May 17, 1872. THE BUILDING NEWS. 389
THE BUILDING NEWS.
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LONDON, FRIDAY, MAY 17, 1872.
ASSISTANTS AND OFFICE
MANAGEMENT.
HE “routine of an architect’s office,”
judging from the number of gentlemen
who profess themselves thoroughly acquainted
with it, would seem to be one of the most
settled and uniform phenomena in the world.
It is something, apparently, which every one in
the profession will comprehend as soon as it is
mentioned, and which is liable to no more
variation than the thickness of a two-brick
wall, or the area of a square of flooring. On
closer examination, however, this wonderful
regularity of practice is not found to exist.
The routine of one office turns out to be
quite a different thing from the routine of
another; and a great many offices may be
found, moreover, in which there is very little
routine at all. Of these last we have nothing
at present to say. We are not about to con-
sider the cases where the clerks and pupils,
like the fountains in Trafalgar-square, play
from ten till four, but those where they
really attempt, with more or less success, to
get the work of the business done. The
question immediately arises, What parts of an
architect’s duties can be properly discharged
by average assistants? Here and there, it is
true, may be found an assistant who is per-
fectly well qualified to discharge them all:
who brings to a subordinate position the
ability, and knowledge, and experience that
would adorn an independent one. In our
own profession, too, as elsewhere, instances
may be met with where the principal is the
inferior man of the two: where, by
his money, or his friends, or his heredi-
tary reputation, he has gained a practice
which he never deserved, and which he
can only conduct by the help of others.
There is something amazing to those whoare
not in the secret, and amusing to those who
are, in the sudden fluctuations in art power
which such a man’s works exhibit. When
Mr. X., after erecting one of the best Gothic
buildings in London, suddenly came out in a
great national competition with a design
which would have done no particular credit
to Batty Langley, it was laughable to hear
the criticisms of the outside world. ‘+ We
cannot understand,” said the newspapers,
“the inferiority of Mr. X.’s architecture : we
think he has been very unwise to depart from
his earlier style, and we should strongly
advise him to adhere to the manner of his
successful work in St. "3. Alas! Mr.
X.’s office staff had changed, and there
was no help for Mr. X. but to change with
it. The advice of all the newspapers is vain
in such a case, and their blame is cruelly
misapplied to a man who doubtless did his
best. Happily, however, such cases as this
are still exceptional. As a rule, the architect
is the head of his own office: he makes his
own designs, whether better or worse, and
leaves to his subordinates, at most, the labour
of developing and explaining them. Mr. X.,
indeed, is taken by the Quarterly Review as
the type or representative of architects in
general. None of them, it informs us, make
their own designs, and their clerks are the
only real architects of the day. How it hap-
pens, under these circumstances, that almost
every architect of note keeps up a distinct
and recognisable individuality of his own, the
reviewer omits to inform us. Some further
explanation is evidently needed here. As a
matter of fact, it is easy enough, in looking
through any collection of drawings, to tell
many of the authors’ names at a glance.
Year after year, in the different exhibitions,
we trace in works by the same hand one con-
sistent character through progressive stages
of development. Mr. Street, and Mr. Burges,
and Mr. Waterhouse, have all changed mate-
rially in the last dozen years; but there has been no loss of identity, and nobody ever mis- takes the work of one for that of another. On the hypothesis of the Quarterly, individual character ought to be always fluctuating, as assistants moved from one office to another. The types of design we are accustomed to associate with well-known names ought to be every now and then cropping up in unex- pected places. We ought to see Mr. Brooks disguised in the garb of Mr. Poulton, and Mr. Tarring building a chapel in the manner of Mr. Butterfield ; while in some offices, at least, a constant transformation scene ought to be going on, and the characteristics of a dozen different designers should brilliantly display themselves one after the other. Unhappily, the assertions of a sensational magazine writer, who invents his facts to suit his theories, are ill borne out by daily experience. To prevent disappointment, we advise architects to be moderate in their expectations. Clever men there doubtless are in the class of assistants, but, like clever men elsewhere, they are very far from being in the majority. Great cleverness, however, is not what the mass of architects require in their clerks ; they want care, and thought, and attention, combined with a fair amount of practical knowledge. These requirements are surely not exorbitant, and yet it is no easy matter to get them satisfied. Candidates for a clerkship there may be in abundance, but few, indeed, of them will be fit for the post. Twenty, perhaps, will make appli- cation in reply to an advertisement, and their claims may be disposed of in some such way as the following. Two or three, it may be, will be eliminated at the outset by an inspection of their spelling, and three or four more will admit themselves capable of little beyond tracing, Half-a-dozen others will be neat draughtsmen, provided that they havea neat drawing to copy from, but this condition seriously diminishes their value, and so we pass on to the remainder. These have been duly articled, and have had five or ten years additional experience; ‘‘can make finished and working