As discussed in Scientific American’s Architects and Builders Edition in March 1887, the unique tower proposed for Earle’s Court, was an early example of green sustainable development that is once again gaining popularity here in the 21st century.
Today, Residential Cluster Developments, or conservation development, is the clustering of residential homes, with shared utilities and extra land utilized as open space, recreation or agriculture, perhaps situated over underground engineered wetlands that treat waste water generated by the homes. It is becoming increasingly popular in subdivision development because it allows the developer to spend much less on land, it is considered sustainable and it makes use of and preserves open space.
As discussed in Wikipedia, in many ways cluster development has been practiced since the earliest communities — from the medieval village to the New England town, like Narragansett. Most of the seacoast properties in Narragansett, RI were improved with unique isolated structures, although several clusters of large summer cottages were also erected, with each cluster having similar design, construction and aesthetics. The most prominent of these clusters became known as Earles Court, which were built between 1886 and 1887, and consisted of four large Late Victorian dwellings along the south side of Earles Court Road. These dwellings were designed by D and J Jardine and Constable Brothers of New York, who were commissioned for the project by Edward Earle. Mr. Earle was a New York Lawyer and an influential summer resident who fell in love with Narragansett and wanted an extensive development with a shared water tower centralized on the property to include a griffin to protect the small community.
As depicted on the Scientific American cover, it appears that the water tower was originally designed to also house a wind mill to generate power that could be shared among the homes. However, there is no evidence that the actual tower was constructed with the windmill. All available photographs of the tower depict it to be topped with a weather vane instead. Either way, Earles Court Tower represents one of the early versions of sustainable development and should be preserved for future generations to learn from.