the building the aspect of a fortress, or mosque. It is
this mysterious rear facade which is shown most often in
photographs. The apertures in this tower-like structure
seem to invite only spirits to enter. In fact behind them is
an unconventional room, painted citrine yellow, where all
Melnikov���s family slept--on altar-like beds. The front of
Melnikov���s house fuses inside and out; the back returns
to ancient ideas of fortification, with windows as peepholes to let in light while blocking the gaze of strangers.
One compromise between exposure and closure is
glass that is sandblasted into semi-opacity, as in Pierre
Chareau���s stunning Maison de Verre (1927-33) in Paris. Chareau���s small frosty panes remind us that the first
glass used in architecture, by the Romans in Alexandria
around 100 A.D. was not transparent at all but of poor
optical quality. The Romans made cast glass windows
for buildings in Rome and for the villas of Pompeii and
Herculaneum. Until the 19th century, glass windows
were reserved for the wealthy; hence, Hardwick���s glorious expanse of this material was also a sign of expense.
Part of my attraction to Hardwick Hall and its progeny
is the use of mullions or panes which architects nowadays tend to eschew except in historicist buildings. I am
less enamored of large-scale sheet glass through which
one sees an unmediated landscape, and which makes
the face of houses blank. An interior with such windows
feels naked.
HYLAND
