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  • The Complete House and Grounds: Learning from Andrew Jackson Downing’s Domestic Architecture by Caren Yglesias
  • Steve Whitesell (bio)
The Complete House and Grounds: Learning from Andrew Jackson Downing’s Domestic Architecture Caren Yglesias, AIA. 2011. Chicago: Center For American Places at Columbia College. 189 pages with Glossary, Notes, Bibliography, and Index. $40.00 clothbound. ISBN 978 1935195245.

The paradox of Downing’s lasting influence on the form and underlying meaning of the American public and domestic landscape, as noted by the author in her introduction, is that in spite of the widely acknowledged popularity of her subject’s written work, almost nothing of his built legacy remains. His reputation is therefore largely based on his literary output, which commenced with eight articles published in 1835 and was solidified in four books that appeared prior to his death at 37 in 1852. A posthumous collection, Rural Essays, was published in 1853 and there was continued [End Page 242] demand for subsequent editions of the books into the fourth quarter of the 19th century. Downing’s contemporary, novelist Catherine Sedgewick, observed that “nobody, whether he be rich or poor, builds a house or lays out a garden without consulting Downing’s works; every young couple who sets up housekeeping buys them” (9).

As described by Yglesias, “Downing was a republican who believed in popular education, popular arts, and popular manners” (187). The title of her book, an expansion of her doctoral dissertation, promised the same common-sense distillation of myriad architectural theories and influences, and passion for the education and improvement of a broad audience as the published work of her subject.

The author, a practicing architect in Washington DC, stated in the introduction that her intention in re-examining Downing and his work was to make “apparent the design principles that satisfied nineteenth century ideas for domestic architecture [that] may guide decisions and domestic design in the twenty-first century as well” (11). Yglesias begins her investigation by examining the biographical details of her subject’s brief life and identifies Downing’s familiarity with a broad range of contemporary and historic literary work that formed the basis of his own hybrid sensibility. These authors included Emerson, Bryant, Lowell, Sir Walter Scott, Edmund Burke, Richard Payne Knight, William Hogarth, and of course, John Loudon. Loudon was Downing’s self-appointed mentor, though they never met, and Yglesisas insightfully attributes a number of ideas and positions taken by Downing directly to Loudon, as well as distinguishing their divergence from the British author’s acceptance of traditional class distinctions. To Loudon, the cottage was generally an outbuilding to a larger estate and reflected the style of the manor and the taste of the owner. For Downing, the cottager’s own interests and tastes were manifested in the design of his modest residence and such individual expression, gently guided by the refining influence of tastemakers like Downing himself, represented the highest achievement of his domestic ideal.

Sidebars in each chapter provide brief, cursory, and often inadequate biographies of other influential contemporary and historical influences on Downing’s development as an author, critic, theorist, and designer. Subjects include those previously mentioned, as well as John Ruskin, Vitruvius, Alberti, Palladio, and Antoine Quatremère de Quincy (1755–1849). The latter’s “Essai sur l’imitation” identified three original building types—cave, tent, and hut—that served as archetypes for contemporary domestic architectural typologies. Loudon translated Quatremère’s essay and further elaborated his ideas for an English-speaking readership and Yglesias returns to Quatremère in each of her five chapters, perhaps overstating his influence on Downing. She identifies 231 elements corresponding to these original dwelling types in the 38 house plans and elevations published in Downing’s two books on domestic architecture, Cottage Residences (1842) and The Architecture of Country Houses (1850). Yglesias finds analogies to the cave in bay windows, alcoves, and boudoirs, while the tent typology is present in transitional interior/exterior elements beloved by Downing such as the porch, loggia, veranda, and umbrage. To the author, “Downing’s hut is the permanent shelter for people and the devices or instruments kept at hand to enhance safety, comfort, and convenience” (133...

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