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+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 40367 ***
+
+Transcriber's Note:
+
+ Inconsistent hyphenation and spelling in the original document have
+ been preserved. Obvious typographical errors have been corrected.
+
+ Italic text is denoted by _underscores_.
+
+
+
+
+THE DECORATION OF HOUSES
+
+
+
+
+ Charles Scribner's
+ Sons
+ New York
+ 1914
+
+ The
+ Decoration of
+ Houses
+
+ By
+
+ Edith Wharton
+ and
+ Ogden Codman Jr.
+
+
+
+
+Copyright, 1897, by CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS
+
+
+
+
+"_Une forme doit être belle en elle-même et on ne doit jamais compter
+sur le décor appliqué pour en sauver les imperfections._"
+
+ HENRI MAYEUX: _La Composition Décorative_.
+
+
+
+
+TABLE OF CONTENTS
+
+
+ PAGE
+ INTRODUCTION xix
+
+ I THE HISTORICAL TRADITION 1
+
+ II ROOMS IN GENERAL 17
+
+ III WALLS 31
+
+ IV DOORS 48
+
+ V WINDOWS 64
+
+ VI FIREPLACES 74
+
+ VII CEILINGS AND FLOORS 89
+
+ VIII ENTRANCE AND VESTIBULE 103
+
+ IX HALL AND STAIRS 106
+
+ X THE DRAWING-ROOM, BOUDOIR, AND MORNING-ROOM 122
+
+ XI GALA ROOMS: BALL-ROOM, SALOON, MUSIC-ROOM, GALLERY 134
+
+ XII THE LIBRARY, SMOKING-ROOM, AND "DEN" 145
+
+ XIII THE DINING-ROOM 155
+
+ XIV BEDROOMS 162
+
+ XV THE SCHOOL-ROOM AND NURSERIES 173
+
+ XVI BRIC-À-BRAC 184
+
+ CONCLUSION 196
+
+ INDEX 199
+
+
+
+
+LIST OF PLATES
+
+
+ FACING PAGE
+
+ I ITALIAN GOTHIC CHEST 1
+
+ II FRENCH ARM-CHAIRS, XV AND XVI CENTURIES 6
+
+ III FRENCH _Armoire_, XVI CENTURY 10
+
+ IV FRENCH SOFA AND ARM-CHAIR, LOUIS XIV PERIOD 12
+
+ V ROOM IN THE GRAND TRIANON, VERSAILLES 14
+
+ VI FRENCH ARM-CHAIR, LOUIS XV PERIOD 16
+
+ VII FRENCH _Bergère_, LOUIS XVI PERIOD 20
+
+ VIII FRENCH _Bergère_, LOUIS XVI PERIOD 24
+
+ IX FRENCH SOFA, LOUIS XV PERIOD 28
+
+ X FRENCH MARQUETRY TABLE, LOUIS XVI PERIOD 30
+
+ XI DRAWING-ROOM, HOUSE IN BERKELEY SQUARE, LONDON 34
+
+ XII ROOM IN THE VILLA VERTEMATI 38
+
+ XIII DRAWING-ROOM AT EASTON NESTON HALL 42
+
+ XIV DOORWAY, DUCAL PALACE, MANTUA 48
+
+ XV SALA DEI CAVALLI, PALAZZO DEL T 54
+
+ XVI DOOR IN THE SALA DELLO ZODIACO, DUCAL PALACE,
+ MANTUA 58
+
+ XVII EXAMPLES OF MODERN FRENCH LOCKSMITHS' WORK 60
+
+ XVIII CARVED DOOR, PALACE OF VERSAILLES 62
+
+ XIX SALON DES MALACHITES, GRAND TRIANON, VERSAILLES 68
+
+ XX MANTELPIECE, DUCAL PALACE, URBINO 74
+
+ XXI MANTELPIECE, VILLA GIACOMELLI 78
+
+ XXII FRENCH FIRE-SCREEN, LOUIS XIV PERIOD 86
+
+ XXIII CARVED WOODEN CEILING, VILLA VERTEMATI 90
