"Buildings – Spain/Portugal circa 1810" Topic

I'm modelling some groups of buildings based on references of Spanish and Portuguese original and although I've been searching the web and looking at painting form the period I can find a definitive answer to a question.

Do the rural villages houses or the town houses of the period have internal wooden shutters to the windows. From what I can glean from the images I've found is that some appear to have internal shutters but others have external ones that hinge into the window opening itself rather than being on the outside wall as we tend to typically think of shutters. My guess is that these might be later editions after the Napoleonic period but equally I'm guessing that these rural windows didn't have glass.

Any thoughts or evidence that might help me? I've been unable to find a book or on-line source that would help with such questions.

My rule of thumb for modelling Peninsular buildings is bars on ground floor windows and interior wooden shutters for upstairs windows. Exterior shutters can even be ignored as you wish.

My Gamarra Mayor Village is only in 3mm but this rule of thumb informed my design.

link

The engravings below are by L'Evêque who accompanied the British army during the campaigns in Portugal. So we have contemporary on-the-spot examples of both rural and urban houses.

Your 3mm buildings look great – so much detail for such small structures.

Thanks for your input that's really helped. I shall enjoy finding suitable 'bars' for the ground floor windows. Would they have internal wooden shutters as well behind the bars?

Glass – would that be the preserve of the wealthy?

I would go with:

All windows except in some utility buildings would have had interior wooden shutters. Over these shutters, wealthy and some utility and some less wealthy properties, especially urban, would have had glazed windows, especially on upper floors (or half-glazed with a lower shutter). Protective iron bars over glazed/shuttered windows would, for ground floor windows, be common for urban properties and familiar for rural dwellings. Exterior wooden shutters would not have been common, especially on older stone buildings with thick walls that would have made exterior shutters difficult to reach from inside.

There's no doubting that iron window bars can be difficult to model!

Thanks for those extra details. I can now continue with confidence! : )