building the american landscape - Univerza v Novi Gorici

Tidy, mainly horizontal, board fencing arranged enclosed the vegetable and flower
gardens, separating the spaces around the buildings from the open countryside and
from the road [Figures 35 and 37]. Herbert Schiffer wrote about the design of
Shaker villages: “these communities which now seem in some respect models of
modern planning ‐ including such concepts as the clustering of dwelling and service
buildings in small groups to locate the proper balance of activity and privacy and to
the optimum use of the surrounding land ‐ evolved as a result of the Shaker
demand for order and efficiency” 71 .
The village of Hancock [Figure 40], besides complying with the general features
described above, is famous for its industrious inhabitants, who had contributed to
make it (and its economy) prosperous over the years, with approximately 300
inhabitants and 3,000 acres of land by about 1830. The Round Stone Barn (1826,
the roof of which was rebuilt in 1864 following a fire, with alterations made to the
original design of the roof) is the most famous building in the village [Figure 39]. 90
feet in diameter, it could contain up to 52 dairy cows. It was used for a large
agricultural machine and for breeding the animals. It enabled the operations of hay
storage to be easily carried out, and protected the stock of hay by means of
carefully studied natural ventilation. It not only allowed simultaneous access to
different levels of the structure, but also enabled the hay to be moved from the
upper levels directly into the mangers of the cows on the lower level. Its circular
shape also enabled horse‐drawn carriages to enter without having to make
complicated manoeuvres to get out of the cowshed. Finally, a special "floating"
floor too had been studied to keep the animals separated from the manure, which
was store, collected through special trapdoors and then used as fertilizer in the
vegetable and flower gardens, where they cultivated seeds and aromatic and
medicinal herbs [Figure 41].
Wood, stone and bricks were the main materials of the various buildings, which also
acted as landmarks, since they could be identified by their colour. The rules of the
Millennial Law of 1821, a programmatic document which set the internal behaviour
rules of the Shaker community, also supplied numerous regulations to be followed
71 SCHIFFER, Herbert, Shaker architecture, Exton, Penns., Schiffer Publishing, 1979, p. 8
41