the profound economic slump that began in late 1913, the effects on ridership of WWI, and the unregulated competition of jitney cabs that appeared in droves (see picture two below). Over 50 such jitneys were active in the Victoria region alone (they set up an association to lobby against regulation) which cut dramatically into the electric railway's passenger market. Ultimately however, the new reality may not have mattered all that much to the Savages, who got to enjoy a luxurious scenic hillside and design a unique bungalow to live in.

 

 

Opening day in 1913, Saanich Interurban line, Sluggett family photo

  

Lake Hill 'jitney' bus in the 1916 snowstorm: unregulated competition

Cross-gabled east-facing front facade, emphasizing horizontality

 

Savage opted to run his bungalow along the ridge that defines the site (it runs south-to-north) which, among other things, allowed him to impart a feeling of grandeur to the building from the approach path (the plain quality of the main gable roof form is on this facade relieved by a trio of cross-gables stepping the building dramatically out into the landscape). The house (photo above) is evidently designed to emphasize horizontal lines and proximity to ground, thus standing in marked contrast to the more vertical, Victorian-era buildings characteristic of town (cf. next photo).

 

 

Bungalow beside a Victorian-era house: horizontal vs vertical emphasis

 

 

Savage took advantage of this upland site to generate long front and rear facades for the bungalow. Fitting the house intimately to the site, he contrived a shallow oblong - just two compact rooms and a small circulation corridor for the back (northern) half of the building, which was deepened somewhat at the south end to accommodate a rear porch with a garden door that also served as a "summer tea room". The addition to the building's width is gained by jogging the footprint outwards and slightly lifting the roof-line. The cross-gabled frontage is made consistent with traditional Tudor-era buildings common in Savage's native England, an attribute that he transformed masterfully into two roofed bays book-ending the welcoming verandah (see second photo below). This verandah, with its substantial roof resting comfortably on two tall tapered stone pillars crowned with trios of short, chunky timber posts, impressively dresses the ridge site.

Fords Hospital, Coventry, England, built in 1509, cross-gabled roof form

 

Cross-gabled roof, dramatically advancing verandah flanked by roofed bays

The bungalow's south wall (its actual gable end) differs totally from the street facade in treatment, comprising an asymmetric assembly of window shapes, types, sizes and formats integrated into a consistent whole (as shown in the photos below: balanced overall, window placements dictated by the floor plan). On this wall Savage delivers a facade that displays what author Nicholas Pevsner characterized as the English genius for "informal grouping" (cf. The Englishness Of English Art).

South facade: an asymmetrical collage of shapes set in a horizontal matrix

South wall pictured in more wan end-of-day light, in December 2017

 

Along this wall, two projecting bays sport unusual fixed-pane leaded-glass windows, one (to the left, photo above) a transom placed over two leaded-glass casements, the other a standalone window composed of honeycomb-shaped (or hexagonal) panes. Untypically for this house, the roofed bays on the south wall also sport exposed rafter tails - a touch of Craftsman-type styling - whereas the main soffits are enclosed, hiding the rafters in a manner consistent with local Arts and Crafts styling. The south wall impresses the viewer as dramatically as the street facade, while exhibiting entirely different features (yet continuing Savage's pattern of jogging of exterior wall planes to achieve movement). Due to the way the land falls away in the south-east corner, necessitating a much-deeper stone foundation there, the south facade appears dramatically taller than the north-facing gable end (photo below) where the building appears to rest directly on the ground, without visible foundation, and is clearly only a storey high. 

 

The west wall differs dramatically from those facing east and south

 

The west wall roof lifts slightly to accommodate the back door and porch

 

Porch roof lifted slightly in order to accommodate an array of functions

The long west wall also steps outwards at the building's south-west end (to the right, middle photo above) with the roof lifted slightly to accommodate a rear porch and a garden door (which on our watch became a conservatory room with a window seat). You can make out the slightly lifted roof in the photo immediately above, enabling just enough height-gain for an enclosed porch containing a utility hub. Note also how, on this facade especially (middle picture above) the bungalow sits remarkably near to ground, literally resting on it along the north wall of the building (to the left, top picture above). This facade has its own visual appeal, but here the architect reveals the main gable roof with its two chimneys; further, that because it sits virtually at ground level, declares that it is just one storey high (photos below). In contrast, the main gable roof is largely masked from view on the front facade, due to the land's elevation and the prominence of the cross gables. Here on the west side, one steps out through a back door that feels remarkably close to ground, then walks out into a protected garden set in an oak meadow.

 

 

Front facade with prominent cross-gables masking the main roof form

The west wall sitting at ground level, leading out into an oak meadow

 

The photo below shows the north facade of the house, which is architecturally similar to the south end, but with less of the drama attributable to height and unique detailing. Fewer windows appear on this facade by design. At the north end, the natural hollow beneath the bungalow is at its shallowest, so this part of the crawlspace is hard to access. This does however reinforce the remarkable proximity to ground, making the building feel that it's fused with it. At some point early on, Savage decided to add a walk-in closet beyond the bedrooms located at the north end. This addition explains the small shed-roofed structure nestled against the northern gable end (photo below) which Savage uses to more fully differentiate this facade. You can also see that Savage designed the walk-in closet to work with the site's natural contours, preferring here to step the bungalow up the land-form rather than to excavate the rock outcrop (the modern building culture's reflexive choice these days would be to level the outcrop). This had beneficial consequences inside too, creating a second level for the building's footprint, necessitating a substantial step-up in order to access the closet. The walk-in closet is shown as already existing by the time Savage annotated a version of the floor plan in 1933 (so the work must have been done prior to that date); in this way, Savage made a seamless addition to an already complex small house. Heritage consultant Stuart Stark remarked that the walk-in closet outside has vaguely art-deco features, meaning it is slightly inconsistent with the design of the main building, but in a way that is still congruent with the overall design. Perhaps this was Savage's way of demonstrating that buildings grow over time, and that he was not afraid of demarcating a brand new building era? 

 

 

North gable rising from ground, walk-in closet stepped up the landform

 

 

 

 

Step-up to the walk-in closet added more recently

 

Books For Looks:

Alan Gowans, The Comfortable House: North American Suburban Architecture, 1890 to 1930. 

Nicholas Pevsner, The Englishness of English Art.

Ebeneezer Howard, Garden Cities Of Tomorrow, 1901.