A garret is a habitable attic, a living space at the top of a house or larger residential building, traditionally small with sloping ceilings. In the days before elevators this was the least prestigious position in a building, at the very top of the stairs.
The word entered Middle English through Old French with a military connotation of watchtower, garrison or billet – a place for guards or soldiers to be quartered in a house. Like garrison, it comes from an Old French word garir of ultimately Germanic origin meaning "to provide" or "defend". [1]
In the later 19th century, garrets became one of the defining features of Second Empire architecture in Paris, France, where large buildings were stratified socially between different floors. As the number of stairs to climb increased, the social status decreased. Garrets were often internal elements of the mansard roof, with skylights or dormer windows. [2]
A "bow garret" is a two-story "outhouse" situated at the back of a typical terraced house often used in Lancashire for the hat industry in pre-mechanised days. "Bowing" was the name given to the technique of cleaning up animal (e.g. rabbit) fur in the early stages of preparation for turning it into hats. What is now believed to be the last bow garret in existence (in Denton, Greater Manchester) is now a listed building in order to preserve this historical relic. [3]
A roof is the top covering of a building, including all materials and constructions necessary to support it on the walls of the building or on uprights, providing protection against rain, snow, sunlight, extremes of temperature, and wind. A roof is part of the building envelope.
A window is an opening in a wall, door, roof, or vehicle that allows the exchange of light and may also allow the passage of sound and sometimes air. Modern windows are usually glazed or covered in some other transparent or translucent material, a sash set in a frame in the opening; the sash and frame are also referred to as a window. Many glazed windows may be opened, to allow ventilation, or closed, to exclude inclement weather. Windows may have a latch or similar mechanism to lock the window shut or to hold it open by various amounts.
Denton is a town in Tameside, Greater Manchester, England, five miles (8 km) east of Manchester city centre. Historically part of Lancashire, it had a population of 36,591 at the 2011 Census.
A bungalow is a small house or cottage that is single-story, and may be surrounded by wide verandas.
A mansard or mansard roof is a multi-sided gambrel-style hip roof characterised by two slopes on each of its sides, with the lower slope at a steeper angle than the upper, and often punctured by dormer windows. The steep roofline and windows allow for additional floors of habitable space, and reduce the overall height of the roof for a given number of habitable storeys. The upper slope of the roof may not be visible from street level when viewed from close proximity to the building.
A dormer is a roofed structure, often containing a window, that projects vertically beyond the plane of a pitched roof. A dormer window is a form of roof window.
A finial or hip-knob is an element marking the top or end of some object, often formed to be a decorative feature.
William Pitt was an Australian architect and politician. Pitt is best known as one of the outstanding architects of the "boom" era of the 1880s in Melbourne, designing some of the city's most elaborate High Victorian commercial buildings. He worked in a range of styles including Gothic Revival, Italianate, French Second Empire, and his own inventive eclectic compositions. He had a notable second career after the crash of the 1890s, becoming a specialist in theatres and industrial buildings.
A veranda or verandah is a roofed, open-air hallway or porch, attached to the outside of a building. A veranda is often partly enclosed by a railing and frequently extends across the front and sides of the structure.
Sunlight House is a Grade II listed building in the art deco style on Quay Street in Manchester, England. Completed in 1932 for Joseph Sunlight, at 14 storeys it was the tallest building in Manchester, and the top floors of turrets and multiple dormer windows and mansard roofs create a distinctive skyline.
A gambrel or gambrel roof is a usually symmetrical two-sided roof with two slopes on each side. The upper slope is positioned at a shallow angle, while the lower slope is steep. This design provides the advantages of a sloped roof while maximizing headroom inside the building's upper level and shortening what would otherwise be a tall roof. The name comes from the Medieval Latin word gamba, meaning horse's hock or leg. The term gambrel is of American origin, the older, European name being a curb roof.
This page is a glossary of architecture.
A hut is a small dwelling, which may be constructed of various local materials. Huts are a type of vernacular architecture because they are built of readily available materials such as wood, snow, ice, stone, grass, palm leaves, branches, clay, hides, fabric, or mud using techniques passed down through the generations.
In architecture, a quadrangle is a space or a courtyard, usually rectangular in plan, the sides of which are entirely or mainly occupied by parts of a large building. The word is probably most closely associated with college or university campus architecture, but quadrangles are also found in other buildings such as palaces. Most quadrangles are open-air, though a few have been roofed over, to provide additional space for social meeting areas or coffee shops for students.
English Gothic is an architectural style that flourished from the late 12th until the mid-17th century. The style was most prominently used in the construction of cathedrals and churches. Gothic architecture's defining features are pointed arches, rib vaults, buttresses, and extensive use of stained glass. Combined, these features allowed the creation of buildings of unprecedented height and grandeur, filled with light from large stained glass windows. Important examples include Westminster Abbey, Canterbury Cathedral and Salisbury Cathedral. The Gothic style endured in England much longer than in Continental Europe.
A porch is a room or gallery located in front of an entrance of a building. A porch is placed in front of the façade of a building it commands, and forms a low front. Alternatively, it may be a vestibule, or a projecting building that houses the entrance door of a building.
Second Empire architecure in the United States and Canada is an architectural style that was popular in both nations in the late 19th century between 1865 and 1900. Second Empire architecture was influenced by the redevelopment of Paris under Napoleon III's Second French Empire, and was influenced partly by the architectural styles of the French Renaissance.
Perpendicular Gothic architecture was the third and final style of English Gothic architecture developed in the Kingdom of England during the Late Middle Ages, typified by large windows, four-centred arches, straight vertical and horizontal lines in the tracery, and regular arch-topped rectangular panelling. Perpendicular was the prevailing style of Late Gothic architecture in England from the 14th century to the 17th century. Perpendicular was unique to the country: no equivalent arose in Continental Europe or elsewhere in the British Isles. Of all the Gothic architectural styles, Perpendicular was the first to experience a second wave of popularity from the 18th century on in Gothic Revival architecture.
A cap-house is a small watch room, built at the top of a spiral staircase, often giving access to a parapet on the roof of a tower house or castle. They provided protection from the elements by enclosing the top of the stairway, and sometimes incorporated windows or gun loops. They were built in various forms, including square turrets, simple boxes, or small houses with gabled roofs, which were sometimes large enough to provide accommodation for a look-out.
| Shared rooms | |
|---|---|
| Private rooms | |
| Spaces | |
| Utility and storage |
|
| Great house areas | |
| Other | |
| Architectural elements | |
| Related | |
