Our 50th Competition

Progress, Volume XII, Issue 7, 1 March 1917, Page 903

Our 50th Competition

Essay on the Quality of Fitness in Architecture : Only two competitors sent in essays on the subject set by Mr. Basil Hooper, A.R.1.8.A., of Dunedin, viz.:-—“Heureka,’' by J. P. Ward, with Mr. C. R. Ford, Architect, of Wanganui; and “Ascot,” by Angus Wilson, with Mr. P. A. Doherty, Auckland. According to the terms of the Competition no prize is awarded unless there are at least three competitors, but the judge advises us that the essay by “Heureka” is worthy of some reward. We are therefore making a special prize of 10/6 for “ Heureka ’s” essay which is published in this issue. The judge’s report runs as follows: It is disappointing that only two entries were received for the essay on this subject, as it is one that well repays study and investigation. The matter is all so close to hand, and immediately under one’s observation, that it should not be much labour to write about it. However, the two essays received are really admirable the one by “Heureka,” placed first, being specially so. Indeed, it is hard to find any fault with it, the expression, style, and spelling, being perfectly correct, and the matter also being quite relevant.. That being so, I cannot do better than let the essay speak for itself, though I will refer to one or two points in it. In speaking of the use of corrugated iron as a roof covering, “Heureka” writes “there is nothing .to be said against” its use. I think this might he qualified slightly by adding “where nothing else can be procured or afforded.” . Also immediately following is the remark about facades “on top of plate glass.” Unfortunately this is true, and architects have to bow before commercialism in this particular, but for all that, it is

usually quite possible to bring the vertical lines right down to the ground in most cases, and not place the supports in the haphazard fashion one so often sees. Then the author is hardly fair to the “Georgian Style,” in calling it “ponderous,” as the Georgian, in its purity, is usually regarded as one of the best legacies of the past, and in fact many of the leading architects of the present day are now designing in that style. Probably the “Early Victorian” is what “Heureka” is referring to. 'Again, the “Mission” furniture, no doubt is truthful, but it has become affectedly natural, so to speak, and a revulsion has come in favour of more graceful forms and varied woods, even though veneered.

Taking the second essay, by “Ascot,” there is not anything very debateable in it, but I think, speaking