Introduction

AMONG the elemental plan forms which are in constant use, the square offers unlimited scope for treatment, ranging from isolated buildings of small dimensions to those of great size containing a geometrical patterning made up of sub-divisions both rectangular and circular. It is impossible to describe in detail the many uses to which the square form can be adapted, for it figures in buildings of every period and has been developed in a variety of ways. It would not be too much to say that the square and circular plan forms are the determining factors in design, and modern investigation of historic examples proves that the square has been taken as the unit in planning and design generally.

It is the object of the following series of Plates to give some of the chief dispositions accompanying the simple square plan, formed not only by enclosing walls but also by columns, as well as by walls in conjunction with columns. Such isolated structures, complete in themselves and generally of small size (Fig. 3), offer a wide range for design: in the larger examples, the square plan occurs in conjunction with subsidiary and sympathetic features showing the development from simplicity to complexity.

The square is frequently used as an interior motive in a composition made up of many parts and not necessarily expressed externally, and several ways of treating it are illustrated. It must be borne in mind that the square is the most difficult form for direct architectural treatment and one that calls for a sound knowledge of geometry, for any departure from the simplicity of the square as an elemental plan form involves the introduction of smaller units in sympathetic consonance with the containing square. Buildings square in plan, when they are of simple type, generally correspond to the square in height, thus enclosing a space which approximates in its three dimensions to the cube, while the double cube is accepted as a satisfactory disposition of length and width to height under almost any circumstances.

The illustrations show a variety of treatments mostly based upon actual examples, in which the design of external frontispieces, with or without colonnades, and internal vaults, domes and ceilings indicates the application of the unit and deals with the elements of support and covering. The exterior design of small square features generally resolves itself into the expression of pediments, pyramidal roofs or curved and sloping coverings. Sometimes the pediment is lifted to accommodate a semi-circular lunette or a parapet is introduced to mask a flat roof.

The square apartment can be covered with either a flat ceiling, cove, cross vaulting or a dome, and examples of all of these are given, but they are not to be looked upon as exhausting the possible ways of covering a square, for at the beginning of the nineteenth century types of “umbrella” ceilings were designed by Sir John Soane and other architects of his school: these, however, are chiefly remarkable for their ingenuity.

Occasionally problems arise in which two or more storeys have to be dealt with internally, leaving a central open “well”: examples of such galleried arrangements are shown on Plate XVIII. The square plan, sub-divided internally and carrying a clerestorey with a flat or coved ceiling is useful from both utilitarian and artistic standpoints. This arrangement can be extended by the inclusion of a flat dome or a cove above the clerestorey.