Page:The museum, (Jackson, Marget Talbot, 1917).djvu/85

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THE ARCHITECTURAL PLAN
63

wall and covered by an insulating wall which absolutely prevents both the loss of space incident to the usual method and the overheating of the wall at one point, which we sometimes find. It may be interesting to those who are about to build a museum, or to change the heating in some museum already built, to see the results of experiments made abroad, which are appended. (See page 62.) It will be seen from this that the temperature in the different parts of the room was extremely uniform, slightly colder near the floor but to no marked degree warmer at the top of the room. The system works perfectly in Germany and should do the same in America. In side-lighted galleries, radiators may be placed under the windows without interfering with exhibition space. In building a museum, the first requisite is to secure good light; the second, to secure available wall and floor space. In almost every case both wall and floor space are necessary. Radiators placed in the middle of a room not only become very disagreeable and ugly pieces of furniture, but they take available exhibition space. Radiators placed in front of the wall render useless the space which they occupy and make the wall directly above them unavailable for exhibition. There is no class of objects which can stand the continued heat. An interesting