On the villa: idylls and ideals

So, why do we in Aotearoa call a villa a villa? What even is a villa? The former is a question that completely flummoxed me when someone asked it of me a few years ago. My response was, “because we do”. Which is a terrible answer for any question. But, here, today, I can tell you why and – generously… – I’m going to share this with you. I should say that this is a very once-over-lightly – many people have written whole (fascinating, I might add) books on the history of the villa. This blog post is but a short summary and, thus, equally short on nuance. There’s nothing wrong in it (hopefully!) but I have less than 1000 words (in theory) and much has been left out.

The villa: important enough to write a whole book about, but do you know why it’s called a villa?

Before we really get into things, I’d like to share James Ackerman’s excellent observation about villas with you (NB: not written in plain language, please don’t give up on the post at this point!): a villa “is a myth or fantasy through which over the course of millennia persons whose position of privilege is rooted in urban commerce and industry have been able to expropriate rural land, often requiring, for the realization of the myth, the care of a laboring class or slaves” (Ackerman 1990: 10). Not a man to hide his politics, Ackerman.

A classic Christchurch villa, albeit rather small and plain - and somewhat rundown. Image: L. Tremlett, Ōtautahi Christchurch archaeological archive.

It all starts with the Romans (something my high school classics teacher was fond of reminding us). The ancient Greeks might have been involved too, but I’m going to focus on the Romans. Wealthy Roman city dwellers, often political figures or at least public ones, developed the villa concept as a retreat from the stresses and strains of city life. More particularly, the stresses and strains attendant upon their lives in the city: the petitioners, the demands on their time, the speeches they needed to give, the plays they needed to write, etc, etc. All of which left them no time to think. And by ‘think’ here, I mean engage in deep contemplation about important matters, as opposed to the general day-to-day thinking about, say, what’s for dinner… (always a pressing concern, I find). Thus, they needed to escape, to have some peace and quiet, and so it was to their rural estates, known as villas, that they decamped. They didn’t just do serious thinking here, they enjoyed the healthier air, nature itself, a slower pace of life, and the opportunities for recreation, be that exercise, fishing, visits from friends or creative pursuits (Ackerman 1990: 35-36).

A slightly more decorative and larger villa, but still a classic Christchurch form - although the porch is a bit unusual. Image: F. Bradley, Ōtautahi Christchurch archaeological archive.

There was a major flourishing of the villa in the late medieval period (who knew?), and it is this period that the aforementioned Ackerman dates the association between the villa and the bourgeois, going so far as to describe the villa as a “bourgeois concept” (Ackerman 1990: 10, 63). This was when the good burghers of Europe began to develop a taste for villa life, much as envisaged by the Romans (that is, the house at the centre of an estate to which city dwellers could retreat to escape the city – in fact, ‘villa’ at this point in time often referred to the estate as a whole, not just the house). It stood in contrast to the homes of the feudal overlords, who typically lived in castles (in the countryside), which, while literal places of retreat during times of war, were by no means the places of figurative retreat that the Romans had built (Ackerman 1990: 63).

A very cute little bay villa, sans veranda. Image: M. Hennessey, Ōtautahi Christchurch archaeological archive.

From here, the villa spreads to England during the Enlightenment (obviously there’s a bit of a time lag, but see earlier comments re word count). In this period and location it gets caught up in ideas about property ownership, privacy, identity and labour (Archer 2005: 1). It continues to embody those same ideals as the Romans and the burghers associated with their villas: a house in the country, with land, to which busy and wealthy city dwellers could retreat (supported by the aforementioned labouring class). But, there is a new development: the villa begins to be built in suburbs, by middle class people, becoming what John Archer has described as the “bourgeois compact villa”, noting also that the suburb was a particular bourgeois location (Archer 2005: 45-52, McKellar 2011: 50-51). As a consequence – as the size of the land parcel these villas stood on reduced and the occupation of the occupiers changed – the villa comes to be more specifically about rest and recreation, and its economic role declines (Archer 2005: 46). These changes reflect the increasing wealth of the English middle class, the growing industrialisation of England and improving transport networks (Ackerman 1990: 17, McKellar 2011: 51). All of this was bundled up with a sort of moral panic on behalf of the English middle classes, as cities were increasingly seen as dirty, disease-ridden and poverty-stricken places that were not suitable to live in, particularly if you were raising a family (Archer  2005: 147). To this, a stand-alone (or, at a pinch, a semi-detached) house in the suburbs was the ideal solution, and enabled the separation of work and home (another key middle class ideal that was connected to all of this).