+
+ XXIV CEILING IN PALAIS DE JUSTICE, RENNES 92
+
+ XXV CEILING OF THE SALA DEGLI SPOSI, DUCAL PALACE,
+ MANTUA 96
+
+ XXVI CEILING IN THE STYLE OF BÉRAIN 100
+
+ XXVII CEILING IN THE CHÂTEAU OF CHANTILLY 102
+
+ XXVIII ANTECHAMBER, VILLA CAMBIASO, GENOA 104
+
+ XXIX ANTECHAMBER, DURAZZO PALACE, GENOA 106
+
+ XXX STAIRCASE, PARODI PALACE, GENOA 108
+
+ XXXI STAIRCASE, HÔTEL DE VILLE, NANCY 112
+
+ XXXII STAIRCASE, PALACE OF FONTAINEBLEAU 116
+
+ XXXIII FRENCH _Armoire_, LOUIS XIV PERIOD 120
+
+ XXXIV SALA DELLA MADDALENA, ROYAL PALACE, GENOA 122
+
+ XXXV CONSOLE IN PETIT TRIANON, VERSAILLES 124
+
+ XXXVI SALON, PALACE OF FONTAINEBLEAU 126
+
+ XXXVII ROOM IN THE PALACE OF FONTAINEBLEAU 128
+
+ XXXVIII _Lit de Repos_, EARLY LOUIS XV PERIOD 130
+
+ XXXIX _Lit de Repos_, LOUIS XV PERIOD 130
+
+ XL PAINTED WALL-PANEL AND DOOR, CHANTILLY 132
+
+ XLI FRENCH BOUDOIR, LOUIS XVI PERIOD 132
+
+ XLII _Salon à l'italienne_ 136
+
+ XLIII BALL-ROOM, ROYAL PALACE, GENOA 138
+
+ XLIV SALOON, VILLA VERTEMATI 140
+
+ XLV SALA DELLO ZODIACO, DUCAL PALACE, MANTUA 140
+
+ XLVI FRENCH TABLE, TRANSITION BETWEEN LOUIS XIV AND
+ LOUIS XV PERIODS 142
+
+ XLVII LIBRARY OF LOUIS XVI, PALACE OF VERSAILLES 144
+
+ XLVIII SMALL LIBRARY, AUDLEY END 146
+
+ XLIX FRENCH WRITING-CHAIR, LOUIS XV PERIOD 150
+
+ L DINING-ROOM, PALACE OF COMPIÈGNE 154
+
+ LI DINING-ROOM FOUNTAIN, PALACE OF FONTAINEBLEAU 156
+
+ LII FRENCH DINING-CHAIR, LOUIS XIV PERIOD 158
+
+ LIII FRENCH DINING-CHAIR, LOUIS XVI PERIOD 158
+
+ LIV BEDROOM, PALACE OF FONTAINEBLEAU 162
+
+ LV BATH-ROOM, PITTI PALACE, FLORENCE 168
+
+ LVI BRONZE ANDIRON, XVI CENTURY 184
+
+
+
+
+BOOKS CONSULTED
+
+
+FRENCH
+
+ ANDROUET DU CERCEAU, JACQUES.
+
+ Les Plus Excellents Bâtiments de France. _Paris, 1607._
+
+ LE MUET, PIERRE.
+
+ Manière de Bien Bâtir pour toutes sortes de Personnes.
+
+ OPPENORD, GILLES MARIE.
+
+ Oeuvres. _1750._
+
+ MARIETTE, PIERRE JEAN.
+
+ L'Architecture Françoise. _1727._
+
+ BRISEUX, CHARLES ÉTIENNE.
+
+ L'Art de Bâtir les Maisons de Campagne. _Paris, 1743._
+
+ LALONDE, FRANÇOIS RICHARD DE.
+
+ Recueil de ses Oeuvres.
+
+ AVILER, C. A. D'.
+
+ Cours d'Architecture. _1760._
+
+ BLONDEL, JACQUES FRANÇOIS.
+
+ Architecture Françoise. _Paris, 1752._
+
+ Cours d'Architecture. _Paris, 1771-77._
+
+ De la Distribution des Maisons de Plaisance et de la
+ Décoration des Édifices. _Paris, 1737._
+
+ ROUBO, A. J., FILS.
+
+ L'Art du Menuisier.
+
+ HÉRÉ DE CORNY, EMMANUEL.
