Ordinary buildings that were something else before they took guests: town houses, corner blocks, a row of neighbours joined behind their fronts. The interest lies in what the conversion kept and what it gave up.
A converted building carries two plans at once. The older one decides where the load falls, how deep the rooms are, where a stair can go and how much light reaches the back; the newer one decides everything else. Where the conversion is good, the older plan stays legible and the newer one stops arguing with it.
Joining neighbours is the hardest version of this. Floors of adjoining houses rarely meet at the same level, so the passage from one into the next runs up or down a few steps, corridors bend where they should run straight, and the street front stays divided even where the interior behind it has become single.16
A row of adjoining old houses in the Rennweg quarter, joined behind their separate street fronts and worked into one house of lodging. The fronts were kept as they stood, so the address reads from outside as several buildings. Their dates are not confirmed.
BeforeAdjoining town houses joined behind kept street fronts
What makes a conversion readable is usually a small number of kept things: a stone stair, a beamed ceiling, the depth of a window reveal, the proportion of a room that no modern plan would produce. These survive because moving them would have cost more than keeping them, and they are more honest than any restoration.17
An old stone house in the Gothic quarter, standing on a small square behind the cathedral, with the street level given over to lodging rooms and a dining room. The building's age appears in published accounts but is not confirmed here.
BeforeStone town house in the Gothic quarter; earlier use not confirmed
Some rooms in such houses are open beyond the guest list. A ground floor dining room, a bar, a terrace or an inner yard may take anyone who walks in, and in a quarter house that is often the point: the building went on being part of its street instead of closing itself off behind a reception desk.18
A quarter house on a corner in the ninth arrondissement of Paris, taken over and reworked as lodging with rooms above and a ground floor open to the street. The building's earlier use is not confirmed by published material.
BeforeCorner house in the ninth arrondissement; earlier use not confirmed
In the end the address matters more than the interior. A house of this kind was built for its street, at the width the street allowed, and it is still read from the pavement. Move the same rooms elsewhere and most of what makes them worth describing would be gone.19
Two neighbouring houses on a narrow street near the cathedral, joined behind their fronts around an inner yard and run as one address. The yard is what makes the joining legible from within. The age of the houses is not confirmed.
BeforeTwo neighbouring houses joined around an inner yard
Ages, styles and attributions are given only where published material supports them; elsewhere the note says that the point is not confirmed. Buildings of this kind change hands and change use. Settle anything that matters to a stay with the house itself.