Wikipedia:WikiProject Architecture/Peer review/Gunston Hall

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[edit] Gunston Hall

Hello! Gunston Hall is a piece of Georgian architecture and was owned by George Mason, a United States Founding Father. I welcome all suggestions for improvement, but I am unsure of the reliability of a few of the references, so it would be great to get another opinion on that. Thanks! ArmedBlowfish (talk|mail) 00:03, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

The article is generally structurally sound and gives a good overview of the subject. Some comments:

• Regarding references: there is something of an overeliance on the offical website, which will almost certainly express a sympathetic point of view. As you've stated the source explicitly in the most contentious cases this isn't so much of a problem, but more diversity in the references would be helpful. The one place where its use is a concern is for the statement no other rooms with chinoiserie woodwork are known to have existed in colonial America. I imagine you've found more or less all the online information about Gunston Hall, but if possible borrowing some of the print sources listed in the official site's bibliography from the library would be of use. I wouldn't use the FXVA reference as it is a tourist brochure, and the location of the mansion is sufficiently straghtforward not to require a reference anyway. The US Navy reference is a dead link at the moment.
• Things without references which could do with one:
  • The various carvings in the mansion were most likely the joint work of both William Buckland and William Bernard Sears
  • Of the bedchambers, the four corner rooms were considered the nicest. Also try to avoid using the word nicest.
• Provide metric conversions of distances in parentheses, and use words instead of figures for numbers of twenty or less.
• There are a few redundant uses of "also" and temporal terms such as "currently" which can be removed. A far better explanation of this than I can give is at User:Tony1/How_to_satisfy_Criterion_1a#Eliminating_redundancy.
• The passive voice (could be, would have) is used a couple of times when the active voice would be more appropriate. e.g. change The attic could be accessed through one of the inner bedrooms to The attic was accessible through one of the inner bedrooms

Hope this helps. Oldelpaso 11:56, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

Thank you so much! Working on it.... Armed Blowfish (talk|mail) 15:54, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

Again, thank you for the help! *Hopefully*, I have fixed all of the problems above, except for the lack of source variety / offline sources, which will take time. Would you be willing to take another look at it? — Armed Blowfish (talk|mail) 20:26, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

Looking good. One thing I neglected to mention before is that the section about the visitors centre and shop is a little brochure-like. The information about admission prices should be removed. It should state what is there rather than suggesting what visitors can do. Oldelpaso 19:24, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

I fixed up the section. Thank you so much!  : ) Armed Blowfish (talk|mail) 21:43, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

I have one piece of software that estimates the grade level readability (unknown method) at 17.1, while another estimates the Flesch-Kincaide grade level readability at 10.9, with a Flesch reading ease of 45.5. I don't know if this is good or bad. — Armed Blowfish (talk|mail) 18:55, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

• I started to copy edit this, but the ref system used makes it hard to do so (that is my problem) but to me the text seems very verbose, with ambiguities and too many " most likely"s and "according to"s (8 in fact) - if something is known as fact say so, if it not known state it as an accreditation or assertion. I don't see how the house can be mostly the design of Buckland if the exterior walls were finished when he first arrived on the scene. "According to Luke Beckerdite" - who is Luke Beckerdite? The text need to be sharpened and refined. It is an interesting page on a fascinating subject but is does need to be pulled together and made less repetitious Giano 23:45, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for your comments and edits! I have excised all uses of the phrase "according to" in favour of other forms of attribution. The most likelies and probablies often occur when the sources themselves are uncertain, because they are making guesses based on archaeological evidence. There is probably a better way to handle that, but I will have to look at it rather than just taking them out. Luke Beckerdite was an author of a chapter of an online book, which is cited. Anyway, I will do my best to more fully address your concerns when I have time. Again, thanks!  : ) Armed Blowfish (talk|mail) 00:28, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

If it is not known for sure then something is an accreditation or an assertion. If someone is an author than say so in the the text. eg The author Fred Smith has asserted that..., or claimed that... on the basis of etc etc etc. Don't just suddenly drop in unexplained a strange name, even if he is listed in the refs. It is a good page on the whole - I'm sure it will get there. Giano 07:14, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

See below. — Armed Blowfish (talk|mail) 15:30, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

This is a great beginning to this article, but there are some things that need work, in my humble opinion:

• Besides a few sentences and the section on construction, the article doesn't really outline the history of the house and the grounds. Take a look at Giano's marvelous article on West Wycombe Park. There is just as much information on the family who occupied the house as there is on the architecture. Additionally, you might consider merging the section on the other Mason plantations into this history. Along those same lines, I would redirect the other plantations to this article unless the articles can be expanded and the plantations are notable enough to warrent separate mention.

A great deal of time is spent on the interior, with little on the exterior. I would create a section on the exterior and combine the interior sections (including basement). In addition, the Gardens and Outbuildings sections could be combined as well.