+
+ Recueil des Plans, Élévations et Coupes des Châteaux,
+ Jardins et Dépendances que le Roi de Pologne occupe en
+ Lorraine. _Paris, n. d._
+
+ PERCIER ET FONTAINE.
+
+ Choix des plus Célèbres Maisons de Plaisance de Rome et de
+ ses Environs. _Paris, 1809._
+
+ Palais, Maisons, et autres Édifices Modernes dessinés à
+ Rome. _Paris, 1798._
+
+ Résidences des Souverains. _Paris, 1833._
+
+ KRAFFT ET RANSONNETTE.
+
+ Plans, Coupes, et Élévations des plus belles Maisons et
+ Hôtels construits à Paris et dans les Environs. _Paris,
+ 1801._
+
+ DURAND, JEAN NICOLAS LOUIS.
+
+ Recueil et Parallèle des Édifices de tout Genre. _Paris,
+ 1800._
+
+ Précis des Leçons d'Architecture données à l'École Royale
+ Polytechnique. _Paris, 1823._
+
+ QUATREMÈRE DE QUINCY, A. C.
+
+ Histoire de la Vie et des Ouvrages des plus Célèbres
+ Architectes du XIe siècle jusqu'à la fin du XVIII siècle.
+ _Paris, 1830._
+
+ PELLASSY DE L'OUSLE.
+
+ Histoire du Palais de Compiègne. _Paris, n. d._
+
+ LETAROUILLY, PAUL MARIE.
+
+ Édifices de Rome Moderne. _Paris, 1825-57._
+
+ RAMÉE, DANIEL.
+
+ Histoire Générale de l'Architecture. _Paris, 1862._
+
+ Meubles Religieux et Civils Conservés dans les principaux
+ Monuments et Musées de l'Europe.
+
+ VIOLLET LE DUC, EUGÈNE EMMANUEL.
+
+ Dictionnaire Raisonné de l'Architecture Française du XIe au
+ XVIe siècle. _Paris, 1868._
+
+ SAUVAGEOT, CLAUDE.
+
+ Palais, Châteaux, Hôtels et Maisons de France du XVe au
+ XVIIIe siècle.
+
+ DALY, CÉSAR.
+
+ Motifs Historiques d'Architecture et de Sculpture
+ d'Ornement.
+
+ ROUYER ET DARCEL.
+
+ L'Art Architectural en France depuis François Ier jusqu'à
+ Louis XIV.
+
+ HAVARD, HENRY.
+
+ Dictionnaire de l'Ameublement et de la Décoration depuis le
+ XIIIe siècle jusqu'à nos Jours. _Paris, n. d._
+
+ Les Arts de l'Ameublement.
+
+ GUILMARD, D.
+
+ Les Maîtres Ornemanistes. _Paris, 1880._
+
+ BAUCHAL, CHARLES.
+
+ Dictionnaire des Architectes Français. _Paris, 1887._
+
+ ROUAIX, PAUL.
+
+ Les Styles. _Paris, n. d._
+
+ BIBLIOTHÈQUE DE L'ENSEIGNEMENT DES BEAUX ARTS.
+
+ Maison Quantin, _Paris_.
+
+
+ENGLISH
+
+ WARE, ISAAC.
+
+ A Complete Body of Architecture. _London, 1756._
+
+ BRETTINGHAM, MATTHEW.
+
+ Plans, Elevations and Sections of Holkham in Norfolk, the
+ Seat of the late Earl of Leicester. _London, 1761._
+
+ CAMPBELL, COLEN.
+
+ Vitruvius Britannicus; or, The British Architect. _London,
+ 1771._
+
+ ADAM, ROBERT AND JAMES.
+
+ The Works in Architecture. _London, 1773-1822._
+
+ HEPPLEWHITE, A.
+
+ The Cabinet-Maker and Upholsterer's Guide.
+
+ SHERATON, THOMAS.
+
+ The Cabinet-Maker's Dictionary. _London, 1803._
+
+ PAIN, WILLIAM.
+
+ The British Palladio; or The Builder's General Assistant.
+ _London, 1797._
+
+ SOANE, SIR JOHN.
+
+ Sketches in Architecture. _London, 1793._
+
+ HAKEWILL, ARTHUR WILLIAM.
