THE SILENT HOUSE

Hokitika Guardian, 10 November 1930, Page 7

THE SILENT HOUSE

MODERN BUILDING METHODS. LONDON, September 19 At Olympia there is a Building Trades Exhibition in progress. It was opened by Lord Burnham, who commented on the importance of the ffixture because both in town and countryside the whole of England was under construction, and it must be seen that reconstruction meant regeneration and not degeneration.

Nearly half of the building in this country now was being done, not' by private enterprise, but by what Lord Burnham called public benevolence, using the word as it was used in the days of the Stuart Kings, for forced benevolence in the way of rates and taxes. Though he could not say this was a fact to rejoice over, it imposed an obligation on the building trade. As their opportunity was great, so was the need for their services, used in the right way. Building was the fundamental art and craft of our civilisation. What we had to do now was to reconcile in it the spirit of the ages. There was, he thought, abundance of courage and of no\ r elty ill what was being done; the pity was that these qualities seemed confined to the larger buildings. When one went just outside London towards the suburbs, one found that, except in some few cases, little attention had been paid to the small house or the bungalow that was covering by what was called the ribbon system so much of our countryside and seaside to-day. In the bigger buildings there was displayed a great spirit of enterprise which spoke well for the possibilities ahead.

In these days when medical men are deploring the hideous noises which have come into modern conditions of life and work, and the harmful effect which they have upon the human nervous system, visitors to the exhibition will le particularly (interested in the silent house of the future, a structure that is to be sound-proof and that will resist extremes of temperature. It consists of a series of rooms designed by Mr T. Trystan' Edwards, and made of sound-resisting materials from a number of British factories. There are floorings of rubber and cork, windows which undertake not to rattle or creak, doors designed to keep silence even when slammed, and partitions of insulating bricks and blocks, thatcllboard, fibreboard, millboards, plywood, aiid other materials.

Hollow bricks baked in England from material brought from Denmark, synthetic wood, straw, and reeds are among the substances used in the coii> struction of the walls. Cork and rubber compositions cover the floors. Ceilings of wood and perforated steel sheets supporting a quantity of eel grass from the Mediterranean absorb sound rather than transmit it. Adjoining each room are cabinets in which doubting visitors may send their friends to shout and make noises while they themselves listen. Many of the exhibits at the exhibition, comments one visitor, give the impression that of late there has been an advance in the artistic side of building. Designers appear to be striving for real beauty rather than for quaint, and often grotesque, effects. One of the many labour-saving devices is the door furniture of polished cast, stainless steel, which requires no cleaning other than an occasional rub.