• The lone sentence on the construction of the house should be placed in the first paragraph of the introduction.
• There are portraits of both Mason and Buckland in their respective articles, these might be included as well.

Your work so far is quite admirable, but this still needs work before this goes for FAC. I hope this is helpful! *Exeunt* Ganymead | Dialogue? 17:37, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Thank you for your advice! I'll do my best to expand on the history, etc. I recently found a new source that should help with that.  : ) Armed Blowfish (talk|mail) 22:15, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Hopefully, there will be enough text to add pictures of Mason and Buckland once I expand the article to include informations in some three new sources I found, listed in Gunston Hall#Further_reading.  : ) Armed Blowfish (talk|mail) 15:27, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] User:IvoShandor

Just glanced at some of the above. I would note that a sentence using "was" is also passive voice.

The attic was accessible through one of the inner bedrooms

That's passive. The subject has to act on the verb for it not to be....

That sentence is hard to construct without passive. _______ accessed the attic through the inner bedrooms. That is how the sentence could be constructed non-passively. Not sure what the missing word would be though.

I hang around peer review a lot so I will try to complete a thorough review for you soon. IvoShandor 10:10, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Thanks! : ) Armed Blowfish (talk|mail) 10:21, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Comments by Mcginnly

What an interesting article, well written, nice images, well referenced - it's a good FA candidate I'd have thought. A few comments:-

1. Presumably this building is listed on the National Register of Historic Places - this should get a mention and the Category:National Register of Historic Places should be included, but please - no infobox!
2. Per Wikipedia:Manual of Style (numbers), there should be a non-breaking space -   between a number and the unit of measurement. For example, instead of 8 km, use 8 km, which when you are editing the page, should look like: 8 km.^[?]
3. In the last paragraph Other Mason plantations - 'George Mason' recurs too much in the text - maybe replace with 'his' and 'he' where possible. (I know there's several G Masons but it gets a bit repetitive)
4. I wonder whether its worthwhile combining the rather short 'outbuildings' section with the 'garden section' into a 'Gardens and outbuildings' section?
5. Unlike other 18th century houses of Gunston Hall's stature, the layout of the second floor is unlike the layout of the floor below - 2 'unlike's and 2 'layout of's - maybe replace the second clause with 'the layout of the second floor is entirely dissimilar to the floor below'
6. It's difficult to imagine the 'rococo, chinoiserie, and Gothic' interiors - these certainly aren't evidenced by the rather sedate image of the corridor - are there no images of these rooms we might be able to include?
7. 'Although chinoiserie was popular in Britain, the Gunston Hall museum website says Gunston was the only house with this decoration in colonial America.[7]' - No need to include a mention of the website in the text and provide a citation - one or the other.
8. 'In November, when Buckland arrived, the exterior walls of Gunston Hall were probably complete' - if it's 'probably' we need to cite who asserts it was probably complete - or is this our own assertion?
9. There's a few mention of 'private, non-public rooms' - surely a private room is, by definition, non-public? redundancy. It's probably better to include a short paragraph explaining how the house would be used at the time, for entertaining etc. and how the house was split between those functions and those for the family's habitation.
10. I'm personally quite interested in Servant's quarters and the way they are integrated into the public/private plan of such houses - you mention the outbuildings providing accomodation for slaves - but where was the kitchen in relation to the dining room - how was the food transported there - where was the laundry?
11. Ideally a plan would be great. I'm happy to draw one up if you have any information I can go on? --Mcginnly | Natter 10:35, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

Thanks! I am starting to make changes per you. : ) Armed Blowfish (talk|mail) 13:09, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

Okay, I made some changes, but some of your suggestions will take more time. I should be able to add more pictures when I add more text. I have found three new potential sources since the peer review started, which are currently listed in Gunston Hall#Further_reading. HABS provides a lot of pictures, so finding a picture that shows architectural detail won't be hard. However, all the indoor photos are greyscale.

HABS also provides architectural drawings, however they do not scale well to small sizes. They should be public domain, so perhaps you could make them readable at sizes suitable for inclusion in the article? That would be most appreciated. See first floor, second floor, basement, house and garden, and grounds. Of course, I doubt there is need for five plans, but perhaps you can decide which are most important. Note that you will probable have to download the TIFFs in order to be able to read the text.

Unfortunately, archaeologists can't seem to find the slave quarters. One of the new potential sources seems to provide a lot of information about the activities that occurred at Gunston Hall Plantation, although it is often unclear if it is talking about GHP specifically, or plantations of that time period in general. I won't be able to use it until I go to the library again. It provides information about the crops grown, goods produced, why the plantation is situated near the Potomac, etc. — Armed Blowfish (talk|mail) 15:53, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Probablies

The uncertain statements in the second paragraph of Gunston Hall#Construction, and how best to attribute them, seems to be a popular point of discussion. Perhaps repeating the reference at the end of every sentence will do? Armed Blowfish (talk|mail) 15:23, 14 March 2007 (UTC)