+
+ General Plan and External Details, with Picturesque
+ Illustrations, of Thorpe Hall, Peterborough.
+
+ LEWIS, JAMES.
+
+ Original Designs in Architecture.
+
+ PYNE, WILLIAM HENRY.
+
+ History of the Royal Residences of Windsor Castle, St.
+ James's Palace, Carlton House, Kensington Palace, Hampton
+ Court, Buckingham Palace, and Frogmore. _London, 1819._
+
+ GWILT, JOSEPH.
+
+ Encyclopedia of Architecture. New edition. _Longman's,
+ 1895._
+
+ FERGUSSON, JAMES.
+
+ History of Architecture. _London, 1874._
+
+ History of the Modern Styles of Architecture. Third edition,
+ revised by Robert Kerr. _London, 1891._
+
+ GOTCH, JOHN ALFRED.
+
+ Architecture of the Renaissance in England.
+
+ HEATON, JOHN ALDAM.
+
+ Furniture and Decoration in England in the Eighteenth
+ Century.
+
+ ROSENGARTEN.
+
+ Handbook of Architectural Styles. _New York, 1876._
+
+ HORNE, H. P.
+
+ The Binding of Books. _London, 1894._
+
+ LOFTIE, W. J.
+
+ Inigo Jones and Christopher Wren. _London, 1893._
+
+ KERR, ROBERT.
+
+ The English Gentleman's House. _London, 1865._
+
+ STEVENSON, J. J.
+
+ House Architecture. _London, 1880._
+
+
+GERMAN AND ITALIAN
+
+ BURCKHARDT, JACOB.
+
+ Architektur der Renaissance in Italien. _Stuttgart, 1891._
+
+ REINHARDT.
+
+ Palast Architektur von Ober Italien und Toskana.
+
+ GURLITT, CORNELIUS.
+
+ Geschichte des Barockstiles in Italien. _Stuttgart, 1887._
+
+ EBE, GUSTAV.
+
+ Die Spät-Renaissance. _Berlin, 1886._
+
+ LA VILLA BORGHESE, FUORI DI PORTA PINCIANA, CON L'ORNAMENTI
+ CHE SI OSSERVANO NEL DI LEI PALAZZO. _Roma, 1700._
+
+ INTRA, G. B.
+
+ Mantova nei suoi Monumenti.
+
+ LUZIO E RENIER.
+
+ Mantova e Urbino. _Torino-Roma, 1893._
+
+ MOLMENTI, POMPEO.
+
+ La Storia di Venezia nella Vita Privata. _Torino, 1885._
+
+ MALAMANI, VITTORIO.
+
+ Il Settecento a Venezia. _Milano, 1895._
+
+ LA VITA ITALIANA NEL SEICENTO. CONFERENZE TENUTE A FIRENZE
+ NEL 1890.
+
+
+
+
+INTRODUCTION
+
+
+Rooms may be decorated in two ways: by a superficial application of
+ornament totally independent of structure, or by means of those
+architectural features which are part of the organism of every house,
+inside as well as out.
+
+In the middle ages, when warfare and brigandage shaped the conditions
+of life, and men camped in their castles much as they did in their
+tents, it was natural that decorations should be portable, and that
+the naked walls of the mediæval chamber should be hung with arras,
+while a _ciel_, or ceiling, of cloth stretched across the open timbers
+of its roof.
+
+When life became more secure, and when the Italian conquests of the
+Valois had acquainted men north of the Alps with the spirit of classic
+tradition, proportion and the relation of voids to masses gradually
+came to be regarded as the chief decorative values of the interior.
+Portable hangings were in consequence replaced by architectural
+ornament: in other words, the architecture of the room became its
+decoration.
+
+This architectural treatment held its own through every change of
+taste until the second quarter of the present century; but since then
+various influences have combined to sever the natural connection
+between the outside of the modern house and its interior. In the
+average house the architect's task seems virtually confined to the
+elevations and floor-plan. The designing of what are to-day regarded
+as insignificant details, such as mouldings, architraves, and
+cornices, has become a perfunctory work, hurried over and unregarded;
+and when this work is done, the upholsterer is called in to "decorate"
+and furnish the rooms.
+
+As the result of this division of labor, house-decoration has ceased
+to be a branch of architecture. The upholsterer cannot be expected to
+have the preliminary training necessary for architectural work, and it
+is inevitable that in his hands form should be sacrificed to color and
+composition to detail. In his ignorance of the legitimate means of
+producing certain effects, he is driven to all manner of expedients,
+the result of which is a piling up of heterogeneous ornament, a
+multiplication of incongruous effects; and lacking, as he does, a
+definite first conception, his work becomes so involved that it seems
+impossible for him to make an end.
+
+The confusion resulting from these unscientific methods has reflected
+itself in the lay mind, and house-decoration has come to be regarded
+as a black art by those who have seen their rooms subjected to the
+manipulations of the modern upholsterer. Now, in the hands of
+decorators who understand the fundamental principles of their art, the
+surest effects are produced, not at the expense of simplicity and
+common sense, but by observing the requirements of both. These
+requirements are identical with those regulating domestic
+architecture, the chief end in both cases being the suitable
+accommodation of the inmates of the house.
+
+The fact that this end has in a measure been lost sight of is perhaps
+sufficient warrant for the publication of this elementary sketch. No
+study of _house-decoration as a branch of architecture_ has for at
+least fifty years been published in England or America; and though
+France is always producing admirable monographs on isolated branches
+of this subject, there is no modern French work corresponding with
+such comprehensive manuals as d'Aviler's _Cours d'Architecture_ or
+Isaac Ware's _Complete Body of Architecture_.
+
+The attempt to remedy this deficiency in some slight degree has made
+it necessary to dwell at length upon the strictly architectural
+principles which controlled the work of the old decorators. The
+effects that they aimed at having been based mainly on the due
+adjustment of parts, it has been impossible to explain their methods
+without assuming their standpoint--that of _architectural
+proportion_--in contradistinction to the modern view of
+house-decoration as _superficial application of ornament_. When
+house-decoration was a part of architecture all its values were
+founded on structural modifications; consequently it may seem that
+ideas to be derived from a study of such methods suggest changes too
+radical for those who are not building, but are merely decorating.
+Such changes, in fact, lie rather in the direction of alteration than
+of adornment; but it must be remembered that the results attained will
+be of greater decorative value than were an equal expenditure devoted
+to surface-ornament. Moreover, the great decorators, if scrupulous in
+the observance of architectural principles, were ever governed, in the
+use of ornamental detail, by the [Greek: sôphrosynê], the "wise
+moderation," of the Greeks; and the rooms of the past were both
+simpler in treatment and freer from mere embellishments than those of
+to-day.
+
+Besides, if it be granted for the sake of argument that a reform in
+house-decoration, if not necessary, is at least desirable, it must be
+admitted that such reform can originate only with those whose means
+permit of any experiments which their taste may suggest. When the rich
+man demands good architecture his neighbors will get it too. The
+vulgarity of current decoration has its source in the indifference of
+the wealthy to architectural fitness. Every good moulding, every
+carefully studied detail, exacted by those who can afford to indulge
+their taste, will in time find its way to the carpenter-built cottage.
+Once the right precedent is established, it costs less to follow than
+to oppose it.
+
+In conclusion, it may be well to explain the seeming lack of accord
+between the arguments used in this book and the illustrations chosen
+to interpret them. While much is said of simplicity, the illustrations
+used are chiefly taken from houses of some importance. This has been
+done in order that only such apartments as are accessible to the
+traveller might be given as examples. Unprofessional readers will
+probably be more interested in studying rooms that they have seen, or
+at least heard of, than those in the ordinary private dwelling; and
+the arguments advanced are indirectly sustained by the most ornate
+rooms here shown, since their effect is based on such harmony of line
+that their superficial ornament might be removed without loss to the
+composition.
+
+Moreover, as some of the illustrations prove, the most magnificent
+palaces of Europe contain rooms as simple as those in any private
+house; and to point out that simplicity is at home even in palaces is
+perhaps not the least service that may be rendered to the modern
+decorator.
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE I._
+
+ ITALIAN GOTHIC CHEST.
+ MUSEUM OF THE BARGELLO, FLORENCE.]
+
+
+
+
+I
+
+THE HISTORICAL TRADITION
+
+
+The last ten years have been marked by a notable development in
+architecture and decoration, and while France will long retain her
+present superiority in these arts, our own advance is perhaps more
+significant than that of any other country. When we measure the work
+recently done in the United States by the accepted architectural
+standards of ten years ago, the change is certainly striking,
+especially in view of the fact that our local architects and
+decorators are without the countless advantages in the way of schools,
+museums and libraries which are at the command of their European
+colleagues. In Paris, for instance, it is impossible to take even a
+short walk without finding inspiration in those admirable buildings,
+public and private, religious and secular, that bear the stamp of the
+most refined taste the world has known since the decline of the arts
+in Italy; and probably all American architects will acknowledge that
+no amount of travel abroad and study at home can compensate for the
+lack of daily familiarity with such monuments.
+
+It is therefore all the more encouraging to note the steady advance in
+taste and knowledge to which the most recent architecture in America
+bears witness. This advance is chiefly due to the fact that American
+architects are beginning to perceive two things that their French
+colleagues, among all the modern vagaries of taste, have never quite
+lost sight of: first that architecture and decoration, having wandered
+since 1800 in a labyrinth of dubious eclecticism, can be set right
+only by a close study of the best models; and secondly that, given the
+requirements of modern life, these models are chiefly to be found in
+buildings erected in Italy after the beginning of the sixteenth
+century, and in other European countries after the full assimilation
+of the Italian influence.
+
+As the latter of these propositions may perhaps be questioned by those
+who, in admiring the earlier styles, sometimes lose sight of their
+relative unfitness for modern use, it must be understood at the outset
+that it implies no disregard for the inherent beauties of these
+styles. It would be difficult, assuredly, to find buildings better
+suited to their original purpose than some of the great feudal
+castles, such as Warwick in England, or Langeais in France; and as
+much might be said of the grim machicolated palaces of republican
+Florence or Siena; but our whole mode of life has so entirely changed
+since the days in which these buildings were erected that they no
+longer answer to our needs. It is only necessary to picture the lives
+led in those days to see how far removed from them our present social
+conditions are. Inside and outside the house, all told of the
+unsettled condition of country or town, the danger of armed attack,
+the clumsy means of defence, the insecurity of property, the few
+opportunities of social intercourse as we understand it. A man's house
+was in very truth his castle in the middle ages, and in France and
+England especially it remained so until the end of the sixteenth
+century.
+
+Thus it was that many needs arose: the tall keep of masonry where the
+inmates, pent up against attack, awaited the signal of the watchman
+who, from his platform or _échauguette_, gave warning of assault; the
+ponderous doors, oak-ribbed and metal-studded, with doorways often
+narrowed to prevent entrance of two abreast, and so low that the
+incomer had to bend his head; the windows that were mere openings or
+slits, narrow and high, far out of the assailants' reach, and piercing
+the walls without regard to symmetry--not, as Ruskin would have us
+believe, because irregularity was thought artistic, but because the
+mediæval architect, trained to the uses of necessity, knew that he
+must design openings that should afford no passage to the besiegers'
+arrows, no clue to what was going on inside the keep. But to the
+reader familiar with Viollet-le-Duc, or with any of the many excellent
+works on English domestic architecture, further details will seem
+superfluous. It is necessary, however, to point out that long after
+the conditions of life in Europe had changed, houses retained many
+features of the feudal period. The survival of obsolete customs which
+makes the study of sociology so interesting, has its parallel in the
+history of architecture. In the feudal countries especially, where the
+conflict between the great nobles and the king was of such long
+duration that civilization spread very slowly, architecture was
+proportionately slow to give up many of its feudal characteristics. In
+Italy, on the contrary, where one city after another succumbed to some
+accomplished condottiere who between his campaigns read Virgil and
+collected antique marbles, the rugged little republics were soon
+converted into brilliant courts where, life being relatively secure,
+social intercourse rapidly developed. This change of conditions
+brought with it the paved street and square, the large-windowed
+palaces with their great court-yards and stately open staircases, and
+the market-place with its loggia adorned with statues and marble
+seats.
+
+Italy, in short, returned instinctively to the Roman ideal of civic
+life: the life of the street, the forum and the baths. These very
+conditions, though approaching so much nearer than feudalism to our
+modern civilization, in some respects make the Italian architecture of
+the Renaissance less serviceable as a model than the French and
+English styles later developed from it. The very dangers and
+barbarities of feudalism had fostered and preserved the idea of home
+as of something private, shut off from intrusion; and while the Roman
+ideal flowered in the great palace with its galleries, loggias and
+saloons, itself a kind of roofed-in forum, the French or English
+feudal keep became, by the same process of growth, the modern private
+house. The domestic architecture of the Renaissance in Italy offers
+but two distinctively characteristic styles of building: the palace
+and the villa or hunting-lodge.[1] There is nothing corresponding in
+interior arrangements with the French or English town house, or the
+_manoir_ where the provincial nobles lived all the year round. The
+villa was a mere perch used for a few weeks of gaiety in spring or
+autumn; it was never a home as the French or English country-house
+was. There were, of course, private houses in Renaissance Italy, but
+these were occupied rather by shopkeepers, craftsmen, and the
+_bourgeoisie_ than by the class which in France and England lived in
+country houses or small private hôtels. The elevations of these small
+Italian houses are often admirable examples of domestic architecture,
+but their planning is rudimentary, and it may be said that the
+characteristic tendencies of modern house-planning were developed
+rather in the mezzanin or low-studded intermediate story of the
+Italian Renaissance palace than in the small house of the same period.
+
+It is a fact recognized by political economists that changes in
+manners and customs, no matter under what form of government, usually
+originate with the wealthy or aristocratic minority, and are thence
+transmitted to the other classes. Thus the _bourgeois_ of one
+generation lives more like the aristocrat of a previous generation
+than like his own predecessors. This rule naturally holds good of
+house-planning, and it is for this reason that the origin of modern
+house-planning should be sought rather in the prince's mezzanin than
+in the small middle-class dwelling. The Italian mezzanin probably
+originated in the habit of building certain very high-studded saloons
+and of lowering the ceiling of the adjoining rooms. This created an
+intermediate story, or rather scattered intermediate rooms, which
+Bramante was among the first to use in the planning of his palaces;
+but Bramante did not reveal the existence of the mezzanin in his
+façades, and it was not until the time of Peruzzi and his
+contemporaries that it became, both in plan and elevation, an accepted
+part of the Italian palace. It is for this reason that the year 1500
+is a convenient point from which to date the beginning of modern
+house-planning; but it must be borne in mind that this date is purely
+arbitrary, and represents merely an imaginary line drawn between
+mediæval and modern ways of living and house-planning, as exemplified
+respectively, for instance, in the ducal palace of Urbino, built by
+Luciano da Laurano about 1468, and the palace of the Massimi alle
+Colonne in Rome, built by Baldassare Peruzzi during the first half of
+the sixteenth century.
+
+The lives of the great Italian nobles were essentially open-air lives:
+all was organized with a view to public pageants, ceremonies and
+entertainments. Domestic life was subordinated to this spectacular
+existence, and instead of building private houses in our sense, they
+built palaces, of which they set aside a portion for the use of the
+family. Every Italian palace has its mezzanin or private apartment;
+but this part of the building is now seldom seen by travellers in
+Italy. Not only is it usually inhabited by the owners of the palace
+but, its decorations being simpler than those of the _piano nobile_,
+or principal story, it is not thought worthy of inspection. As a
+matter of fact, the treatment of the mezzanin was generally most
+beautiful, because most suitable; and while the Italian Renaissance
+palace can seldom serve as a model for a modern private house, the
+decoration of the mezzanin rooms is full of appropriate suggestion.
+
+In France and England, on the other hand, private life was gradually,
+though slowly, developing along the lines it still follows in the
+present day. It is necessary to bear in mind that what we call modern
+civilization was a later growth in these two countries than in Italy.
+If this fact is insisted upon, it is only because it explains the
+relative unsuitability of French Renaissance or Tudor and Elizabethan
+architecture to modern life. In France, for instance, it was not until
+the Fronde was subdued and Louis XIV firmly established on the throne,
+that the elements which compose what we call modern life really began
+to combine. In fact, it might be said that the feudalism of which the
+Fronde was the lingering expression had its counterpart in the
+architecture of the period. While long familiarity with Italy was
+beginning to tell upon the practical side of house-planning, many
+obsolete details were still preserved. Even the most enthusiastic
+admirer of the French Renaissance would hardly maintain that the
+houses of that period are what we should call in the modern sense
+"convenient." It would be impossible for a modern family to occupy
+with any degree of comfort the Hôtel Voguë at Dijon, one of the best
+examples (as originally planned) of sixteenth-century domestic
+architecture in France.[2] The same objection applies to the furniture
+of the period. This arose from the fact that, owing to the unsettled
+state of the country, the landed proprietor always carried his
+furniture with him when he travelled from one estate to another.
