Mansard roof

A mansard or mansard roof (also called a French roof or curb roof) is a four-sided gambrel-style hip roof characterized by two slopes on each of its sides with the lower slope, punctured by dormer windows, at a steeper angle than the upper. The steep roof with windows creates an additional floor of habitable space, (a garret), and reduces the overall height of the roof for a given number of habitable storeys. The upper slope of the roof may not be visible from street level when viewed from close proximity to the building.

The earliest known example of a mansard roof is credited to Pierre Lescot on part of the Louvre built around 1550. This roof design was popularized in the early 17th century by François Mansart (1598–1666), an accomplished architect of the French Baroque period. It became especially fashionable during the Second French Empire (1852–1870) of Napoléon III.Mansard in Europe also means the attic (garret) space itself, not just the roof shape and is often used in Europe to mean a gambrel roof.

Mansard Roof (song)

"Mansard Roof" is the debut single by indie rock band, Vampire Weekend, released on October 23, 2007.

Music video

"Mansard Roof" was the first song from Vampire Weekend's album to have a video. The video was filmed in Perth Amboy, New Jersey. The main scene in the video, directed by Alexis Boling, is set on a yacht and uses still frames. The Guardian writer Anna Pickard wrote a commentary about the song, discussing the song itself as "one of the happiest, summeriest songs you could ever imagine" and humorously describing the band as "a bunch of nice little boys on a sailboat having some tea and deciding to be in the sixties [...] whilst experimenting with African pop rhythms and retro shades."

Pitchfork Media writer, Mark Richardson, commented that in the video "they had some fun with their packaged image as clever Ivy League grads by embracing it completely".

Critical reception

Drowned in Sound described Koenig's vocals as sounding "as if on a day out from the institution, picking geraniums and wavering with the beauty of the world outside" and said that "whilst utterly unconvincing" that there was "something unwholesomely satisfying about it all". The single was summarised as, "unnervingly gratifying mundane schlop". Pitchfork Media described the keyboard as being "set to a perky, almost piping tone, the kind of sunny sound you'd hear in old west-African pop". Drowned in Sound decried the branding of the band as "afro-pop" and said the single was "far from the 'afro-pop' hyperbole."