“Brightcot” Letchworth

"Brightcot," the house built for the Misses Wilkinson in Letchworth, is chiefly interesting as an example of simple, straightforward and economical planning, to suit the site, of a house for two ladies to live in.  Above all the warnings I would give to the designer of small houses would come one against the conscious effort to gain picturesqueness. Let the exterior be always the logical outcome and expression of well thought out interior arrangements. I would on the other hand call his attention to the fact that perhaps the most potent factors in artistic success or failure in designing small houses is in the relation of solids to voids, of window spaces to wall spaces, and in the proportions and distribution of these. Every turn of the road reminds us that we seldom find satisfactory solutions of the difficulties that the modern demand for lighter rooms has created, and how frequently this demand upsets the charming relations of window spaces to wall spaces which make much of the old work so lovely.

Reference    The Craftsman Volume XVII number 1 April 1910 pp 3-14. Barry Parker Modern Country Homes in England, number one