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François Cointereaux’s École d’ Architecture Rurale (1790-91) and its Influence in Europe and the Colonies

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 April 2016

Louis Cellauro  and
Gilbert Richaud
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Extract

This article continues from our previous article on François Cointereaux, published in this journal last year. The aim of this second article is to cast light on the dissemination of the technique of pisé, as perfected by this French agriculturalist and architect, in Europe and its colonies. Although Cointereaux is considered today a minor eighteenth-century architect, the fascicles (cahiers) of his École d’Architecture Rurale were translated shortly after their publication in Paris in 1790–91 into six languages (German, Russian, Danish, English, Finnish, and Italian); these in turn attracted the interest of major architects such as Henry Holland (1745-1806) in England, David Gilly (1748-1808) in Germany, and Nicolai L’vov (1751-1803) in Russia, who founded a school of earth construction in Tiukhili near Moscow based on those of Cointereaux in Paris. Through his publications, Cointereaux generated, at the end of the eighteenth century, an almost universal interest in this vernacular material that was both cheap and abundant. His influence outside France was indeed significant, especially in Europe, where many leading architects used pisé for rural and residential buildings. The sudden interest in this vernacular technique, coinciding with the neo-classical age in revolutionary France and in Europe, might seem surprising. Doubtless this success can largely be explained by a desire to revive rural architecture, as well as by the cheap price of the material and its incombustibility. Although we have no means of assessing the number of pupils who attended Cointereaux’s schools, we do know that there were many visitors, notably foreign ones. In the period 1790–95, they were attracted by the novelty of the material and by his demonstrations of its application; this facilitated the wider dissemination of pisé architecture in Europe, North America and Australasia in 1795–1840.

Type
Research Article
Information
Architectural History , Volume 49 , 2006 , pp. 129 - 148
Copyright
Copyright © Society of Architectural Historians of Great Britain 2006

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References

Notes

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27 See Makhrov, ‘Earth Architecture’, n. 21, who quotes a letter from Menelaws to Lvov of 28 November 1803, Russian State Historical Archive, Collection 1285, 2, no. 50, p. 50.

28 For the British interest in pisé, see especially Robinson, John Marti, Georgian Model Farms. A Study of Decorative and Model Farm Buildings in the Age of Improvement 1800–1860 (Oxford, 1983)Google Scholar, Chapter ‘Building Materials’, pp. 51–56.

29 Plaw, John, Ferme Ornée; or Rural Improvement (London, 1795), (pi. XXI)Google Scholar. The advertisement reads: ‘In addition to the customary method of making Mud-Walls, as practised in Devonshire and the other countries of England, I beg to notice the new method of building Walls for Cottages, &c. as practised in France; of which an account is given in a little work lately published at Paris, under the title of Maison de Pisé. The method there proposed and an experience recommended, is to construct the Walls of dry earth, well rammed, or beaten together in a mould, like a case; the advantage attending this method is by the author M. Cointeraux spoken of in the highest terms, and as applicable to building of considerable extent, with upper stories, &. That this method is practicable on a small scale, I am well assured by some gentlemen, who have really built with success in this manner. It certainly is cheap, for the mould or case once formed, is easily shifted, and the whole process may be performed by common labourers. It may be proper to observe, the several pieces of the mould must be made to fit properly, and the whole must be well braced or tied together, to resist the percussion of the beating. This method has some advantages over that usually practised; for, being, worked dry, the building is habitable as soon as formed, no danger being likely to arise to the inhabitants from damp walls.’

30 For a complete survey of Holland’s career, see Dorothy Stroud, Henry Holland his Life and Architecture (London, 1966).

31 Communications to the Board of Agriculture; on Subjects Relative to the Husbandry, and Internal Improvement of the Country, 1: 3–4 (1797), pp. 387–403, and pis XLVIII-LIV.

32 Communications to the Board of Agriculture, p. 391.

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44 Communications to the Board of Agriculture, 1 (1797), p. 111.

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47 Young, Arthur, Annals of Agriculture, xxxix: 227 (1803), pp. 410–18 Google Scholar.

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49 François Cointereaux, ‘Description du modèle en pierres factices bâti dans la pépinière de M. Gibbs (sic) à Brompton près de Londres’, Nouveau traité sur l’art de bâtir dans les campagnes, et sur les divers moyens applicables aux travaux d’agriculture (Paris, 1815), pp. 7–8: ‘Ce modèle est sur un plan rectangulaire: il a 13 pieds 8 pouces de longueur, 11 pieds de largeur. Sa disposition est simple. L’entrée est à l’occident; une fenêtre, en face de cette entrée, est au soleil levant; ses côtés latéraux au midi et au nord sont pleins, c’est à dire sans porte ni fenêtre pour laisser apercevoir le bel appareil des pierres factices. La hauteur des murs est de 8 pieds 6 pouces, celle de chaque pente au pignon pour l’écoulement des eaux est de 3 pieds 6 pouces, en tout 12 pieds d’élévation … Elle offre à tous les curieux un berceau; ainsi au moyen de 4 colonnes en terre placées en avant de la façade, j’ai converti cette chaumière en un petit temple.’

50 Faulkener, Thomas, History and Antiquities of Kensington (London, 1820), p. 24 Google Scholar.

51 Ibid., p. 24.

52 See the reprint in Bertagnin, Mauro, Il Pisé et la Regola: manualistica settecentesca per l’architettura in terra. Riedizione critica del manuale di Giuseppe del Rosso ‘Dell’economica construzione delle case di terra’ (1793) (Rome, 1992), pp. 29–107 Google Scholar.

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54 Williams-Ellis, Clough, Cottage building in cob, pisé and stabilized earth (Cambridge, 1916). Republished sucessively in 1917, 1919, 1920, 1947 and 1999 Google Scholar.