FARMER AND ARCHITECT

Sun (Auckland), Volume I, Issue 119, 10 August 1927, Page 10

FARMER AND ARCHITECT

ADVANTAGE OF CO-OPERATION THE VALUE OF WELL-PLANNED BUILDINGS. The well-known tendency of experts to differ on questions relative to their sphere, which to outsiders will appear to be essential, is as powerfully evident in the farming community as in other fields of specialised knowledge. It is hardly possible to induce a congregation of farmers to discuss such topics as the housing of pigs or the right proportions of cow-standing without disclosing that the view's of equally trustworthy and practical men may be poles asunder. As in other communities there are, of course, all shades of opinion and practice—from the stick-in-the-muds at one end of the scale, passing through those who are ordinarily sane but not specially alert by way of the live-wire enthusiasts to the cranks and faddists at the other extreme.

There is, however, one quality which seems almost general to all farmers, and that is an evident feeling that it is almost sacrilege for any hut a practical farmer to attempt to know anything of farming processes or the arrangement of farm buildings. This viewpoint is undoubtedly responsible for much bad amateur planning and needless consequent inconvenience. If farmers would put their cards freely on the table and describe fully and in detail their needs and intended routine, they might secure from architects the same kind of guidance as the modern manufacturer does—and with equal advantage. But a large proportion of architecturally-designed farm buildings fail from non-acquaintance with simple essentials—probably too simple and obvious to the farmer to be even stated among the preliminaries, and not realised by him until errors and* offences in idea have become solid fact. On the oilier hand the architect who is privileged to adventure in the field of homestead design ought to realise that in the present circumstances afflicting agriculture his efforts should be concentrated on a good working plan and a sound structure, developed with that appearance of rightness which should be the result of training and competence, rather than upon finding

means to introduce any cherished tricks of design or favourite material. It is better social service to design a building that can be built, and when built can he used, and while in use is not viewed with aversion as having cost more than it should, rather than to produce a conception which outruns the means of its intending owner, with equally unsatisfying results, whether abandoned or translated into fact. Cleanliness, light and air should be striven for in modern farm-building design, says an article in the “Architects’ Review,” as they have been in all other improved forms of building. The innocent old woman who deplored the waywardness of farmers in always placing their gates in the muddiest parts of the fields, though her reasoning was absurd, yet had her finger on one of the drawbacks of agricultural employment, particularly as affecting the rising generation, which has a distaste for mud-wallowing. Too often the yards and surroundings of a farm building are tacitlv assumed as necessarily filthy throughout a great part of each year, and this is typical of many inconveniences which are held to be inevitable because they “always have been.” This is not the way to encourage the younger generation to farm work. Good buildings well-planned are worth while.