Chippendale and the Eighteenth Century in England.

The classification of furniture in England is on a different basis from that of France, as the rulers of England were not such patrons of art as were the French kings. Flemish, Dutch and French influences all helped to form the taste of the people. The Jacobean period lasted from the time of James I to the time of William and Mary. William brought with him from Holland the strong Dutch feeling that had a tremendous influence on the history of English furniture, and during Anne's short reign the Dutch feeling still lasted.

It was not until the early years of the reign of George II that the Georgian period came into its own with Chippendale at its head. Some authorities include William and Mary and Queen Anne in the Georgian period, but the more usual idea is to divide it into several parts, better known as the times of Chippendale, Adam, Hepplewhite and Sheraton. French influence is marked throughout and is divided into parts. The period of Chippendale was contemporaneous with that of Louis XV, and the second part included the other three men and corresponded with the last years of Louis XV, when the transition to Louis XVI was beginning, and the time of Louis XVI.

It was not until the latter part of Chippendale's life that he gave up his love of rococo curves and scrolls, dripping water effects, and his Chinese and Gothic styles. His early chairs had a Dutch feeling, and it is often only by ornamentation that one can date them.

The top of the Dutch chair had a flowing curve, the splat was first solid and plain, then carved, and later pierced in geometrical designs; then came the curves that were used so much by Chippendale. The carving consisted of swags and pendants of fruit and flowers, shells, acanthus leaves, scrolls, eagle's heads, carved in relief on the surface.

Dutch chairs were usually of walnut and some of the late ones were of mahogany. Mahogany was not used to any extent before 1720, but at that time it began to be imported in large quantities, and its lightness and the ease with which it could be worked made it appropriate for the lighter style of furniture then coming into vogue.

Chippendale began to make chairs with the curved top that is so characteristic of his work. The splat back was always used, in spite of the French, and its treatment is one of the most interesting things in the history of English furniture. It gave scope for great originality. Although, as I have said before, foreign influence was strong, the ideas were adapted and worked out by the great cabinet-makers of the Georgian period with a vigor and beauty that made a distinct English style, and often went far, far ahead of the originals.

There were, so far as we know, three Thomas Chippendales: the second was the great one. He was born in Worcester, England, about 1710, and died in 1779. He and his father, who was also a carver, came to London before 1727. Very little is known about his life, but we may feel sure he was that rare combination: a man of genius with decided business ability. He not only designed the furniture which was made in his shop, but executed a large part of it also, and superintended all the work done there by others. That he was a man of originality shows distinctly through his work, for although he adapted and copied freely and was strongly influenced by the Dutch, French, and "Chinese taste," there is always his own distinctive touch. The furniture of his best period, and those belonging to his school, has great beauty of line and proportion, and the exquisite carving shows a true feeling for ornament in relation to plain surfaces. There are a few examples in existence of carving in almost as high relief as that of Grinling Gibbons, swags, etc., and in his most rococo period his carving was very elaborate. It always had great clearness of edge and cut, and a wonderful feeling for light and shade. In what is called "Irish Chippendale," which was furniture made in Ireland after the style of Chippendale, the carving was in low relief and the edges fairly smoothed off, which made it much less interesting.

Chippendale looked upon his work as one of the arts and placed his ideal of achievement very high, and that he received the recognition of the best people of the time as an artist of merit is proved by his election to the Society of Arts with such men as Sir Joshua Reynolds, Horace Walpole, Samuel Johnson, David Garrick, and others.

The genius of Chippendale justly puts him in the front rank of cabinet-makers and his influence was the foundation of much of the fine work done by many others during the eighteenth century. He is often criticized for his excessive rococo taste as displayed in the plates of the "Gentleman's and Cabinet-maker's Director," and in some of his finished work. Many of the designs in the "Director" were probably never carried out, and some of them were probably added to by the soaring imaginations of the engraver. This is true of all the books published by the great cabinet-makers, and it always seems more fair to have their reputations rest on their finished work which has come down to us.



Chippendale, of course, must bear the chief part of the charge of over-elaboration, and he frankly says that he thinks "much enrichment is necessary." He copied Meissonier's designs and had a great love for gilding, but the display of rococo taste is not in all his work by any means, nor was it so excessive as that of the French. The more self-restrained temperament of the Anglo-Saxon race makes a deal of difference. He early used the ogee curve and cabriole leg, the knees of which he carved with cartouches and leaves or other designs. The front rail of the chair also was often carved. There were several styles of curved leg, the cabriole leg of Dutch influence, and the curved style of Louis XV. There were also several variations on the claw and ball foot. Many Chippendale chairs were without stretchers, but the straight legged style usually had four. The seats were sometimes in a box frame or rebate, and sometimes the covering was drawn over the frame and fastened with brass headed nails. Chippendale in the "Director" speaks of red morocco, Spanish leather, damask, tapestry and other needlework as being appropriate for the covering of his chairs.



In about 1760 or 1765 he began to use the straight leg for his chairs. The different shapes of splats will often help in deciding the dates of their making, and its development is of great interest. The curves shown in the diagram on page 84 are the merest suggestions of the outline of the splat, and they were carved most beautifully in many different designs. Ribbon-back chairs are dated about 1755 and show the adapted French influence. His Gothic and Chinese designs were made about 1760-1770. Ladder-back chairs nearly always had straight legs, either plain or with double ogee curve and bead moldings, but there are a few examples of ladder-back and cabriole legs combined, although these are very rare. The chair settees of the Dutch time, with backs having the appearance of chairs side by side, were also made by Chippendale. "Love seats" were small settees. It was naively said that "they were too large for one and too small for two." A large armchair that shows a decided difference in the manners of the early eighteenth century and the present day was called the "drunkard's chair."



When the craze for "Indian work" was at its height, there were many pieces of old oak and walnut furniture covered with lacquer to bring it up to the fashionable standard, but their forms were not suitable, and oak especially, with its coarse grain did not lend itself to the process. The stands for lacquer cabinets vary in style, but were often gilded in late Louis XIV and Louis XV style. The difference between true lacquer and its imitations is hard to explain. The true was made by repeated coats of a special varnish, each rubbed down and allowed to become hard before the next was put on. This gave a hard, cool, smooth surface with no stickiness. Modern work, done with paint and French varnish, has not this delightful feeling, but is nearly always clammy to the touch, and the colors are hurt by the process of polishing. Chippendale did not use much lacquer, but in the "Director" he often says such and such designs would be suitable for it.

Much of the furniture that Chippendale made was heavy, but the best of it had much beauty. His delicate fretwork tea-tables are a delight, with their fretwork cupboards and carving. He seemed to combine many sides in his artistic temperament, a fact that many people lay to his power of assimilating the work of others. He did not make sideboards in our sense of the word. His were large side-tables, sometimes with a drawer for silver and sometimes not. Pier-tables were very much like them in shape, but smaller, and were often gilded to match the mirrors which were placed above them.

The larger pieces of Chippendale furniture have the same characteristic of perfect workmanship and detail which the chairs possess. Dining-tables were made in sections consisting of two semi-circular ends and two center pieces with flaps which could all be joined together and make a very large table. The beds he made had four posts and cornice tops elaborately carved and often gilded, with a strong Louis XV feeling. The curtains hung from the inside of the cornice. He also made many other styles of beds, such as canopy beds, tent beds, flat tester beds, Chinese beds, Gothic beds: there was almost nothing he did not make for the house from wall brackets to the largest wardrobes.

To many people used to the simple Chippendale furniture which is commonly seen, the idea of rich and beautiful carving and gilding comes as a surprise, and even in the "Director" there are no plates which show his most beautiful work. His elaborate furniture was naturally chiefly order work, and so was not pictured, and much of it that is left is still in the possession of the descendants of the original owners. The small number of authentic pieces which have reached public sales have been eagerly snapped up by private collectors and museums at large prices.



In America much of the furniture called Chippendale was not made by Chippendale himself, but was made after his designs and copied from imported pieces by clever cabinet-makers here in the, then, colonies. The average American of the eighteenth century was a simple and not over rich person of good breeding and refined taste who appreciated the fact that the elaborate furniture of England and France would not be in keeping with life in America, and so either imported the simpler kinds, or demanded that the home cabinet-maker choose good models for his work. This partly explains why we have so much really good Colonial furniture, and not so much of the elaborately carved and gilded variety.



Robert Adam

Robert Adam was the second of the four sons of William Adam, and was born in 1728. The Adam family was Scotch of good social position. Robert early showed a talent for drawing. He was ambitious, and, as old Roman architecture interested him above all other subjects, he decided that he could attain his ideals only by study and travel in Italy. He returned to England in 1758 after four years of hard work with the results of his labors, the chief treasure being his careful drawings of Diocletian's villa. His classical taste was firmly established, and was to be one of the important influences of the eighteenth century.

Robert and James Adam went into partnership and became the most noted architects of their day in England. The list of their buildings is long and interesting, and much of their architectural and decorative work is still in existence.

To many people it will seem like putting the cart before the horse to say that Robert Adam had in any way influenced the style we call Louis XVI, but it is a plausible theory and certainly an interesting one. Mr. G. Owen Wheeler in his interesting book on "Old English Furniture" makes a strong case in favor of the Adam Brothers. Classical taste was well established in England by 1765, before the transition from Louis XV to Louis XVI began, and Robert Adam published his book in parallel columns of French and English, which shows it must have been in some demand in France. The great influence of the excavations at Pompeii must naturally not be underestimated, as it was far reaching, but with the beautiful Adam style well developed, just across the Channel, it seems probable that it may have had its share in forming French taste. The foundation being there, the French put their characteristic touch to it and developed a much richer style than that of the Adam Brothers, but the two have so much in common that Louis XVI furniture may be put into an Adam room with perfect fitness, and vice versa. As the Adams cared only to design furniture some one else had to carry out the designs, and Chippendale was master carver and cabinet-maker under them at Harewood House, Yorkshire, and probably was also in many other instances.



The early furniture of Adam was plain, and the walls were treated with much decoration that was classic in feeling. He possessed the secret of a composition of which his exquisite decorations on walls and ceilings were made. After 1770 he simplified his walls and elaborated his furniture designs until they met in a beautiful and graceful harmony. He designed furniture to suit the room it was in, and with the dainty and charming coloring, the beauty of proportion and the charm of the wall decoration, the scheme had great beauty.



He used the ram's head, wreaths, honeysuckle, mythological subjects, lozenge-shaped, oval and octagonal panels, and many other designs. He was one of the first to use the French idea of decorating furniture with painting and porcelain plaques, and the furniture itself was simple and beautiful in line. The stucco ceilings designed by the brothers were picked out with delicate colors and have much beauty of line.

A great deal of the most beautiful Adam decoration was the painting on walls and ceilings and furniture by Angelica Kaufmann, Zucchi, Pergolesi, Cipriani, and Columbani. The standard of work was so high that only the best was satisfactory.

Adam usually designed his furniture for the room in which it was to stand, and he often planned the house and all its contents, even to the table silver, to say nothing of the door-locks. The chairs were of mahogany, or painted, or gilded, wood. Some had oval upholstered backs, with the covering specially designed for the room, and some had lyre backs, later used so much by Sheraton, and others had small painted panels placed in the top rail, with beautiful carving. Mirrors were among the most charming articles designed by Adam, and had composition wreaths and cupids and medallions for ornament. They were usually made in pairs in both large and small sizes. A pair of antique mirrors should be kept together, as they are very much more valuable than when separated.

Adam was one of the first to assemble the pieces that later grew into the sideboard—a table, two pedestals, and a cellaret. There is a sideboard designed by him for Gillows, in which the parts are connected, and it is at least one of the ancestors of the beautiful Shearer and Hepplewhite ones and our modern useful, though not always beautiful, article. When, late in his career, Adam attempted to copy the French, he was not so successful, as he did not have their flexibility of temperament, and was unable to give the warmer touch to the classic, which they did so well. His paneled walls, however, have great dignity and purity of line and feeling, and the applied ornament was really an ornament, and not a disfigurement as too often happens in our day. With Adam one feels the surety of knowledge and the refinement of good taste led by a high ideal.



Hepplewhite

The work of Hepplewhite and his school lasted from about 1760 to 1795; the last nine years of the time the business was carried on by his widow, Alice, under the name of A. Hepplewhite & Co. For five years after that some work was done after his manner, but it was distinctly inferior. In the early seventies Hepplewhite's work was so well known and so much admired that its influence was shown in the work of his contemporaries. There was a great difference between his style and that of Chippendale, his being much lighter in construction and effect, besides the many differences of design. Hepplewhite was strongly influenced by the French style of Louis XVI, and also the pure taste of Robert Adam at its height. Hepplewhite, however, like all the great cabinet-makers, both French and English, was a great genius himself and stamped the impress of his own personality upon his work.

Many people date Hepplewhite's fame from the time of the publication of his book, "The Cabinet Maker and Upholsterer's Guide," in 1788, not realizing that he had been dead for two years when it appeared. Its publication was justified by the well established popularity of his furniture and the success with which his designs were carried out by A. Hepplewhite & Co.

It is interesting to notice the difference in the size of chairs which became apparent during Hepplewhite's time. Hoop-skirts and stiffened coats went out of fashion, and with them went the need of large chair seats. The transition chairs made by Hepplewhite were not very attractive in proportion, as the backs were too low for the width. The transition from Chippendale to Hepplewhite was not sudden, as the last style of Chippendale was simpler and had more of the classic feeling in it. Hepplewhite says, in the preface to his book: "To unite elegance and utility, and blend the useful with the agreeable, has ever been considered a difficult, but an honorable task." He sometimes failed and sometimes succeeded. His knowledge of construction enabled him to make his chairs with shield, oval, and heart-shaped backs. The tops were slightly curved, also the tops of the splats, and at the lower edge where the back and the splat join, a half rosette was carved. He often used the three feathers of the Prince of Wales, sheaves of wheat, anthemion, urns, and festoons of drapery, all beautifully carved, and forming the splat. The backs of his chairs were supported at the sides by uprights running into the shield-shaped back and did not touch the seat frame in any other way. With this apparent weakness of construction it is wonderful how many of his chairs have come down to us in perfect condition, but it was his knowledge of combining lightness with strength which made it possible.

Hepplewhite used straight or tapering legs with spade feet for his furniture, often inlaid with bellflowers in satinwood. The legs were sometimes carved with a double ogee curve and bead molding. He did not use carving in the lavish manner of Chippendale, but it was always beautifully done, and he used a great deal of inlay of satinwood, etc., oval panels, lines, urns, and many other motives common to the other cabinet-makers of the day, and also painted some of his furniture. His Japan work was inferior in every way to that of the early part of the eighteenth century. The upholstery was fastened to the chairs with brass-headed tacks, often in a festoon pattern. Oval-shaped brass handles were used on his bureaus, desks, and other furniture. He made many sideboards, some, in fact, going back to the side table and pedestal idea, and bottle-cases and knife-boxes were put on the ends of the sideboards. His regular sideboards were founded on Shearer's design.

Shearer's furniture was simple and dainty in design, and he has the honor of making the first real serpentine sideboard, about 1780, which was not a more or less disconnected collection of tables and pedestals. It was the forerunner of the Hepplewhite and Sheraton sideboards that we know so well. Shearer is now hardly known even by name to the general world, but without doubt his ideal of lightness and strength in construction had a good deal of influence on his contemporaries and followers.

Hepplewhite was very fond of oval and semi-circular shapes, and many of his tables are made in either one way or the other. His sideboards, founded on Shearer's designs, are very elegant, as he liked to say, in their simplicity of line, their inlay, and their general beauty of wood. He was most successful in his chairs, sideboards, tables, and small household articles, for his larger pieces of furniture were often too heavy. Some of the worst, however, were made by other cabinet-makers after his designs, and not by Hepplewhite himself.



Sheraton

Thomas Sheraton was born in 1750, and was a journeyman cabinet-maker when he went to London. His great genius for furniture design was combined with a love of writing tracts and sermons. Unfortunately for his success in life, he had a most disagreeable personality, being conceited, jealous, and perfectly willing to pour scorn on his brother cabinet-makers. This impression he quite frankly gives about himself in his books. The name of Robert Adam is not mentioned, and this seems particularly unpleasant when one thinks of the latter's undoubted influence on Sheraton's work. Sheraton's unfortunate disposition probably helped to make his life a failure.

It is very sad to see such possibilities as his not reaping their true reward, for poverty dogged his steps all through life, and he was always struggling for a bare livelihood. His books were not financially successful, and at last he gave up his workshop and ceased to make the furniture he designed. He was an expert draughtsman and his designs were carried out by the skillful cabinet-makers of the day. Adam Black gives a very pitiful account of the poverty in which Sheraton lived, and says: "That by attempting to do everything he does nothing." His "nothing," however, has proved a very big something in the years which have followed, for Sheraton is responsible for one of the most beautiful types of furniture the world has known, and although his life was hard and bitter, his fame is great.

Sheraton took the style of Louis XVI as his standard, and some of his best work is quite equal to that of the French workmen. He felt the lack of the exquisite brass and ormolu work done in France, and said if it were only possible to get as fine in England, the superior cabinet-making of the English would put them far ahead in the ranks. To many of us this loss is not so great, for the beauty of the wood counts for more, and is not detracted from by an oversupply of metal ornament, as sometimes happened in France. "Enough is as good as a feast." Sheraton, at his best, had beauty, grace, and refinement of line without weakness, lightness and yet perfect construction, combined with balance, and the ornament just sufficient to enhance the beauty of the article without overpowering it. It is this fine work which the world remembers and which gave him his fame, and so it is far better to forget his later period when nearly all trace of his former greatness was lost.



Sheraton profited by the work of Chippendale, Adam, and Hepplewhite, for these great men blazed the trail for him, so to speak, in raising the art of cabinet-making to so high a plane that England was full of skilled workmen. The influence of Adam, Shearer, and Hepplewhite, was very great on his work, and it is often difficult to tell whether he or Hepplewhite or Shearer made some pieces. He evidently did not have business ability and his bitter nature hampered him at every turn. The Sheraton school lasted from about 1790 to 1806. He died in 1806, fairly worn out with his struggle for existence. Poor Sheraton, it certainly is a pitiful story.



Sheraton's chair backs are rectangular in type, with urn splats, and splats divided into seven radiates, and also many other designs. The chairs were made of mahogany and satinwood, some carved, some inlaid, and some painted. The splat never ran into the seat, but was supported on a cross rail running from side to side a few inches above the seat. The material used for upholstery was nailed over the frame with brass-headed tacks.

Bookcases were of mahogany and satinwood veneer, and the large ones were often in three sections, the center section standing farther out than the two sides. The glass was covered with a graceful design in moldings, and the pediments were of various shapes, the swan-neck being a favorite.

Sideboards were built on very much the lines of those made by Shearer and Hepplewhite. There were drawers and cupboards for various uses. The knife-boxes to put on the top came in sets of two, and sometimes there was a third box. The legs were light and tapering with inlay of satinwood, and sometimes they were reeded. There was inlay also on the doors and drawers. There were also sideboards without inlay. The legs for his furniture were at first plain, and then tapering and reeded. He used some carving, and a great deal of satinwood and tulip-wood were inlaid in the mahogany; he also used rosewood. The bellflower, urn, festoons, and acanthus were all favorites of his for decoration.

He made some elaborate and startling designs for beds, but the best known ones are charming with slender turned posts or reeded posts, and often the plain ones were made of painted satinwood.

The satinwood from the East Indies was fine and of a beautiful yellow color, while that from the West Indies was coarser in grain and darker in color. It is a slow growing tree, and that used nowadays cannot compare with the old, in spite of the gallant efforts of the hard working fakirs to copy its beautiful golden tone.

All the cabinet-makers of the eighteenth century made ingenious contrivances in the way of furniture, washstands concealed in what appear to be corner cupboards, a table that looks as simple as a table possibly can, but has a small step-ladder and book rest hidden away in its useful inside, and many others. Sheraton was especially clever in making these conveniences, as these two examples show, and his books have many others pictured in them. Sheraton's list of articles of furniture is long, for he made almost everything from knife-boxes to "chamber-horses," which were contrivances of a saddle and springs for people to take exercise upon at home.

Sheraton's "Drawing Book" was the best of those he published. It was sold chiefly to other cabinet-makers and did not bring in many orders, as Chippendale's and Hepplewhite's did. His other books showed his decline, and his "Encyclopedia," on which he was working at the time of his death, had many subjects in it beside furniture and cabinet-making. His sideboards, card-tables, sewing-tables, tables of every kind, chairs—in fact, everything he made during his best period—have a sureness and beauty of line that makes it doubly sad that through the stress of circumstances he should have deserted it for the style of the Empire that was then the fashion in France. One or two of his Empire designs have beauty, but most of them are too dreadful, but it was the beginning of the end, and the eighteenth century saw the beautiful principles of the eighteenth century lost in a bog of ugliness.

There were many other cabinet-makers of merit that space does not allow me to mention, but the great four who stood head and shoulders above them all were Chippendale, Adam, Hepplewhite and Sheraton. They, being human, did much work that is best forgotten, but the heights to which they all rose have set a standard for English furniture in beauty and construction that it would be well to keep in mind.

The nineteenth century passed away without any especial genius, and in fact, with a very black mark against its name in the hideous early Victorian era. The twentieth century is moving along without anything we can really call a beautiful and worthy style being born. There are many working their way towards it, but there is apt to be too much of the bizarre in the attempts to make them satisfactory, and so we turn to the past for our models and are thankful for the legacy of beauty it has left to the world.



A General Talk

When one faces the momentous question of furnishing a house, there are numerous things which must be looked into and thoroughly understood if success is to be assured. If one is building in the country the first question is the placing of the house in regard to the view, but in town there is not much choice. The architect being chosen with due regard to the style of house one wishes, the planning can go merrily on. The architect should be told if there are any especially large and beautiful pieces of furniture or tapestry to be planned for, so they shall receive their rightful setting. After all, architects are but human, and cannot tell by intuition what furniture is in storage.

It is sad to see how often architecture and decoration are looked upon as two entirely disconnected subjects, instead of being closely allied, playing into each other's hands, as it were, to make a perfect whole. To many people, a room is simply a room to be treated as they wish; whereas many rooms are absolute laws unto themselves, and demand a certain kind of treatment, or disaster follows. In America this kind of house is not found so often as in Europe, but the number is growing rapidly as architects and their clients realize more and more the beauties and possibilities of the great periods as applied to the modern house. It is only to the well-trained architect and decorator with correct taste that one may safely turn, for the ill-trained and commonplace still continue to make their astounding errors, and so to have the decoration of a room truly successful one must begin with the architect, for he knows the correct proportions of the different styles and appreciates their importance. He will plan the rooms so that they, when decorated, may complete his work and form a beautiful and convincing whole. This will give the restfulness and beauty that absolute appropriateness always lends.



This matter of appropriateness must not be overlooked, and the whole house should express the spirit of the owner; it should be in absolute keeping with his circumstances. There are few houses which naturally demand the treatment of palaces, but there are many which correspond with the smaller chateaux of France and the manor-houses of England. It is to these we must turn for our inspiration, for they have the beauty of good taste and high standards without the lavishness of royalty; but even royalty did not always live in rooms of state, for at Versailles, and Petit Trianon, there is much simple exquisite furniture. The wonderful and elaborate furniture of the past must be studied of course, but to the majority of people, then as now, the simpler expression of its fundamental lines of beauty are more satisfactory. The trouble with many houses is that their furnishings are copied from too grand models, and the effect in an average modern house is unsuitable in every way. They cannot give the large vistas and appropriate background in color and proportion which are necessary. Beauty does not depend upon magnificence.



If one has to live in a house planned and built by others one often has to give up some long cherished scheme and adopt something else more suited to the surroundings. For instance, the rooms of the great French periods were high, and often the modern house has very low ceilings, that would not allow space for the cornice, over-doors and correctly proportioned paneling, that are marked features of those times. Mrs. Wharton has aptly said: "Proportion is the good breeding of architecture," and one might add that proportion is good breeding itself. One little slip from the narrow path into false proportion in line or color or mass and the perfection of effect is gone.

Proportion is another word for the fitness of things, and that little phrase, "the fitness of things," is what Alice in Wonderland calls a "portmanteau" phrase, for it holds so much, and one must feel it strongly to escape the pitfalls of period furnishing. Most amazing things are done with perfect complacency, but although the French and English kings who gave their names to the various periods were far from models of virtue, they certainly deserved no such cruel punishment as to have some of the modern rooms, such as we have all seen, called after them.

The best decorators refuse to mix styles in one room and they thus save people from many mistakes, but a decorator without a thorough understanding of the subject, often leads one to disaster. A case in point is an apartment where a small Louis XV room opens on a narrow hall of nondescript modern style, with a wide archway opening into a Mission dining-room. As one sits in the midst of pink brocade and gilding and looks across to the dining-room, fitted out in all the heavy paraphernalia of Mission furniture, one's head fairly reels. No contrast could be more marked or more unsuitable, and yet this is by no means an uncommon case.

If one intends to adopt a style in decorating one's house, there should be a uniformity of treatment in all connecting rooms, and there must be harmony in the furniture and architecture and ornament, as well as harmony in the color scheme. The foundation must be right before the decoration is added. The proportion of doors and windows, for instance, is very important, with the decorated over-door reaching to the ceiling. The over-doors and mantels were architectural features of the rooms, and it was not until wallpapers came into common use, in the early part of the nineteenth century, that these decorative features slowly died out.

The mantel and fireplace should be a center of interest and should be balanced with something of importance on the other side of the room, either architectural or decorative. It was this regard for symmetry, balance, proportion, and harmony, which made the old rooms so satisfying; there was no magic about it, it was artistic common sense.

The use for which a room is intended must be kept in view and carried out with real understanding of its needs. The individuality of the owner is of course a factor. Unfortunately the word individuality is often confounded with eccentricity and to many people it means putting perfectly worthy and unassuming articles to startling uses. By individuality one should really mean the best expression of one's sense of beauty and the fitness of things, and when it is guided by the laws of harmony and proportion the result is usually one of great charm, convenience, and comfort. These qualities must be in every successful house.

In furnishing any house, whether in some special period or not, there are certain things which must be taken into account. One of these is the general color scheme. Arranging a color scheme for a house is not such a difficult matter as many people suppose, nor is it the simple thing that many others seem to think. There is a happy land between the two extremes, and the guide posts pointing to it are a good color sense, a true feeling for the proportion and harmony of color, and an understanding of the laws of light. The trouble is that people often do not use their eyes; red is red to them, blue is blue, and green is green. They have never appeared to notice that there are dozens of tones in these colors. Nature is one of the greatest teachers of color harmony if we would but learn from her. Look at a salt marsh on an autumn day and notice the wonderful browns and yellows and golds in it, the reds and russets and touches of green in the woods on its edge, and the clear blue sky over all with the reflections in the little pools. It is a picture of such splendor of color that one fairly gasps. Then look at the same marsh under gray skies and see the change; there is just as much beauty as before, the same russets and golds and reds, but exquisitely softened. One is sparkling, gay, a harmony of brilliancy; the other is more gentle, sweet and appealing, a harmony of softened glory.

Again, Nature makes a thousand and one shades of green leaves to harmonize with her flowers; the yellow green of the golden rod, the silver green of the milkweed, the bright green of the nasturtium. Notice the woods in wintertime with the wonderful purple browns and grays of the tree trunks and branches, the bronze and russet of the dead leaves, and the deep shadows in the snow. Everywhere one turns there are lessons to learn if one will only use seeing eyes and a thinking mind.

A house should be looked at as a whole, not as so many units to be treated in a care-free manner. A room is affected by all the rooms opening from it, as they, in turn, are affected by it. There can be variety of color with harmony of contrast, or there can be the same color used throughout, with the variety gained by the use of its different tones. The plan of each floor should be carefully studied to get the vistas in all directions so that harmony may reign and there will be no danger of a clashing color discord when a door is opened. The connecting rooms need not be all in one color, of course, but they should form a perfect color harmony one with another, with deft touches of contrast to accent and bring out the beauty of the whole scheme: This matter of harmony in contrast is an important one. The idea of using a predominant color is a restful one, and adds dignity and apparent size to a house. The walls, for instance, could be paneled in white enameled wood, or plaster, and the necessary color and variety could be supplied by the rugs, hangings, furniture, and pictures.

Another charming plan is to have different tones of one color used—a scheme running from cream or old ivory through soft yellow and tan to a russet brown would be lovely, especially if the house did not have an over supply of light. Greens may be used with discretion, and a cool and attractive scheme is from white to soft blue through gray. If different colors are to be used in the different rooms the number of combinations is almost unlimited, but there must always be the restraining influence of a good color sense in forming the scheme or the result will be disappointing, to say the least.

A very important matter in the use of color is in its relation to the amount and quality of the light. Dreary rooms can be made cheerful, and too bright and dazzling rooms can be softened in effect, by the skillful use of color. The warm colors,—cream white, yellows—but not lemon yellow—orange, warm tans, russet, pinks, yellow greens, yellowish reds are to be used on the north or shady side of the house. The cool colors,—white, cream white, blues, grays, greens, and violet, are for the sunny side. Endless combinations may be made of these colors, and if a gray room, for example, is wished on the north side of the house, it can be used by first choosing a warm tone of gray and combining with it one of the warm colors, such as certain shades of soft pink or yellow. We can stand more brilliancy of color out-of-doors than we can in the house, where it is shut in with us. It is too exciting and we become restless and nervous. No matter on what scale a house is furnished one of its aims should be to be restful.

There is one great mistake which many people make of thinking of red as a cheerful color, and one which is good to use in a dark room. The average red used in large quantities absorbs the light in a most disheartening manner, making a room seem smaller than it really is; it makes ugly gloomy shadows in the corners, for at night it seems to turn to a dingy black, and increases the electric light bill. Red is also a severe strain on the eyes, and many a red living-room is the cause of seemingly unaccountable headaches. I do not mean to say that red should never be used, for it is often a very necessary color, but it must be used with the greatest discretion, and one must remember that a little of it goes a long way. A room, for instance, paneled with oak, with an oriental rug with soft red in it, red hangings, and a touch of red in an old stained glass panel in the window, and red velvet cushions on the window seat, would have much more warmth and charm than if the walls were covered entirely with red. One red cushion is often enough to give the required note. The effect of color is very strong upon people, although a great many do not realize it, but nearly everyone will remember a sudden and apparently unexplained change of mood in going into some room. One can learn a deal by analyzing one's own sensations. Figured wall-papers should also be chosen with the greatest care for this same reason. Papers which have perpetual motion in their design, or eyes which seem to peer, or an unstable pattern of gold running over it, must all be ignored. People who choose this kind of paper are blest, or cursed, whichever way one looks at it, by an utter lack of imagination.

A room is divided into three parts, the floor, the walls, and the ceiling, and the color of the room naturally follows the law of nature; the heaviest or darkest at the bottom, or floor; the medium tone in the center, or walls; and the lightest at the top, or ceiling. It is only when one has to artificially correct the architectural proportions of a room that the ceiling should be as dark, or darker, than the walls. A ceiling can also be seemingly lowered by bringing the ceiling color down on the side walls. A low room should never have a dark ceiling, as it makes the room seem lower.

Walls should be treated as a background or as a decoration in themselves. In the latter case any pictures should be set in specially arranged panels and should be pictures of importance, or fresco painting. The walls of the great periods were of this decorative order. They were treated architecturally and the feeling of absolute support which they gave was most satisfactory. The pilasters ran from base or dado to the cornice and the over-doors made the doors a dignified part of the scheme, rather than mere useful holes in the wall as they too often are nowadays.

Paneling is one of the most beautiful methods of wall decoration. There are many styles of paneling, stone, marble, stucco, plaster, and wood, and each period has its own distinctive way of using them, and should be the correct type for the style chosen. The paneling of a Tudor room is quite different from a Louis XVI room. In the course of a long period like that of Louis XV the paneling slowly changed its character and the rococo style was followed by the more dignified one that later became the style of Louis XVI.

Tapestry and paintings of importance should have panels especially planned for them. If one does not wish to have the paneling cover the entire wall, a wainscot or dado with the wall above it covered with tapestry, silk, painting, or paper, will make a beautiful and appropriate room for many of the different styles of furniture. A wainscot should not be too high; about thirty-six inches is a good height, but should form a background for the chairs, sofas, and tables, placed around the room.

A wainscot six or more feet high is not as architecturally correct as a lower one, because a wall is, in a way, like an order in its divisions, and if the base, or wainscot, is too high it does not allow the wall, which corresponds to the column, to have its fair proportion. This feeling is very strong in many apartment houses where small rooms are overburdened by this kind of wainscot, and to make matters worse, the top is used as a plate-rail. A high wainscot should be used only in a large room, and if there are pilasters arranged to connect it with the cornice, and the wall covering is put on in panel effect between, the result is much better than if the wall were left plain, as it seems to give more of a raison d'etre.

Tapestry is another of the beautiful and important wall coverings, and the happy possessor of Flemish or Gobelin, or Beauvais, tapestries, is indeed to be envied. A rare old tapestry should be paneled or hung so it will serve as a background. Used as portieres, tapestry does not show the full beauty of its wonderful time-worn colors and its fascination of texture. It is not everyone, however, who is able to own these almost priceless treasures of the past, and so modern machinery has been called to the aid of those who wish to cover their walls and furniture with tapestry. Many of these modern manufactures are really beautiful, thick in texture, soft in color, and often have the little imperfections and unevennesses of hand weaving reproduced, so that we feel the charm of the old in the new. Many do not realize that in New York there are looms making wonderful hand-woven tapestries with the true decorative feeling of the best days of the past. On the top floor of a large modern building stand the looms of various sizes, the dyeing tubs, the dripping skeins of wool and silk, the spindles and bobbins, and the weavers hard at work carrying out the beautiful designs of the artist owner. There are few colors used, as in mediaeval days, but wonderful effects are produced by a method of winding the threads together which gives a vibrating quality to the color. When the warp in some of the coarser fabrics is not entirely covered it is sometimes dyed, which gives an indescribable charm. Tapestries of all sizes have been made on these looms, from the important decoration of a great hall, to sofa and chair coverings. Special rugs are also made. It is a pleasure to think that an art which many considered dead is being practiced with the highest artistic aim and knowledge and skill in the midst of our modern rush. This hand-woven tapestry is made to fit special spaces and rooms, and there is nothing more beautiful and suitable for rooms of importance to be found in all the long list of possibilities.

The effect of modern tapestry, like the old, is enhanced if the walls are planned to receive it, for it was never intended to be used as wall-paper. It is sometimes used as a free hanging frieze, so to speak, and sometimes a great piece of it is hung flat against the wall, but as a general thing to panel it is the better way.

Another beautiful wall covering is leather. It should be used much more than it is, and is especially well adapted for halls, libraries, dining-rooms, smoking-and billiard-rooms, and dens. Its wonderful possibilities for rooms which are to be furnished in a dignified and beautiful manner are unsurpassed. It may be used in connection with paneling or cover the wall above a wainscot.

Fresco painting is another of the noble army of wall treatments which lends itself beautifully to all kinds and styles of rooms.

Amidst all the grandeur of tapestry and painting one must not lose sight of the simpler methods, for they are not to be distained. Wall-papers are growing more and more beautiful in color, design, and texture, and one can find among them papers suited to all needs. Fabrics of all kinds have become possibilities since their dust-collecting capacity is now no longer a source of terror, as vacuum cleaners are one of the commonplaces of existence. Painting or tinting the walls, when done correctly, is very satisfactory in many rooms.

There is no doubt that in many houses are wonderful collections of furniture, tapestries and treasures of many kinds, that are placed without regard to the absolute harmony of period, although the general feeling of French or Italian or English is kept. They are usually great houses where the sense of space keeps one from feeling discrepancies that would be too marked in a smaller one, and the interest and beauty of the rare originals against the old tapestries have an atmosphere all their own that no modern reproduction can have. There are few of us, however, who can live in this semi-museum kind of house, and so one would better stick to the highway of good usage, or there is danger of making the house look like an antique shop.



To carry out a style perfectly, all the small details should be attended to—the door-locks, the framework of the doors and windows, the carving. All these must be taken into account if one wishes success. It is better not to attempt a style throughout if it is to be a makeshift affair and show the effects of inadequate knowledge. The elaborate side of any style carried out to the last detail is really only possible and also only appropriate for those who have houses to correspond, but one can choose the simpler side and have beautiful and charming rooms that are perfectly suited to the average home. For instance, if one does not wish elaborate gilded Louis XVI furniture, upholstered in brocade, one can choose beautiful cane furniture of the time and have it either in the natural French walnut or enameled a soft gray or white to match the woodwork, with cushion of cretonne or silk in an appropriate design. Period furnishing does not necessarily mean a greater outlay than the nondescript and miscellaneous method so often seen.



Whatever the plan for furnishing a house may be, the balance of decoration must be kept; the same general feeling throughout all connecting parts. If a drawing-room is too fine for the hall through which one has to pass to reach it, the balance is upset. If too simple chairs are used in a grand dining-room the balance is upset, the fitness of things is not observed. When the happy medium is struck throughout the house one feels the delightful well-bred charm which a regard for the unities always gives. It is not only in the quality of the decorations that this feeling of balance must be kept, but in the style also. If one chooses a period style for the drawing-room it is better to keep to it through the house, using it in its different expressions according to the needs of the different rooms. If one style throughout should seem a bit monotonous at least one nationality should be kept, such as French, or English. If several styles of French furniture are used do not have them in the same room; for instance, Louis XV and Empire have absolutely nothing in common, but very late Louis XVI and early Empire have to a certain extent. It does not give the average person a severe shock to walk from a Louis XVI hall into a Louis XV drawing-room, but the two mixed in one room do not give a pleasing effect. The oak furniture of Jacobean days does not harmonize with the delicate mahogany furniture of the eighteenth century in England. The delicate beauty of Adam furniture would be lost in the greatness of a Renaissance salon. A lady whose dining-room was furnished in Sheraton furniture one day saw two elaborate rococo Louis XV console tables which she instantly bought to add to it. The shopman luckily had more sense of the fitness of things than a mere desire to sell his wares, and was so appalled when he saw the room that he absolutely refused to have them placed in it. She saw the point, and learned a valuable lesson. One could go on indefinitely, giving examples to warn people against startling and inappropriate mixtures which put the whole scheme out of key.

I am taking it for granted that reproductions are to be chosen, as originals are not only very rare, but also almost prohibitive in price. Good reproductions are carefully made and finished to harmonize with the color scheme. The styles most used at present are, Louis XIV, XV, XVI, Jacobean, William and Mary, and Georgian. Gothic, Italian and French Renaissance, Louis XIII, and Tudor styles are not so commonly used. We naturally associate dignity and grandeur with the Renaissance, and it is rather difficult to make it seem appropriate for the average American house, so it is usually used only for important houses and buildings. Some of the Tudor manor houses can be copied with delightful effect. The styles of Henri II and Louis XIII can both be used in libraries and dining-rooms with most effective and dignified results.

The best period of the style of Louis XV is very beautiful and is delightfully suited to ball-rooms, small reception-rooms, boudoirs, and some bedrooms. In regard to these last, one must use discretion, for one would not expect one's aged grandmother to take real comfort in one. Nor does this style appeal to one for use in a library, as its gayety and curves would not harmonize with the necessarily straight lines of the bookcases and rows of books. Any one of the other styles may be chosen for a library.

The English developed the dining-room in our modern sense of the word, while the French used small ante-chambers, or rooms that were used for other purposes between meals, and I suppose this is partly the reason we so often turn to an English ideal for one. There are many beautiful dining-rooms done in the styles of Louis XV and XVI, but they seem more like gala rooms and are usually distinctly formal in treatment. Georgian furniture, or as we so often say, Colonial, is especially well suited to our American life, as one can have a very simple room, or one carried out in the most delightful detail. In either case the true feeling must be kept and no startling anachronisms should be allowed; radiators, for instance, should be hidden in window-seats. This same style may be used for any room in the house, and there are beautiful reproductions of Chippendale, Adam, Hepplewhite, and Sheraton furniture that are appropriate for any need.

In choosing new "old" furniture, do not buy any that has a bright and hideous finish. The great cabinet-makers and their followers used wax, or oil, and rubbed, rubbed, rubbed. This dull finish is imitated, but not equaled, by all good furniture makers, and the bright finish simply proclaims the cheap department store.

In parts of the country Georgian furniture has been used and served as a standard from the first, and it is a happy thing for the beauty of our homes that once more it has come into its own. It is the high grade of reproduction which has made it possible.

The mahogany used by Chippendale, and in fact by all the eighteenth century cabinet-makers, was much more beautiful than is possible to get to-day, for the logs were old and well seasoned wood, allowed to dry by the true process of time, which leaves a wonderful depth of color quite impossible to find in young kiln-dried wood. The best furniture makers nowadays, those who have a high standard and pride in their work, have by careful and artistic staining and beautiful finish, achieved very fine results, but the factory article with its dreadful "mahogany" stain, its coarse carving, and its brilliant finish, shows a sad difference in ideal. The best reproductions are well worth buying, and, as they are made with regard to the laws of construction, they stand a very good chance of becoming valued heirlooms. There are certain characteristics of all the eighteenth century cabinet-makers, both English and French, which are picked out and overdone by ill-informed manufacturers. The rococo of Chippendale is coarsened, his Chinese style loses its fine, if eccentric, distinction, and the inlay of Hepplewhite and Sheraton is another example of spoiling a beautiful thing. Thickening a line here and there, or curving a curve a bit more or less, or enlarging the amount of inlay, achieves a vulgarity of appearance quite different from the beautiful proportions of the originals, and it is this which one must guard against in buying reproductions. The lack of knowledge of correct proportion is not confined to the cheaper grades, where necessary simplicity is often a protection, but is apt to be found in all. The best makers, as I have said, take a pride in their work and one can rely on them for fine workmanship and being true to the spirit of the originals.

There is one matter of great importance to be kept in mind and practiced with the sternest self-control, and that is, to eliminate, eliminate, eliminate. Walk into the center of a room and look about with seeing, but impersonal eyes, and you will be astonished to find how many things there are which are unnecessary, in fact, how much the room would be improved without them. In every house the useless things which go under the generic name of "trash" accumulate with alarming swiftness, and one must be up with the lark to keep ahead of the supply. If something is ugly and spoils a room, and there is no hope of bringing it into harmony, discard it; turn your eyes aside if you must while the deed is being done, but screw your courage to the sticking point, and do it. She is, indeed, a lucky woman who can start from the beginning or has only beautiful heritages from the past, for the majority of people have some distressingly strong pieces of ugly furniture which, for one reason or another, must be kept. One sensible woman furnished a room with all her pieces of this kind, called it the Chamber of Horrors, and used it only under great stress and strain, which was much better than letting her house be spoiled.

A home should not be a museum, where one grows exhausted going from one room to another looking at wonderful things. Rather should it have as many beautiful things in it as can be done full justice to, where the feeling of simplicity and restfulness and charm adds to their beauty, and the whole is convincingly right. The fussy house is, luckily, a thing of the past, or fast getting to be so, but we should all help the good cause of true simplicity. It does not debar one from the most beautiful things in the world, but adds dignity and worth to them. It does not make rooms stiff and solemn, but makes it possible to have the true gayety and joy of life expressed in the best periods.



Georgian Furniture

A delightful renaissance of the Georgian period in house decoration is being felt more and more, and every day we see new evidence that people are turning with thanksgiving to the light and graceful designs of the eighteenth century English cabinet-makers. There is a charm and distinction about their work which appeals very strongly to us, and its beauty and simplicity of line makes delightful schemes possible.

The Georgian period seems especially fitted for use in our homes, for it was the inspiration of our Colonial houses and furniture, which we adapted and made our own in many ways. The best examples of Colonial architecture are found in the thirteen original states. In many of these houses we find an almost perfect sense of proportion, of harmony and balance, of dignity, and a spaciousness and sense of hospitality, which few of our modern houses achieve. The halls were broad and often went directly through the house, giving a glimpse of the garden beyond; the stairs with their carefully thought-out curve and sweep and well placed landings, gave at once an air of importance to the house, while the large rooms opening from the hall, with their white woodwork, their large fireplaces, and comfortable window-seats, confirmed the impression.

It is to this ideal of simple and beautiful elegance that many people are turning. By simplicity I do not mean poverty of line and decoration, but the simplicity given by the fundamental lines being simple and beautiful with decoration which enhances their charms, but does not overload them. Even the most elaborate Adam room with its exquisite painted furniture, its beautifully designed mantel and ceiling and paneled walls, gave the feeling of delightful and beautiful simplicity. This same feeling is expressed in the furniture of Louis XVI, for no matter how elaborate it may be, it is fundamentally simple, but with a warmer touch than is found in the English furniture of the same time.

The question of period furnishing has two sides, and by far the more delightful side is the one of having originals. There is a glamor about old furniture, a certain air of fragility, although in reality it is usually much stronger than most of our modern factory output, which adds to the charm. With furniture, as with people, breeding will out. When one has inherited the furniture, the charm is still greater, for it is pleasant to think of one's own ancestors as having used the chairs and tables, and danced the stately minuet, with soft candle-light falling from the candelabra, and the great logs burning on the old brass andirons. But if one cannot have one's own family traditions, the next best thing is to have furniture with some other family's traditions, and the third choice is to have the best modern reproductions, and build up one's own traditions oneself.

The feeling which many people have that Georgian furniture was stiff and uncomfortable is not borne out by the facts. The sofas were large and roomy, the settees delightful, the arm-chairs and wing chairs regular havens of rest, and when one adds the comfort which modern upholstery gives, there is little left to desire. Even the regulation side-chair of the period, which some think was the only chair in very common use, is absolutely comfortable for its purpose. Lounging was much less in vogue then than nowadays and the old cabinet-makers realized that one must be comfortable when sitting up as well as when taking one's ease. One must not be deterred by this unfounded bugaboo of discomfort if one wishes a room or house done after the great period styles of the eighteenth century. With care and knowledge, the result is sure to be delightful and beautiful.

This little book, as I have said before, is not intended to be a guide for collectors, for that is a very big subject in itself, but is meant to try to help a little about the modern side of the question. There are many grades of furniture made, and one should buy with circumspection, and the best grade which is possible for one to afford. The very best reproductions are made with as much care and knowledge and skill as the originals, and will last as long, and become treasured heirlooms like those handed down to us. They are works of art like their eighteenth century models. The wood is chosen with regard to its beauty of grain, and is treated and finished so the beauty and depth of color is brought out, and the surface is rubbed until there is a soft glow to it. If one could have the ages-old mahogany which Chippendale and his contemporaries used, there would be little to choose between the originals and our best reproductions, so far as soundness of construction and beauty of detail go. But the fact that they were the originals of a great style, that no one since then has been able to design any furniture of greater beauty than that of England and France in the eighteenth century, and that we are still copying it, gives an added charm to a rare old chair or sideboard or mirror. The modern workman in the best workshops is obliged to know the different styles so well that he cannot make mistakes, and if he ventures to take a little flight of fancy on his own account, it will be done with such correctness of feeling that one is glad he flew; but few attempt it. In the lower grade of reproductions one must have an eagle eye when buying. I saw a rather astounding looking Chippendale chair in a shop one day, with a touch of Gothic—a suspicion of his early Dutch manner—and, to give a final touch, tapering legs with carved bellflowers! "What authority have you for that chair?" I asked, for I really wanted to know what they would call the wonder.

"That," the shopman answered, the pride of knowledge shining in his eyes, "is Chinese Chippendale."

Another anachronism which has appeared lately, and sad to say in some of the shops that should know better, is painted Adam furniture with pictures on it of the famous actresses of the eighteenth century. The painting of Angelica Kauffman, Cipriani, Pergolesi and the others, was charming and delightful. Nymphs and cupids, flowers, wreaths, musical instruments, and poetical little scenes, but never the head of a living woman! The bad taste of it would have been as apparent to them as putting the picture of Miss Marlowe, or Lillian Russell on a chair back would be to us.

The finish is another matter to bear in mind. There is a thick red stain, which for some mysterious reason is called mahogany, which is put on cheaper grades of furniture and finished with a high polish. Fortunately, it is chiefly used on furniture of vulgar design, but it sometimes creeps in on better models. Shun it whenever seen. The handles must be correct also, and a glance at the different illustrations will be of help in this matter.

The pieces of furniture used throughout a house, no matter what the period may be, are more or less the same, so many chairs, tables, beds, mirrors, etc., and when one has decided what one's needs are, the matter of selection is much simplified. Of course one's needs are influenced by the size of the house, one's circumstances, and one's manner of life. To be successful, a house must be furnished in absolute harmony with the life within its walls. A small house does not need an elaborate drawing-room, which could only be had at the expense of family comfort; a simple drawing-room would be far better, really more of a living-room. In a large house one may have as many as one wishes.

A house could be furnished throughout with Chippendale furniture and show no sign of monotony of treatment. The walls could be paneled in some rooms, wainscoted in others, and papered in others. This question of paper is one we have taken in our own hands nowadays, and although it was not used much before the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, there are so many lovely designs copied from old-time stuffs and landscape papers, which are in harmony with the furniture, that they are used with perfect propriety. One must be careful not to choose anything with a too modern air, and a plain wall is always safe.

The average hall will probably need a pair of console tables and mirrors, some chairs, Oriental rugs, a tall clock if one wishes, and, if the hall is very large and calls for more furniture, there are many other interesting pieces to choose from. A hall should be treated with a certain amount of formality, and the greater the house, the greater the amount; but it also should have an air of hospitality, of impersonal welcome, which makes one wish to enter the rooms beyond where the real welcome waits.

The window frames of Colonial and Georgian houses were often of such good design that no curtains were used, and the wooden inside shutters were shut at night. Nowadays the average house has what might be called utility woodwork at its windows and so we cover them with curtains. These curtains may be of linen, cretonne, damask, or brocade, according to the house, and may either fall straight at the side with a slight drapery or shaped or plain valance at the top, or be drawn back from the center. A carved cornice or the regular box frame may be used.

The stairs were often of beautifully polished hardwood, and they were sometimes covered with rugs. Large Chinese porcelain jars on the console tables are suitable, and other beautiful ornaments.

As the drawing-room usually opens from the hall, it is better to keep both rooms in the same general scale of furnishing. The average sized drawing-room will need sofas, a small settee, two or three tables, one of them a gallery table if desired, chairs of different shapes and size, mirrors, a cabinet if one has rare pieces of old porcelain, and candelabra. Oriental rugs, a fire screen, ornaments, and pictures, but these last should not be of the modern impressionistic school. The woodwork should be white, or light, and the furniture covered with damask, needlework, brocade or tapestry.

The dining-room can be made most charming with corner cupboards and cabinet, a large mahogany table and side table and beautiful morocco covered chairs. Chippendale did not make sideboards in our sense of the word, but used large side tables. One of the modern designs which many like to use, for to them it seems a necessity, is a sideboard made in the style of Chippendale. The screen may be leather painted after "the Chinese taste," or it may be damask. The chairs may be covered with tapestry or damask if one does not care for morocco. Portraits are interesting in a dining-room, or old prints, or paintings, and if you can get the old dull gold carved frames, so much the better. They may also be set in panels.

The bedrooms may have either four-post canopy beds or low-posts beds. Chippendale's canopy beds had usually a carved cornice with the curtains hung from the inside. The other furniture should consist of a dressing-table, a chest of drawers to correspond with a chiffonier, a highboy, a sewing table, a bedside table, a comfortable sofa, a fireside or wing chair and other chairs according to one's need. The walls may be covered with either an old-fashioned or plain paper,—or paneled, with hangings and chair coverings of chintz or cretonne. The bed hangings may be of cretonne also, for it makes a very charming room, but if one objects to colored bed hangings, white dimity, or muslin or linen may be used.

It is the art of keeping the correct feeling which makes or mars a room of this kind, and no pieces of markedly modern and inharmonious furniture should be used. In furnishing a house in Georgian or Colonial manner one need not keep all the rooms in the same division of the period, for there is a certain general air of harmony and relationship about them all, and the common bond of mahogany makes it possible to have a Chippendale library, an Adam drawing-room, a Hepplewhite dining-room and a Sheraton hall, or any other combination desired. The spirit of all the eighteenth century cabinet-makers was one of honest construction and beauty of line and workmanship. When they took ideas from other sources they made them so distinctly their own, so essentially English that there is a family resemblance through all their work.

Adam decoration and furniture makes most delightful rooms. The painted satinwood furniture for dining-room, drawing-room and bedrooms, lends itself to lovely schemes with its soft golden tones, its delightfully woven cane chair backs and panels. A room on the sunny side of the house, with a soft old ivory colored wall, dull blue silk curtains, and a yellow and blue Chinese rug, would be most charming with this satinwood furniture.

Then, as I have said before, there are the many different shades of enameled and carved furniture and also beautiful natural wood. One can have more of a sideboard in an Adam than in a Chippendale room, as he used two pedestals, one at each end of a large serving-table. He often made tables to fit in niches, which is a charming idea.

An Adam mantel is very distinctive and one should be careful in having it correct. There are beautiful reproductions made. The lamp and candle shades should also be designed in the spirit of the time. There are lovely Adam designs in nearly all materials suitable for hangings and chair coverings. Oriental rugs or plain colored carpets appeal to us more than large-figured rugs. Adam sometimes had special rugs made exactly reproducing the design of the ceiling, but it is an idea that is better forgotten.

With Hepplewhite and Sheraton the same general ideas hold; keep to the spirit of the furniture, try to have a central idea in the house furnishing, so that the restful effect of harmony may be given.



The rugs which harmonize best with Georgian furniture are Orientals of different weaves and colors, or plain domestic carpet rugs. The floor should be the darkest of the three divisions of a room—the floor, the walls, the ceiling, but it should be an even gradation of color value, the walls half-way in tone between the other two. This is a safe general plan, to be varied when necessity demands. In drawing-rooms light and soft colors are usually in better harmony than dark ones, and a wide and beautiful choice can be made among Kermanshah, Kirman, Khorasan, Tabriz, Chinese, Oman rugs, and many others. It is more restful in effect if the greater part of the floor is covered with a large rug, but if one has beautiful small rugs they may be used if they are enough alike in general tone to escape the appearance of being spotty. One should try them in different positions until the best arrangement is found.



Living-rooms and libraries are usually more solid in color than drawing-rooms and so need deeper tones in the rugs. The choice is wide, and the color scheme can be the deciding note if one is buying new rugs. If one already has rugs they must be the foundation for the color scheme of the room.



Furnishing With French Furniture

"This is my Louis XVI drawing-room," said a lady, proudly displaying her house.

"What makes you think so?" asked her well informed friend.

To guard against the possibility of such biting humor one must be ever on the alert in furnishing a period room. It is not a bow-knot and a rococo curve or two that will turn a modern room, fresh from the builder's hands, into a Louis XV drawing-room.

French furniture is not appropriate to all kinds of houses, and it is often difficult to adapt it to circumstances over which one has no control. The leisurely and pleasant custom of our ancestors of building a house as they wished it, and what is more, living in it for generations, is more or less a thing of the past. Nowadays a house is built, and is complete and beautiful in every way, but almost before the house-warming is over, business is sitting on the doorstep, and so the family moves on. We, as a nation, have not the comfortable point of view of the English who consider their home, their home, no matter how the outside world may be behaving. Their front doors are the protection which insures their cherished privacy, and the feeling that they are as settled as the everlasting hills gives a calmness to their attitude toward life which is often missing from ours. How many times have we heard people say when talking over plans—"Have it thus and so, for it would be much better in case we ever care to sell." This attitude, to which of course there are hundreds of exceptions, is an outgrowth of our busy life and our tremendous country. The larger part of the home ideal is the one which Americans so firmly believe in and act upon—that it is the spirit and atmosphere which makes a home, and not only the bricks and mortar.

It is this point of view which makes it possible for many of us to live happily in rented houses whose architecture and arrangement often give us cold shivers. We are not to blame if all the proportions are wrong; and there is a certain pleasure in getting the better of difficulties.

If one is building a house, or is living in one planned with a due regard to some special period, and has a well thought out scheme of decoration, the work is much simplified; but if one has to live in the average nondescript house and wishes to use French furniture, the problem will take time and thought to solve. In this kind of house, if one cannot change it at all, it is better to keep as simple and unobtrusive a background as possible, to have the color scheme and hangings and furniture so beautiful that they are a convincing reason themselves of the need of their being there, but one should not try to turn the room itself into a period room, for it would mean failure. The walls may be covered with a light plain paper, or silk, the woodwork enameled white or cream or ivory, and then with one's mirrors and furnishings, the best thing possible has been done, and it ought to be a charming room, if not a perfect one. If one can make a few changes I advise new lighting fixtures and a new mantel, for these two important objects in the room are conspicuous and nearly always wrong.

It is almost impossible to give a list of furniture for each room in a house, as each house is a law unto itself, but the fundamental principles of beauty and utility and appropriateness apply to all.

The furniture of the time of Louis XIV, having so much that is magnificent about it, is especially well suited to large rooms for state occasions, great ballrooms and state drawing-rooms. These rooms not being destined for everyday use should be treated as a brilliant background; paneling, painting, tapestry, and gilding should decorate the walls, and beautiful lights and mirrors should aid in the effect of brilliancy. It must be done with such knowledge that there is no suggestion of an hotel about it. Console tables, and large and dignified chairs should be used for furniture. Nothing small and fussy in the way of ornaments should be put in the rooms, for they would be completely out of scale and ruin the effect.

Every house does not need these rooms for the elaborate side of life, and the average drawing-room is a much simpler affair. If both kinds are required the simpler one should be in the same general style as the great rooms, but not on so grand a scale. If the style of Louis XV is chosen for all, in the family drawing-and living-rooms the paneling, or dado, and furniture should be of the simpler kind, and beautiful, gay, and home-like rooms, evolved with soft colored brocades, Beauvais or Gobelin tapestry, and either gilded or enameled or natural walnut furniture. The arm-chairs or bergeres of both Louis XV and Louis XVI are very comfortable, the chaise-longue cannot be surpassed, and the settees of different shapes and sizes are delightful. There need be no lack of comfort in any period room, whether French or English.

A music room, to be perfect, should not have heavy draperies to deaden the sound, and the window and door openings should be treated architecturally to make this possible. In a French music room the walls may be either paneled, or have a dado with a soft tint above it. This space may be treated in several ways: it may have silk panels outlined with moldings, or dainty pastoral scenes painted and framed with wreaths and garlands of composition. The style of the Regency with its use of musical instruments for decorative motifs is also attractive. The chairs should be comfortable, the lights soft and well shaded side-lights, with a plentiful supply near the piano.



A piano is usually a difficulty, for they are so unwieldy and dark that they are quite out of key with the rest of the room. We have become so used to its ugliness, however, that, sad to say, we are not so much shocked by it as we should be, thinking it a necessary evil. If we walk through the show rooms of one of the great piano companies we shall see that this is a mistake, for there are many cases made of light colored woods, and some have a much more graceful outline than the regulation piano. Cases can be made to order to suit any scheme, if one has a competent designer. A music room should not have small and meaningless ornaments in it; the ideal is a restful and charming room where one may listen with an undistracted mind.

The modern dining-room with all its comforts is really of English descent. In France, even in the eighteenth century, only the palaces and great houses had rooms especially set apart for dining-rooms. Usually a small ante-chamber was used, which served as a boudoir or reception room between meals. To our more established point of view it seems a very casual method. At last, late in the century, the real ideal of a dining-room began to gain ground, and although they were very different from ours, we find really charming ones described and pictured. The walls were usually light in tone, paneled, with graceful ornamentation, and often there were niches containing wall-fountains of delightful design. The sideboards were either large side-tables, or a species of side-table built in niches, with a fountain between them which was used as a wine cooler. These fountains where cupids and dolphins disported themselves would be a most attractive feature to copy in some of our rooms, in country houses especially. The tables were round or square, but not the extension type which came later from England, and the chairs were comfortable, with broad upholstered or cane seats, and rather low backs. There should be a screen to harmonize with the room in front of the pantry door. We also add hangings, for, as I have said many times, our window-frames are not a decoration in themselves. Old prints show most delightfully the manner in which curtains were hung when they were used; the very elaborate methods, however, were not used by the better class.

A morning-room should be furnished as a small informal living-room, and the simpler style of the chosen period used.

The style of Louis XVI is beautifully adapted to libraries, for they do not have to be dark and solid in style, as many seem to think. In fact a library may be in any style if carried out with the true feeling and love of books, but of course some styles are more appropriate than others. In a Louis XVI library the paneling gives way to the built-in bookcases which are spaced with due regard to keeping the correct proportions. There is usually a cupboard space running round the room about the height of a dado and projecting a little beyond the bookcases above. The colors of the rugs and hangings may be warm and rich as the books give the walls a certain strength.

There are also beautiful reproductions of bedroom furniture, chairs and dressing-tables, desks, chiffoniers and Chaises-longues, and beds.

Andirons, side-lights for the walls and dressing-table, doorknobs and locks, can all be carried out perfectly. Lamp and candle shades and sofa cushions should all be in keeping. The walls may be paneled in wood enameled with white or some light color, or they may be covered with silk or paper, in a panel design, with curtains to match. There are lovely designs in French period stuffs.

The rugs most appropriate for French period rooms are light or medium in tone, and of Persian design. The floral patterns of the Persians seem to harmonize better with the curves and style of furniture than do the geometrical designs of the Caucasian rugs. Savonnerie and Aubusson rugs may also be used, if chosen with care, and the plain carpets and rugs mentioned later are a far better choice than gaudy Orientals of modern make, or bad imitations.



Country Houses

The Country House is a comparatively modern idea, and one which has added much to the joy of life. There are all kinds and conditions of them, great and small, grand and simple, and each is a joy to the proud possessor.

Life was such a turbulent affair in the Middle Ages that country life in the modern sense was an impossibility. The chateaux and castles and large manor-houses were strongly fortified, and there were inner courts for exercise. When war became the exception and not the rule, the inherent love in all human beings for the open began to assert itself, and the country house idea began to grow.

Italy was the first country where we find this freedom of attitude exemplified in the beautiful Renaissance villas near Rome and Florence. The best were built during the sixteenth century, and were owned by the great Italian families, like the de Medici and d'Este. They seem more like places built for the parade and show of life than homes, but the home ideal with all its conveniences was another outgrowth of peace.

The plan of an Italian villa is very interesting to study, to see how every advantage was taken of the land, how the residence, or casino, was placed in regard to the formal garden and the view over the valley, for they were usually on a hillside and the slope was terraced, how the statues and fountains, the beautiful ilex and cypress and orange trees, the box-edged flower-beds and gravel paths, all formed a wonderful setting for the house, and together made a perfect whole. The Italian villa was not necessarily large, in fact the Villa Lante contains only six acres, which are divided into four terraces, the house being on the second and built in two parts, one on each side. Each terrace has a beautiful fountain, with a cascade connecting those on the fourth and third. This villa is indeed, an example of taking advantage of a fairly small space. It was built by the great Vignola in 1547, and although slightly showing the wear of time, has all the beauty and charm and romance which only centuries can give.

The Italian villa can be adapted to the American climate and scenery and point of view, but it must be done by one of the architects who have made a deep study of the Italian Renaissance so the true feeling will be kept. There are some beautiful examples already in the country.

In France, the chateaux which have most influenced country house building are those which were built during the sixteenth century, many of them during the reign of Francis 1st. Among the number are Azay le Rideau, Chenonceaux, and Chaumont. Blois and Amboise are also absorbingly interesting, but belong partly to an earlier time. The chateau region in Touraine is a treasure land of architectural beauty. In the time of Louis XIV Le Notre changed many of these old chateaux from their fortified state to the more open form made possible by a peaceful life.

We turn to England for the most perfect examples of country houses, for the theory of country living is so thoroughly understood there, one might really say it is a national institution. Many of the manor-houses, both great and small, are beautiful examples of Tudor architecture, which seems especially suited to their setting of lovely green parks. The smaller country house, which has no pretention to being a show place, is as perfect in its way. The English love for out-of-doors makes them achieve wonders with even small gardens, and the climate, being gentle, helps matters immensely.

