TOP FLOOR HOMES

Hutt News, Volume 2, Issue 34, 30 January 1930, Page 10

TOP FLOOR HOMES

FAVOIJBED IN LONDON,

Londoners are finding out the joys of living near tci the sky, and top-floor homes are increasingly in demand.

1 There.is a complete reversal of the old ordeV. At one time the rule used to be■'.'the higher you went, the cheaper the rent." Starting with the first floor the charges were proporfionately less the farther from the street one ciiwelt; says the "Star/ London.

The people who used to occupy the top- —and cheapest —floor were in the habit of apologising to friends'for being so .high. up. Now,however, they boast about, it, and closer proximity to the sky is no excuse for getting the rent lowered. -. . .;

Then poor souls" were forced to accept attics and garrets in which, to starsre, and perhaps to die. Nowadays a different class of people deliberately choose them in order to live—rana live.well.

One. finds the.; fact of a flat being at the top of a biiniding being emphasised both by agents and home-seekers. They expiate on the numerous; advantages. Who -would live on. the ground level, they- ask, with the incessant noise of other'^foik overhead!

1 iNTearetf the sky, there 1 is more light, more aiiv more quietude. , The street may be dingy below, the outlook depreasins, tut,up above 6n.e cau often, get a view that lias to be. seen to Be believed. It frequcintly happens, r too, that the roof is available as a garden, and these •verhead London pleasaunces are .be* surprisingly numerous and POP 7 liter. Boarding-houses andr other establishments which used to let attic floors ■b a last resource now find these once despised locales paying propositions. Students, musicians, artists and others whose work demands seclusion and quiet" seek these rooms in preference to more pretentious apartments.

This gfowing fondneßS for living neaT the sky is also noticeable in the arrangement of iip-to-date private residences. The high-up'"rooms that used to be servants ? bedrooms and box or lumber rooms are nowadays rarely put to such nms. They are coveted as sitting-rooms studios, libraries and bedrooms. Their const ruetional peculiarities often lend . thetnst-lvcs to very in&dvidual decorative

schemes