A much larger, but quite plain, bay villa. Image: M. Hennessey, Ōtautahi Christchurch archaeological archive.

As the size and wealth of the English middle classes grew, so too did the suburban villa proliferate. Its spread was aided by the books of people like J. C. Loudon, whose work popularised the bourgeois compact villa and provided numerous examples of the different types of villa that could be built. On the back of this, the growing number of architectural pattern books further spread and popularised the ideal, also making it more accessible to a wider range of people. By the time English colonial settlers began arriving in New Zealand in the early nineteenth century, the concept of the – bourgeois – villa was firmly entrenched in their cultural baggage, as it were. The first reference to a villa in a New Zealand newspaper dates to 1840 – in this case, to a “villa allotment” i.e. a section of land on which it would be suitable to build a villa (New Zealand Gazette and Wellington Spectator 6/6/1840: 4).

And that, folks, in just a little bit more than 1000 words, is how we came to have the villa in Aotearoa. It’s not just a house type, it’s an ideal: of peace and quiet and rest and recreation, a set of circumstances best achieved on a small parcel of land (big enough for a garden, and to separate you from your neighbours), in a standalone house, not in the central city, and it’s not a place of work. For men, at least. These ideals morphed and changed a bit here in New Zealand, but that’s a topic for another day. Before I sign off, though, I’d like to ask you to pause and think about these ideals might today relate to, say, a holiday house, or how they might have fed into the growth of the lifestyle block.

Katharine Watson

References

Ackerman, James S., 1990. The Villa: Form and Ideology of Country Houses. Princeton University Press, Princeton.

Archer, John, 2005. Architecture and Suburbia: From English Villa to American Dream House, 1690-2000. University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis.

McKellar, Elizabeth, 2011. “The villa. Ideal type or vernacular variant?”. In Peter Guillery (ed.), Built from Below:  British Architecture and the Vernacular. Routledge, London. Pp. 49-72.

New Zealand Gazette and Wellington Spectator. Available at: www.paperspast.natlib.govt.nz.

On halls

The hall. It’s probably not the most important room in your house (if you even have a hall) – chances are, it’s more a thoroughfare than a in which space you actually do things. In fact, in modern houses, the hall is often quite the minor bit-part player, serving as nothing more than a route from A to B, and maybe a space to hang some things. It’ll come as a surprise, then, to learn that the esteemed Jeremy Salmond has described this unassuming room as the dictator of the house plan (Salmond 1986: 173). Of course, he was referring to the role of the hall in Pākehā houses in 19th century New Zealand, not houses designed in the 21st century. Not only were the houses of that era different from those designed today, it was also a different social and cultural context, so halls meant different things and were used in different ways. And so this is what today’s blog post sets out to explore: the importance of the hall in Pākehā 19th century houses in New Zealand.

A classic Victorian villa hall.

Halls have quite a long history in English housing. They date back as far as c.1400, when an open hall was the heart of the house, where quite the range of activities took place: eating, business meetings, gatherings, etc. They were a room where things happened, not just a thoroughfare. And the majority of houses had a hall, around which they were centred (the homes of the very poorest being the exception). Another great description of the hall comes from Matthew Johnson, who refers to halls of the 15th century as “part of a common spatial vocabulary that materialised a common set of household and patriarchal values that run up and down the social scale” (Johnson 2015: 28). The hall’s function began to change in the 16th century, as ideas about privacy where certain activities should take place changed and houses began to have more rooms, each with their own designated function (whether the change in ideas or the more rooms came first, I’m not sure – it’s possibly a bit chicken-and-egg; Johnson 2015: 28).

A house with no hall. Image: P. Mitchell & K. Watson.

The hall persisted, however, and for New Zealand’s 19th century English settlers, it was almost as fundamental to their concept a house as a kitchen or bedroom – okay, maybe not quite on that level, but more important than a bathroom, which I think really puts things into perspective (although that reflects a whole different set of ideas – and technologies). Only the very earliest arrivals, or the very poorest, built houses without halls. But as soon as someone could afford a house with a hall, that was what they built. This hall was the entrance into the house, something that’s quite different from modern house designs, serving to prove that an entrance hall is not, in fact, fundamental to the concept of a house, but that this idea was a social construct, born of a particular set of ideas, in a particular time and place.

Cottage layout. In this layout, the hall was only one room deep, ending at the kitchen. A bedroom typically opened off the kitchen. Image: P. Mitchell & K. Watson.

