Exerpts from Home and Garden by Gertrude Jekyll

Many of my friends knowing that I dabble in construction and various handicrafts, have asked whether I did not design my house myself. To which question, though I know it is meant to be kind and flattering, I have to give an emphatically negative answer. An amateur who has some constructive perceptions may plan and build a house after a fashion; and to him and his it may be, and quite rightly and honestly, a source of supreme satisfaction. But it will always lack the qualities that belong to the higher knowledge, and to the firm grasp of the wider expression. There will be bungles and awkward places, and above all a want of reposeful simplicity both in and out. If an addition is made it will look like a shamefaced patch boggled on to a garment; a patch that is always conscious of its intrusive presence. Whereas an addition planned by a good architect will be like one of those noble patches such as were worked by some Italian genius in needlework two hundred years ago. The garment needed a patch, and a patch was put in, but instead of a clumsy attempt being made to conceal it, it was glorified and ornamented and turned into some graceful arabesque of leaf and flower and tendril. Enriched by cunning needlework of thread or cord or delicate goldern purifying, so that what began by being an unsightly rent, grew under the skilful fingers, quickened by the ready wit of the fertile brain, into a thing of enduring beauty and delight. Page 33

…only pretension is to be of sound work done with the right intension, of material used according to the capability of its nature and the purpose designed, with due regard to beauty of proportion and simplicity of effect. Page 25