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Great Camps of the Adirondacks

door Harvey H. Kaiser

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A valuable and beloved guide to the Great Camps of the Adirondacks. It was to this region that the rich and famous at the turn of the century repaired after spending July in their Newport cottages. Nowhere are are the exuberant glories of rustic vernacular architecture more happily displayed than in these rambling and inventive homes.… (meer)
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I came across this book in my research of the field of vernacular architecture. It turns out that vernacular has a somewhat unfortunate etymology; although it means native, domestic, and functional, the word is Latin, and refers to a home-born slave.

Etymology aside, the field of vernacular architecture is about architecture that is of place, informed by indigenous materials, and local craft. The spruce-log camp vernacular of the Adirondacks is an excellent example of this.

This book is a revised and expanded edition of an earlier book, first published in 1982. Like Morris Dancing and tracker organs, there was a time in the 20th century where it seemed as though the tradition of the great camp might be broken. Apparently, the publication of the first edition of this book coincided with a reinvigoration of this world

Modern Adirondack camps started as rustic cabins in the mid-1800s, for fishers, hunters, and trappers. In the late 1800s, Robber Barrons started coming up and establishing self-sufficient compounds complete with transportation (rail, ferry, roads), farmers, dairies, entertainment ("casinos").

I find it fascinating to contemplate the lifestyle of these camp-goers. People would head up to these camps, often for two to three months over the summertime, bringing their families and a few dozen friends, along with staff. Maybe a little mail by post might have made its way in and out of the camps, but otherwise, these people were essentially on enforced vacation. I can't think of parallels today of both the saturation and social contact, and the firewall between communication with the outer world and prohibition on work. How would your life be if you spend a fifth of your year with your family and friends, on retreat in a natural setting?

As the term "great camp" implies, these camps have extensive facilities. Their layout is like a campus, with many smaller buildings, each with a dedicated function (boathouse, teahouse, bedroom, library, etc.). This is a kind of architecture I have always admired. When laying out architectural plans as a child, I would often split a house up across multiple buildings according to function. I like isolating spaces—both for psychological as well as aesthetic and practical purposes (especially sound pollution).

There is a tension in the evolution of the great camp construction style. Traditionally, these buildings were crafted of whole spruce logs harvested on-site. Over time, with the desire for tighter houses, modern construction techniques, and the lack of lumber, building techniques transitioned to half-log veneers, with whole-log corners tacked on. This kind of evolution in construction is rife in the modern world, and not without cost. Native materials infer certain craft traditions. In our globalized world, these traditions often become expensive, time-consuming, or inconvenient to maintain. And yet there is a nostalgia for their aesthetic. And so people move to a new method of craft (often one that is much less vernacular), but try to maintain aesthetic cues to maintain a certain lineage and cultural wealth. I guess this is yet another example of cultural appropriation. I find the term "cultural appropriation" to be used so broadly as to be almost meaningless. But to give it utility in this context: cultural appropriation is the process of using the semblance of cultural wealth to give credence to something that, in its evolved form, is no longer authentic.

The next question becomes: is it ever appropriate to accept methods of construction that attempt to leverage the aesthetic of a craft tradition while lacking their integrity? Clearly, many people believe that it is, as this is most of architecture. That said, it is a troubling question, and leaves me wondering what kind of somatic costs these practices result in. There is something jarring about learning that something is a "veneer" when you hadn't thought it was, something that undermines our sensory perception and the nature of reality.

An interesting aside: during the late 1800s, Japanese culture was in vogue in the United States. This being the case, even though the great camps are "rustic" in many ways, it was traditional to have aspects of Japanese culture to adorn them, such as painted screens and fans hung on the walls.

This book has left me pondering how we arrive in a space colors our experience of a place. Many of the camps in this book are accessible only by boat or pontoon plane. This transition creates both a physical and mental threshold around a place, which can help to give definition to that place—it can be more fully itself, less muddled with lingering sensations from adjacent experience.

A note on the quality of this book: it is lower than most that make it to publication. There were points where text was repeated across chapters, or photos used more than once. The quality of the photography is utilitarian, and does not have the feel of a professional photographer. There are various typos throughout. They aren't so rampant as to compromise reading experience, but are a nagging presence. There's a publishers note mentioning that the author died before the book was published; some of the lack of polish might be related to these circumstances.

Also missing from this book: a map of the region. It is hard to get a true sense of a place-sourced architecture without having a map. ( )
  willszal | May 16, 2022 |
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A valuable and beloved guide to the Great Camps of the Adirondacks. It was to this region that the rich and famous at the turn of the century repaired after spending July in their Newport cottages. Nowhere are are the exuberant glories of rustic vernacular architecture more happily displayed than in these rambling and inventive homes.

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