To be fair, the hall was not entirely without practical function. For one, it served as a buffer to help keep the dirt and grime and miasmas (literally, bad airs, and believed by many Victorians to be the cause of various infectious diseases, until they cottoned on to germ theory) out of the living spaces in the house, such as the parlour/drawing room, bedrooms and any other such rooms you might have been able to afford. It might also have served to help keep the heat – such as it was – in those rooms in winter. It also allowed for the aforementioned segregation of space, particularly separating work spaces from living spaces, and ensuring the privacy of those using the living spaces. This was particularly important in houses where servants were employed. And there was another function, too, that a hall could fulfil: a place for kids to play. Of course, the extent to which a hall could fulfil any of these functions depended largely on its size. But, to modern eyes at least, it was something of a waste of space. And it was a waste of space that you were paying for the privilege of having.

Villa layout. In this layout, the hall was more than one room deep and all the living spaces opened off the hall. Work spaces, however, might be interconnected. Image: F. Bradley & K. Watson.

So, what were halls like in 19th century Christchurch? Well, they came in four basic forms (see images above and below), which I have defined partly based on my research and partly based on the work of Jeremy Salmond (Salmond 1986: 154-155). These four forms also defined the layout of the house. And it’s when looking at who built what sort of hall/layout that one of the less obvious things about a hall is revealed: there was a clear relationship between the class of the builder (used here to refer to the person who commissioned construction of the house) and the layout chosen (see the graph below).

Half-villa layout. This was a variant on the villa layout, typically (but not exclusively) found in semi-detached houses. The hall ran along one side of the house, rather than through the centre of it. Image: Dalman Architects.

The relationship between class and house layout.

The narrowest of halls, just wider than the front door. Image: P. Mitchell.

But it wasn’t just in relative length that the hall varied, it also varied in width, and this mattered too. Here’s how. In part it mattered because, the wider your hall, the more things you could display in it – and if you were very wealthy, it could become wide enough for a fireplace. And the heads of dead animals. Houses with a cottage layout generally had halls that were barely wider than the front door, a combination that truly minimised the amount of space required for the hall (and thus reduced building costs). Houses with a villa layout typically had halls that were wide enough to accommodate sidelights on either side of the front door (see the image below). Given this clear relationship (see the graph below), and given that we already know that there was also a relationship between house layout and class, it is not surprising that there is also a relationship between sidelights and class.

The relationship between house layout and the presence or absence of sidelights.

The relationship between class and the presence or absence of sidelights.

Thanks to those sidelights (or the absence of them), then, a casual passer-by knew what the layout of your house was (the front door of 19th century houses in New Zealand typically faced the street). And what class you were. Of course, there were other factors that might equally have told them this, such as the size of your house and what suburb you’d built in. But there were few other features of your house (such as bay windows, or verandas, or eaves brackets or other decorative components) that were a reliable indicator of the class of the person who built the house (in Christchurch, at least – things may well have been different elsewhere). Where things get really interesting, though, is when houses don’t fit this pattern (I’m also intrigued that it was only a small number of houses that didn’t fit said pattern, but that’s something for another day). Did couples who built houses with a cottage layout but with sidelights place more importance on external appearances than their contemporaries? Were they consciously trying to make their house look ‘better’, or did they just like sidelights (and see them as letting more light into what could be quite a dingy space)? Those who built a house with a villa layout but without sidelights would have saved money by not having them, but why did they choose to save money in this particular way? Did they not care that people might think they were working class as a consequence (and, quite frankly, why should they have cared)? Was how the house functioned – in terms of the separation of rooms and privacy – more important?

A front door with sidelights on either side. Image: F. Bradley.

 I was surprised, when I carried out my analysis of the relationship between different features on the exterior of house (bay windows, verandas, eaves brackets, number of windows, etc) and class of the builder that it was, of all things, sidelights that were most important. They seem so unassuming. And this is really the moral of this particular story, as it were: the broader structures and patterns that underly society are expressed materially, and sometimes in seemingly quite mundane and unexpected things. The particular power of archaeology is its ability to reveal and explore these relationships, to look at the patterns but also to examine what doesn’t fit the pattern – and why.

K. Watson

References

Johnson, Matthew, 2015. “English houses, materiality, and everyday Life.” Archaeological Papers of the American Anthropological Association 26 (1): 27-39.

Salmond, Jeremy, 1986. Old New Zealand Houses 1800-1940. Reed, Auckland.

