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Pattern BookThe Hammond's Ferry Pattern Book is intended as the basis for an "assembly kit" for those individuals and builders seeking a firm footing in the design of their own homes. It identifies a strong variety of housing styles typical of Augusta and North Augusta, illustrating key components of these styles, such as massing and scale, the shapes of windows and doors, roof pitches, eave details, and types of porches. The book is a guide for homeowners and members of the Hammond's Ferry Builder's Guild to use as they build the neighborhood's homes and civic structures. Eventually the book will guide in rebuilding, expanding, and repairing these structures.The Pattern Book forms the basis of the Hammond's Ferry Riverfront Code. The Code is supported by city ordinance, which gives the developer its parameters within which it can provide the system of infrastructure necessary for an urban community like Hammond's Ferry. The book is born of a cooperative effort among developers, designers, and builders, serves as a set of riverfront architectural standards—essential for creating a cohesive neighborhood identity when the building process is entrusted to a guild rather than a single designer or developer. However, this is not a strict set of dos and don'ts. It is about typologies and attitudes. Many of the homes that inspired the book were built 200 years ago or more. These same patterns and forms are found in the foundation of classical architecture and have been validated for thousands of years. While people live differently today, the classical patterns invoked in the Pattern Book remain firmly in place and are inspiration for the homes of Hammond's Ferry. They are meant to create structures that harmonize with the homes and buildings already in the area, establishing a sense of place. The Pattern Book was written over the course of several months. A visual and photographic survey of the entire region was conducted to better understand the architectural fabric of the city. Creating a Pattern Book is not about analyzing the monumental one-of-a-kind buildings, but understanding the structures that are reinforced over and over. The evolution of a region's architecture is part history lesson and part study in climatology. Early local buildings were influenced by techniques imported from England, native America, France, and Africa. They were simple one-room pens that hugged the street. These simple forms are still visible in rural areas and some parts of downtown. Houses grew geometrically, adding rear sheds, doubling in width, or rising in height. This sort of repetition of form identifies the Augusta "look"—a look that is similar to that found in nearby Savannah and many other Southeastern coastal and river town prototypes. The fundamental building form is referred to as a "raised cottage." Intense summer sun, heat, humidity, flooding, and the bugs inherent to a Southern climate also drove architectural design. Houses were placed on raised basements to optimize breezes and avoid flood waters and low-living insects. One or more porches provided an elevated spot that was cool and shady—ideal for gathering, dining, and often sleeping. Urban structures with retail establishments on the ground floor and living space above—typical of the Hammond's Ferry live/work buildings—mimic early domestic forms with the front basement replaced by the storefront or office and a balcony substituted for the porch. The consistent use of materials, echoing those that exist elsewhere in North Augusta, reinforces the connection of Hammond's Ferry to the rest of the area. There is an emphasis on horizontal wood siding and brick—some of the land on which Hammond's Ferry sits was once a brick factory. Capturing the spirit of the historic dwellings and recreating them with modern techniques and materials creates a neighborhood that is a product of its own time that is executed with traditional details and forms. Hammond's Ferry will have a clear identity—one that is in synch with the rest of North Augusta. |