drawings and perspectives, besides understanding the general routine” aforesaid. You select one of them, and put him down at your desk: a young man, perhaps, of some taste, considerable industry, and great love for his profession. With all these good qualities, his success might seem certain, but no, they are marred by unaccount- able carelessness. You are never sure of any- thing he does until you have checked it and counter-checked it im a way which is almost as troublesome as doing it altogether. His work is neat, and looks creditable on the sur- face, but it cannot be depended on. Instead ot being a help, he is a constant source of anxiety, and youlive in the daily dread of some undetected blunder. A year or two of independent practice, it may be hoped, will cure him, and, with a sigh for his clients, you dismiss him to it. His place is filled by arepetition of the original process, and the new occupant shows himself free from his predecessor’s failing. He knows the use of a scale, and has no idea of demanding a per- centage of error as his right on all occasions. So far you are delighted, and really feel that your time is being saved, and that your work, so far as it can be done by others, is making genuine progress. A week or two, unfortunately, will moderate your rejoicings. The drawings go on admir- ably to a certain point, and there they always stick fast as if bewitched. Nothing is ever finished under the new régime, at least, in the office ; nothing ever would be finished, if you did not finish it yourself. By close investigation, you discover the reason. There are many parts about every building which are not ‘pretty.’ The foundations are not ‘‘ pretty,” nor the drains, nor the flues, nor the sleeper walls and the sections of the joists; in fact, there are innumerable details which come under this unfortunate
find omitted, left for you to do, or to get done, as you may see fit. Your present assistant thinks such matters unworthy of his attention, and after attending to all the points which haye any “prettiness” to recommend them, he lays the plans aside as finished, and leaves you the pleasant task of making up for his omissions. To do this you must first find them, which, when *a drawing is apparently complete, is not always easy ; and the certainty that sooner or later you will fail to find some of them in time, is one that by no means supplies the pleasantest food for reflection. You fall back on the despairing belief that if you want a thing done you must doit yourself, forif transferred to others, it is either done by halves, or half done wrong. We have said nothing as yet about archi- tectural knowledge or ability to design. ‘The failings noticed above—want of care, and want of thoroughness—may exist with, as they very often do without, experience and artistic talent. In either case they are ruinous, and nothing can atone for them ; and yet they are so common that the architect is fortunate indeed who has not to complain of them. All over the world, without doubt, they are abun- dant enough, but there seems to be some- thing in the training of architectural pupils which makes them specially prevalent in our own profession. Youths get hold of the notion that the way to eminence is to “make neat drawings and showy perspectives ; they think architecture begins and ends with tracery and carving, and the actual building, with all the care and thoroughness which it requires, receives no part of their attention. Time and experience will cure them of this delusion, if it is curable at all; but in the meanwhile they are jwasting their oppor- tunities and worrying their employers. We turn to the more hopeful minority, to those junior members of the profession who, if they live and work,will some day be qualified to adorn its higher stations. What -should be their true position at present? What amount of liberty ought they to have ? Should they be mere copyists and transcribers for their principal, or should they, in a subordi- nate place, have some opportunity of thinking for themselves? We are inclined to recom- mend the latter course, though everything must depend on individual talent. There cannot be too much thought in a design, and though the main arrangement must be the product of one man’s mind, there is room for many in the details. We have as yet few workmen capable of enriching a building from the stores of their own invention: could not some of our junior architects supply their place? We no more wish than expect to see the dream of the Quarterly Review realised, and our assistants made the real architects of the present ; but where they are competent to design, and capable of designing in har- mony with the general scheme of the work they are engaged on, we do not see why some opportunities should not be given them. The architect of a building is, or should be, he who masses out the whole, and influences the work of the subordinate designers. It is a poor ambition for him to be able to boast that everything, great and small, about the build- ing was designed by himself. Let him design, by all means, as far as he can design his best, but let him not, from a paltry jealousy of dividing his praise, spread his hasty fancies over acres of stonework, when the careful efforts of an inferior would surpass them. The greatness of an architect is not measured by superficial rods, like brickwork, and if he is wise, he will be only too glad of the oppor- tunity to concentrate his strength. Artistic excellence is not usually found to advance hand in hand with public favour; on the con- trary, the one too often declines as the other increases. Many of our best men are over- worked ; their productions, itis true, are their own, but they are not what they might be. They have no time for thought, or category. ‘These, then, you will uniformly | consideration, or revision. The first idea