The Francises: living beyond their means

Harriet and Joseph Francis strike me as ambitious young things. Which is no bad thing. They arrived in Christchurch in 1876, newly married, pregnant and ready to tackle colonial life (Church of England Marriages and Banns 1875, Lyttelton Times 23/9/1876: 2). As with most migrants to New Zealand, they were seeking something better than they had left behind. Joseph came from a family in Wiltshire, all of whom worked in the woollen mills (England Census 1861). Except for Joseph, who trained as a law clerk (England Census 1871). Was this his decision, to take a different (and ‘better’) career path from his parents and siblings, or was it one made by his parents? We’ll never know and, on balance, it doesn’t make a great deal of difference. The point is that, even before he left England, Joseph was on a different trajectory from the rest of his family. Unfortunately, I know far less about Harriett and thus it’s difficult to explore what might have motivated her.

Harriet and Joseph Francis, c.1875-76, possibly taken prior to their departure for New Zealand. Image: private collection, Liz Francis.

Although Harriett and Joseph’s early life in the city is hard to trace, I know that they lived in Oxford Terrace, before moving to Peterborough Street and that Joseph worked as a waiter (Lyttelton Times 23/9/1876: 2, Wise’s 1878-79: 66). In 1878, Joseph bought a 405 square metre section in the Avon loop, an area that was just starting to develop as a working class suburb (LINZ 1878). Very soon thereafter, he commissioned architect J. C. Maddison to design a house for this land (Lyttelton Times 1/10/1878: 4). Now, there’s not a lot of information on how common it was to commission an architect to design a house in 19th century Christchurch, or even less about much it cost to do so, but I suspect it added significantly to the cost of a build. Further, in my PhD research, I looked at a sample of 101 houses from across Christchurch and just eight were designed by architects, three of whom were architects designing houses for themselves.

The advertisement calling for tenders for the construction of Cora Villa. Image: Lyttelton Times 1/10/1878: 4

So why did Harriett and Joseph choose to commission an architect? Good question. It’s also a question for which there is no clear answer, because the resulting house was, well, spectacularly ordinary (PIC). Advertisements for the rental or sale of the house never mentioned that it was designed by Maddison (who would go on to be quite a prominent architect in the city) and it’s hard to see that the Francises gained anything for this expense. There is one tantalising detail, however, that could explain things. Joseph Francis worked as a waiter at the White Hart Hotel, owned by Joseph Oram Sheppard (Globe 31/1/1879: 3). Maddison designed extensions to the hotel in 1876, and it is possible that Sheppard recommended Maddison’s services to Joseph (Lyttelton Times 15/8/1876: 1). 

Harriett and Joseph called their new house Cora Villa, named for one of their children who died in infancy (BDM Online, n.d., Lyttelton Times 27/11/1879: 1). Not only was the house fairly ordinary for its time and place, it was also a curious mixture of spending and saving. While the sash windows on the street-facing elevation were single pane, those on the sides and rear had two panes, a less fashionable and probably cheaper form. Likewise, only the street-facing elevation had rusticated weatherboards, with cheaper plain weatherboards used on the sides and rear. The house was small, too: at 78.9 square metres, it was smaller than the average working-class house. Money had also been saved by not having any built-in internal decoration, such as a hall arch or ceiling roses, ceiling cornices or plinth blocks. There were, however, four fireplaces, which was unusual for a working class house. Another unusual feature was that lath and plaster linings were used throughout the house – kitchens and sculleries were more typically lined with match-lining, which was cheaper than lath and plaster.

The very standard villa that J. C. Maddison designed for Harriet and Joseph. Image: P. Mitchell.

It seems that the Francises never lived in Cora Villa. Instead, just over a year after Maddison called for tenders for its construction, Joseph advertised it to rent (Lyttelton Times 27/11/1879: 1). Instead of living in their new house, Harriett and Joseph embarked on a career in hotelkeeping, assisted by one J. O. Sheppard (Lyttelton Times 27/11/1879: 1, 14/7/1880: 3). But things were not to go well and this relationship was not one that would benefit the young couple. In 1881, Joseph sold Cora Villa to Sheppard (LINZ 1878). The following year, Sheppard called in his debts, and Joseph was forced to give up the Rolleston Hotel and declare bankruptcy. A court case over Joseph’s debts to Sheppard revealed that he owned land in Waimate, Rolleston and Christchurch, but was heavily mortgaged (to the sum of at least £1400) and carried other debts relating to the purchase of supplies for the hotel (Star 30/6/1882: 3). Sheppard himself turned out to be in financial difficulties and was declared bankrupt the following year (Macdonald 1952-64: S290). Sheppard no doubt demanded repayment of Joseph’s debts to stave off his own bankruptcy, but the state of Joseph’s finances suggests it is unlikely he could have run the Rolleston Hotel for much longer, although he may have been able to avoid bankruptcy.

