Ernest Flagg

Disadvantages... can be entirely removed by... the ridge-dormer. By its use space in the roof, otherwise of little value, becomes the most desirable.

One of the most ancient and inexpensive ways of obtaining shelter, was to utilize the space under sloping roof rafters. Indian wigwams have no other kind. Where civilization is slightly more advanced, low stone walls are built upon which …

There have always seemed to the writer sound reasons for using the module system in architectural design.

The Parthenon stands as a reproach to the rest of the world. May not this be because the rest of the world has forgotten, or never knew, the principles which made the Parthenon possible and of which harmony of proportion... was one?

The Greeks were men of sense; if they used the system they did so for a purpose, as artists rather than mathematicians and imperceptible irregularities could not affect that purpose.

A Greek architect of the great epoch would no more have thought of omitting the mark of the harmonic scale of proportion, on which the design was based, than would the composer of music think of omitting the harmonic scale of his …

As in poetry and music, even the unskilled ear may be offended by a mistake in measure, without discerning the cause, may not also a mistake in the harmony of dimensions unconsciously offend us in design?

When, in architecture, one uses a fixed unit and combinations of it, to produce harmony, the effect should be most striking and apparent... as it is in music by the measured beat and in poetry by the cadence and rhythm.

Certain combinations of dimensions produce harmonious results, but since the time of the ancient Greeks no system of design, consistently base on that knowledge, has been formulated.

For more than two thousand years architectural design by the use of a modulus, except in the case of the classic orders, had been a lost art.

It was only within comparatively recent times that several refinements in Greek architecture... such as the slight entasis of the columns, the greater size of the corner columns, and the convex curve of the stylobate were discovered.

To the Greek harmony was of supreme importance, and if the triglyphs represented the harmonic scale... their meaning and use is abundantly explained. ...The universal admiration which Greek proportions have always excited proves that the …

the harmonic scale of the monument.

spacing constitutes a fixed modulus

The Greeks designed by a modulus of fixed measure

Greek art was extremely simple and direct; both in design and construction the Greek mind abhorred complicaton.

standardization implies quantity.

Where the processes and apparatus is used, over and over again, great economy should result

The system of building, described in this work, is intended for repetition.

Why can there not be a new art founded on the only principle which can produce great art—the principle that art is the interpretation or extraction of the essence of beauty in nature, and all else is secondary?

The best art, and the only art which will ever lead to great results, must have for its basis the interpretation of beauty in nature.

2d. Saving space: (a) By the utilization of the large volume of space contained in the slopes of roofs... (b) by the reduction of floor thickness... (c) by the utilization of space (as on shipboard) for lockers, cupboards, closets, etc... …

1st. Saving of time, trouble, and money in the preparation of plans by the module system, and the standardization of parts and methods.

Economy in building consists in the aggregate of a great number of savings, which when considered separately may seem trivial, but when combined are important. The list of those here provided for... may be divided into classes as follows: