Customer Reviews

French Farmhouses and Cottages (Country Series)

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Some photo-essays have a cinematic effect. You start to forget that you are leafing through the pages of a book and fall into a world that is at once unfamiliar yet somehow known. As the images pass by you keep hoping that the show will get even better and if you are lucky, sometimes it does. As with French Farmhouses And Cottages which reads like a great movie and kept me surprised with its eccentricity and charm right to the last page. Cottages and out-buildings like these are each absolutely unique and all are situated in settings that epitomise the notion of living in creative harmony with your surroundings. If for no other reason than the structures are always built of the materials that comprise the land of occupancy.

The photo captions in French Farmhouses And Cottages are superb and highlight the type of construction in evidence, the purpose of each building economically in the life of the community, and the building materials that were used and why. A lengthy section of text which is entitled 'Introduction' would better be described as a comprehensive review of rural life in France during an era when the horse provided the defining reality for all economic activity in agricultural areas of the country. Extensive discussion in this well-written and highly informative essay focuses specifically on building practises on farm steads as well as planning strategies for setting up the working farm. Materials which were readily available for building and roofing are given consideration as well since local stone, clay and wood were utilised for French farmhouse construction as represented in this volume. But the setting for the creative labours which made use of those materials, rural France a hundred years ago, produced the inspiration. The synthesis of the two frequently defies imagination.

I intend to use pictures from this book as 'models' for paintings. I expected the subjects of the photos to be much more 'cutesy', but what a nice surprise that they are realistic. And lots of very informative historic background info including dates and different regions of France.