The Francises put their new house up for rent shortly after it was built, with no mention of Maddison’s involvement. Image: Lyttelton Times 27/11/1879: 1.

It is tempting to see the young Joseph as having come under Sheppard’s sway whilst working at the White Hart Hotel. Sheppard, who was only five years older than Joseph, was from a well-known family of hotel proprietors. Prior to his bankruptcy, he had done very well out of the White Hart (Macdonald 1952-64: S290). It is easy to imagine a situation where Joseph looked up to and was somewhat bedazzled by the successful Sheppard and was convinced that he could follow the same path to success. The two may even have become friends, given their similar ages. Perhaps Sheppard convinced Joseph that he too could make his fortune from hotels. Or perhaps it was a straightforward business arrangement. It is impossible to know from this distance. Joseph’s use of an architect to design Cora Villa certainly suggests someone who did not always make sound financial decisions, or decisions for the right reasons, and the details of his finances in 1882 support this. What is clear is that the relationship between the two men was fundamental to the trajectory that Harriett and Joseph’s lives took in Christchurch. 

Harriett died in 1887, leaving Joseph with four children (BDM Online, n.d., Star 19/5/1887: 2). As was not uncommon in such a situation, Joseph remarried quickly, to Nellie Britt (BDM Online, n.d.). Remarrying quickly after the loss of a spouse was common for men in particular, in order not just to provide care for his children (and himself), but to keep the family on a sound financial footing (Cooper and Horan 2993: 207-208). Joseph and Nellie would have two children, only one of whom survived to adulthood (BDM Online, n.d.). Little more is known of Joseph’s life. By 1889, he was once again working as a waiter in a hotel, this time in Timaru, where he would live until his death in 1894 (NZER (Timaru), 1893: 22, Timaru Herald 21/3/1889: 3, 3/7/1894: 2, Wise’s 1892-93: 49).

What can we learn from this story of Harriett and Joseph and the house they built in the Avon loop? In the first instance, I think it speaks to their ambition and their desire for a better life in New Zealand. Part of that better life was the dream of owning a home of their own, with some land. This is a dream that was common to many of New Zealand’s 19th century settlers, and one that would have been far out of reach of a law clerk – or a waiter – in England at the time. It also speaks to the centrality of land, and land ownership, to the dreams of many of those 19th century settlers. And, even though things did not work out well for Harriett and Joseph, it gives an indication of the relative affordability of land and building in that time and place (thanks, in part, to the way in which it was cheaply acquired from Ngāi Tahu). In these things, Harriett and Joseph’s story speaks to the roots of the strong tradition of home ownership in Aotearoa. Finally, it also highlights that the hopes and dreams of those who came to New Zealand in the 19th century were not always met, and that the ‘settler’ experience was not always characterised by ‘success’.

Katharine Watson 

References

Births, Deaths and Marriages (BDM) Online. Available at: https://www.bdmhistoricalrecords.dia.govt.nz/

 Church of England Marriages and Banns [online]. Available at: http://home.ancestry.com.au/

 Cooper, A. and Horan, M., 2003. Down and out on the Flat: the gendering of poverty. In: B. Brookes, A. Cooper and R. Law, ed. 2003. Sites of Gender: Women, Men and Modernity in Southern Dunedin, 1890-1939. Auckland: Auckland University Press. Pp. 207-208.

 England Census [online]. Available at: http://home.ancestry.com.au/

 Globe [online]. Available at: https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers

 LINZ, 1878. Certificate of title 34/251, Canterbury. Landonline.

 Lyttelton Times [online]. Available at: https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers

 Macdonald, G. R., 1952-64. Macdonald Dictionary of Canterbury Biography [online]. Available at: https://collection.canterburymuseum.com/explore

 New Zealand Electoral Roll (NZER) [online]. Available at: http://home.ancestry.com.au/

 Star [online]. Available at: https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers

 Timaru Herald [online]. Available at: https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers

Wise’s New Zealand Post Office Directory, 1866-1954 [online]. Available at: http://home.ancestry.com.au/