In America we are taking up the English country house ideal more and more and adapting it to our own needs. The question of architecture is a question of personal choice influenced by climate, and there are now numberless charming houses scattered over the length and breadth of the land which have been built with the purpose of being country homes. They are not for summer use only, but all the year round keep their hospitable doors open, or else the season begins so early and ends so late, that, with the holiday time between, the house hardly seems closed at all. It is this attitude which is changing country house architecture to a great extent. The terraces and porches and gardens and glasshouses are all there, but the house itself is more solidly built and is prepared to stand cold weather.

For the average American the best types of country house to choose from are the smaller Tudor manor-houses, Italian villas, Georgian architecture in England, and our own Colonial style which of course was founded on the Georgian. In the south and southwestern parts of this country a modified Spanish type may be used in place of Tudor, which does not give the feeling of cool spaces so necessary in hot climates. The bungalow type is also popular in the South.

There are many architects in this country who understand thoroughly the plan and spirit of Colonial times, and who succeed in giving to the comforts of modern days the true stamp of the eighteenth century. The style makes most delightful houses, and with the great supply of appropriate furniture from which to choose, it would be hard to fail in having a charming whole.

The house and garden should be planned together to have the best effect. Each can be added to as time goes on, but when a plan is followed there is a look of belonging together which adds greatly to the charm.



In an all-the-year country house a vestibule is a necessity as much as in a town house, and the hall should be treated with the dignity a hall deserves, and not as a second living-room. In many English houses of Tudor days the stairs were behind a carved screen, or concealed in some manner, which made it possible to use the hall as a gathering place. Our modern hall is not a descendant of this old hall of a past day (the living-room is much more so), but is really only a passage, often raised to the nth power, connecting the different rooms of the house, and should be treated as such. The stairs and landing and vista should be beautiful, and the furnishing should be dignified and in perfect scale with the rest of the house. Marble stairs and tapestry and old carved furniture and beautiful rugs, or the simplest possible furniture, may be used, but the hall should have an impersonally hospitable air, one which gives the keynote of the house, but reserves its full expression until the privacy of the living-rooms is reached.



The average country house is neither very magnificent nor very simple, but strikes the happy medium and achieves a most delightful home-like charm, which at the very outset makes life seem well worth living. It is rarely furnished in a period style throughout, but has the modern air of comfort which good taste and correct feeling give. For instance, the hall may have paneling and Chippendale mirror, a table, and chairs; the living-room furnished in a general Colonial manner mixed with some comfortable stuffed furniture, but not over-stuffed, lovely chintz or silk hangings, and a wide fireplace; the morning-room on something the same plan, but a little less formal; and the drawing-room a little more so, say in Adam or simple Louis XVI furniture. The library should have plenty of comfortable sofas and chairs, and a large table (it is hard to get one too large), some of the bookcases should be built in to form part of the architectural plan of the room, and personally I think it is a better idea to have all the space intended for bookcases built in in the first place, as this insures harmony of plan. Another important thing in a library is to have the lights precisely right, and the window-seats and the fireplace should be all that their names imply in the way of added charm and comfort to the room. The dining-room should be bright and cheerful and in harmony with the near-by rooms. A breakfast-room done in lacquer is very charming.

The bedrooms should be light and airy, and so planned that the beds can be properly placed. They may be furnished in old mahogany, French walnut in either Louis XV or XVI style, or in carefully chosen Empire; painted Adam furniture is also lovely, and willow furniture makes a fresh and attractive room. The curtains should be hung so they can be drawn at night if desired, and the material should be chosen to harmonize in design with the room.

The children's rooms should be sunny and bright and furnished according to their special tastes, which if too astounding, as sometimes happens, can be tactfully guided into safe channels.

The servants should be given separate bedrooms, a bathroom, and a comfortable sitting-room beside their dining-room. Making them comfortable seems a simple way of solving the servant question.

The bungalow type of small country house is usually very simply furnished, and the best type of Mission furniture or willow is especially well suited to it. Bungalows are growing more and more in favor, and, although they originated in America in the West, we find delightful ones everywhere, on the Maine coast and in the woods and mountains. They are a tremendous advance over the small and elaborate house of a few years ago.

Cretonne and chintz can be used in all the rooms of a country house with perfect propriety, and is a really lovely method of furnishing, as it is fresh and washable, and comes in all gradations of price. Willow furniture with cretonne cushions makes a pleasant variety with mahogany in simple rooms.

Fresh air and sunlight, lovely vistas through doors and windows of the garden beyond, cool and comfortable rooms furnished appropriately, and with an atmosphere about them which expresses a hospitable and charming home spirit, is the ideal standard for a country house.



The Nursery and Play-room

We should be thankful that the old idea of a nursery has passed away and instead of the dreary and rather shabby room has come the charming modern nursery with its special furniture and papers, its common sense and sanitary wisdom and its regard for the childish point of view. The influence of surroundings during the formative years of childhood has a deal to do with the child's future attitude toward life, and now that parents realize this more, the ideal nursery has simplicity, charm and artistic merit, all suited to the needs of its romping inhabitants.

The wall-papers for nurseries are especially attractive with their gay friezes of wonderful fairy-tale people, Mother Goose, Noah's Ark and happy little children playing among the flowers. Some of the designs come in sets of four panels that can be framed if desired. A Noah's Ark frieze with the animals marching two by two under the watchful eyes of the Noah family, with an ark and stiff little Noah's Ark trees, will give endless pleasure if placed about three feet from the floor where small tots can take in its charm. If placed too high, it is very often not noticed at all. Some of the most attractive nurseries have painted walls with special designs stenciled on them.

If any one of these friezes is placed above a simple wainscot, the effect is charming. The paper for nurseries is usually waterproof, for a nursery must be absolutely spick and span. Another thing that gives much pleasure in a nursery is to build on one side of the room a platform about a yard wide and six inches high, and cover it with cushions.

The furniture in a day nursery should consist of a toy cupboard stained to match the color scheme of the room and large enough for each child to have his own special compartment in it. If the children's initials are painted or burned on the doors, it gives an added feeling of pride in keeping the toys in order. There are many designs of small tables and chairs made with good lines, and the wicker ones with gay cretonne cushions are very attractive. The tables and chairs should not have sharp corners and should be heavy enough not to tip over easily. There should be a bookcase for favorite picture-books. Besides the special china for the children's own meals there should be a set of play china for doll's parties. A sand table, with a lump of clay for modeling, a blackboard and, in the spring, window-boxes where the children can plant seeds, will all add vastly to the joy of life.

And do not forget a comfortable chair for the nurse-maid. White muslin curtains with side hangings of washable chintz or linen or some special nursery design in cretonne should hang to the sill.

The colors in both day and night nurseries should be soft and cheerful, and the color scheme as carefully thought out as for the rest of the house. Both rooms should be on the sunny side of the house, and far enough away from the family living-room to avoid any one's being disturbed when armies charge up and down the play-room battle-ground or Indians start out on the warpath.

The best floor covering for a day nursery is plain linoleum, as it is not dangerously slippery and is easily kept clean. If the floor is hard wood, it must not have a slippery wax finish. It will also save tumbles if the day nursery has no rugs, but the night nursery ought to have one large one or several small ones by the beds and in front of the open fire. Washable cotton rugs are best to use for this purpose.

When children are very small, it is necessary to have sides to the beds to keep them from falling out. The beds should be placed so that the light does not shine directly in the children's eyes in the morning, and there should be plenty of fresh air. The rest of the night nursery furniture should consist of a dressing-table, a chest of drawers, a night table and some chairs. There should be a few pictures on the walls hung low, and beautiful and interesting in subjects and treatment. The fire should be well screened.

Pictures like the "Songs of Childhood," for instance, would be charming simply framed. If there is only one nursery for both day and night use, the room should be decorated as a day nursery and the bed-cover made of white dimity with a border of the curtain stuff or made entirely of it.



Curtains

The modern window, with its huge panes of glass and simple framework, makes an insistent demand for curtains. Without curtains windows of this kind give a blank, staring appearance to the room and also a sense of insecurity in having so many holes in the walls. The beautiful windows of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries in Italy, England and France, give no such feeling of incompleteness, for their well-carved frames, and over-windows, and their small panes of glass, were important parts of the decorative scheme. Windows and doors were more than mere openings in those days, but things have changed, and the hard lines of our perfectly useful windows get on our nerves if we do not soften them with drapery. In that hopeless time in the last century called "Early Victorian," when black walnut reigned supreme, the curtains were as terrifying as the curves of the furniture and the colors of the carpets. Luckily most of us know only from pictures what that time was, but we all have seen enough remnants of its past glories to be thankful for modern ways and days. The over-draped, stuffy, upholstered nightmares have entirely disappeared, and in their place have come curtains of a high standard of beauty and practicality—simple, appropriate, and serving the ends they were intended for.

The effect of curtains must be taken into account from both the outside and the inside of the house. The outside view should show a general similarity of appearance in the windows of each story, in the manner of hanging the curtains and also of material. The shades throughout the house should be of the same color, and if a different color is needed inside for the sake of the color scheme, either two shades should be used or they should be the double-faced kind. Shades should also be kept drawn down to the same line, or else be rolled up out of sight, for there is nothing that gives a more ill-kept look to a house than having the shades and curtains at any haphazard height or angle.