CORRESPONDENCE.
A HOUSING EXPERIMENT.
[To tics Enters or TUE "Se:toreros"] ' 13m,—The housing question is becoming acute with many people, especially with that class who gave up their homes early in the war, cannot expect to be housed by the Government, and cannot afford to build under present conditions. This was my position early last year on being discharged from the Army after three years service. I had practically nowhere to live. Hence 1 decided to try to build myself a permanent home in Buckinghamshire. As the experiment was successful, I think a few notes on it might be of value to other people with a little capital or the means of raising it, and especially to other discharged officers; for without the education of the war—the impetus to undertake and do unusual things-1 should not have attempted it.
I shall not describe the house more than to say that it is thirty-eight feet long and fifteen and a half wide in two stories. It is built in eleven-inch hollow brick walls roughcasted, home- grown timber, and a tiled roof. It contains a large general living-room, a small kitchen-pantry, a study, four bedrooms. and a bathroom and loft. This, I think, is the extreme mini- mum for a family of three (middle-class), but quite sufficient to Live in respectably. It is more like a folded-up flat than a country house. I did not attempt at all to be "cottagy," except on the exterior, and that is severe. It was a queston, of course, not of what to build, but of what to omit. Every- thing not absolutely vital was left out. I have only one mantelpiece, for instance. In spite of this economy, it was difficult to begin building. Contractors laughed at me. So I became the builder myself. I bought the materials from any local source available and had them brought to the site. A builder in a neighbouring town sold me his stock of bricks. He elude also the windows and doors and hired me plant. It took me about six weeks to dig the foundations, working five hours a day (as I was partly disabled); but my site elopes steeply, so that much extra work was involved. After that I employed one man, an invalid R.E. sergeant, formerly a bricklayer's foreman, and very skilful. I became his labourer, and a jobbing gardener helped at intervals. We built the walls and put on the roof in two months. Neither of us was able to carry a hod, so the bricks were pulled up in a basket, eight at a time. This man worked for me for nearly five months for six hours a day, and before he left the house was ready for plastering. I employed an elderly local man for this and laboured for him. After that a plumber came and pat in the range, hot-water arrangements, and sanitary work. I did most of the painting, fittings, and joinery, except the stairs.
Thus in about six months I have built an eight-roomed house by working every day for that period for six hours, assisted and guided all the time by one skilled man on the job. I was surprised to find the amount of the work an ordinary unskilled person can do, and have come to the oon- elusion that building a house, even in the solid traditional English manner, is not the work of specialists only, and that any intelligent man under guidance can do nearly seventy per cent. of it. There are of course the feelings of the regular army of bricklayers and carpenters to he thought of, but we who have survived the war are used to learning other people's trades, and now we want homes.
The time which it takes to build a house in this manner is naturally the objection to it. On the other band, the money saved on the total cost by working oneself and by purchasing one's own materials is considerable. In my house, for instance. the materials cost about £300, including the bath, range, and other fittings. I spent as well on labour of all sorts during the whole period about £120, and I calculate that I saved by my own labour a sum quite equal to that required for my keep during the time that I worked. Naturally. such work could only be undertaken by men with something definite to live on while they were doing it. That is why I think it might appeal to pensioned officers and men. Moreover, if a group of, say, six men, ex-offieers for instance, wishing to form a small colony on the land or to live in the country within reach of their businesses, were to work together on one building or group of buildings, they would house them- selves sooner than I did and more cheaply, especially if they were helped in the following ways: (1) They should be given plans very clearly and simply drawn to a large scale, together with a hook of instructions, net a specification nor a text-book on construction, but more like an Army training manual—a simple guide to the whole business of building a house, from mixing concrete to workmen's insurance. (2) They should bo visited constantly—at least once a fortnight—by a practical architect or builder. (3) They should always have one skilled man on the job. For there are in our country towns and villages a number of workmen who, styling themselves officially " bricklayers," are well acquainted with the aurpenter's, tiler's, and plasterer's trades as well. Lastly, if such building opera- tions were organized by some Society or Provincial Council, or even Department of State, the difficulties of finding land and the legal expenses entailed might be lessened: and if some provision were made for the purchase and delivery of material at the lowest cost, the price would be further lowered.
These are revolutionary proposals, I suppose. There are, however, a great many almost roofless and dissatisfied people in the country. There are also many partly disabled and delicate men who would benefit in health by the out-of-door work. The occupation of building a home for oneself forms an admirable link between life in a trench and life in an office, and the interest derived from it is valuable in a period of unrest. I can recommend the work both as a tonic and as a recipe for happiness.—I am, Sir, die., A. S. G Bonus.
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