Rick F. wrote:Unity wrote:Flash! wrote:I agree with Nancy--clematis. We have one just like that that covers our mailbox each spring. They're lovely.
It's aways a challenge to pronounce the name correctly -- is it cleMATis or CLEMatis? The horticulture snobs choose the latter.
I like the split-split-split house -- fully unconstrained vernacular architecture.
--John
John,
My wife says it's CLEMatis, but I'll side with the majority. I guess that makes her a horticulture snob. (And to confirm that verdict, she says clematis is the original ancient Greek name for this plant.)
As for the "unconstrained vernacular architecture"--I doff my cap at your expansive knowledge of buildings, architecture, and terminology. (Unless, of course, you meant "unconstrained
vertical architecture," in which case I undoff my cap and merely congratulate you for your inventiveness!)
Rick F.
It didn't occur to me that I was using inscrutable jargon.
Answers.com wrote:vernacular
n.
1. The standard native language of a country or locality.
2. (a) The everyday language spoken by a people as distinguished from the literary language. See synonyms at dialect.
(b) A variety of such everyday language specific to a social group or region: the vernaculars of New York City.
3. The idiom of a particular trade or profession: in the legal vernacular.
4. An idiomatic word, phrase, or expression.
5. The common, nonscientific name of a plant or animal.
adj.
1. Native to or commonly spoken by the members of a particular country or region.
2. Using the native language of a region, especially as distinct from the literary language: a vernacular poet.
3. Relating to or expressed in the native language or dialect.
4. Of or being an indigenous building style using local materials and traditional methods of construction and ornament, especially as distinguished from academic or historical architectural styles.
5. Occurring or existing in a particular locality; endemic: a vernacular disease.
6. Relating to or designating the common, nonscientific name of a plant or animal.
[From Latin vernāculus, native, from verna, native slave, perhaps of Etruscan origin.]
Another way of saying it would be
ad hoc, home-grown architecture.
--John
(Having toiled 30 years in the historic preservation art, maybe I'm sort of a historic preservation snob.
)