+Furniture, in the vocabulary of the middle ages, meant something which
+may be transported: "Meubles sont apelez qu'on peut transporter";--hence
+the lack of variety in furniture before the seventeenth century, and
+also its unsuitableness to modern life. Chairs and cabinets that had
+to be carried about on mule-back were necessarily somewhat stiff and
+angular in design. It is perhaps not too much to say that a
+comfortable chair, in our self-indulgent modern sense, did not exist
+before the Louis XIV arm-chair (see Plate IV); and the cushioned
+_bergère_, the ancestor of our upholstered easy-chair, cannot be
+traced back further than the Regency. Prior to the time of Louis XIV,
+the most luxurious people had to content themselves with hard
+straight-backed seats. The necessities of transportation permitted
+little variety of design, and every piece of furniture was constructed
+with the double purpose of being easily carried about and of being
+used as a trunk (see Plate I). As Havard says, "Tout meuble se
+traduisait par un coffre." The unvarying design of the cabinets is
+explained by the fact that they were made to form two trunks,[3] and
+even the chairs and settles had hollow seats which could be packed
+with the owners' wardrobe (see Plate II). The king himself, when he
+went from one château to another, carried all his furniture with him,
+and it is thus not surprising that lesser people contented themselves
+with a few substantial chairs and cabinets, and enough arras or cloth
+of Douai to cover the draughty walls of their country-houses. One of
+Madame de Sévigné's letters gives an amusing instance of the
+scarceness of furniture even in the time of Louis XIV. In describing a
+fire in a house near her own hôtel in Paris, she says that one or two
+of the persons from the burning house were brought to her for shelter,
+because it was known in the neighborhood (at that time a rich and
+fashionable one) that she had _an extra bed_ in the house!
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE II._
+
+ FRENCH CHAIRS, XV AND XVI CENTURIES.
+ FROM THE GAVET COLLECTION.]
+
+It was not until the social influences of the reign of Louis XIV were
+fully established that modern domestic life really began. Tradition
+ascribes to Madame de Rambouillet a leading share in the advance in
+practical house-planning; but probably what she did is merely typical
+of the modifications which the new social conditions were everywhere
+producing. It is certain that at this time houses and rooms first
+began to be comfortable. The immense cavernous fireplaces originally
+meant for the roasting of beeves and the warming of a flock of frozen
+retainers,--"les grandes antiquailles de cheminées," as Madame de
+Sévigné called them,--were replaced by the compact chimney-piece of
+modern times. Cushioned _bergères_ took the place of the throne-like
+seats of Louis XIII, screens kept off unwelcome draughts, Savonnerie
+or moquette carpets covered the stone or marble floors, and grandeur
+gave way to luxury.[4]
+
+English architecture having followed a line of development so similar
+that it need not here be traced, it remains only to examine in detail
+the opening proposition, namely, that modern architecture and
+decoration, having in many ways deviated from the paths which the
+experience of the past had marked out for them, can be reclaimed only
+by a study of the best models.
+
+It might of course be said that to attain this end originality is more
+necessary than imitativeness. To this it may be replied that no lost
+art can be re-acquired without at least for a time going back to the
+methods and manner of those who formerly practised it; or the
+objection may be met by the question, What is originality in art?
+Perhaps it is easier to define what it is _not_; and this may be done
+by saying that it is never a wilful rejection of what have been
+accepted as the necessary laws of the various forms of art. Thus, in
+reasoning, originality lies not in discarding the necessary laws of
+thought, but in using them to express new intellectual conceptions; in
+poetry, originality consists not in discarding the necessary laws of
+rhythm, but in finding new rhythms within the limits of those laws.
+Most of the features of architecture that have persisted through
+various fluctuations of taste owe their preservation to the fact that
+they have been proved by experience to be necessary; and it will be
+found that none of them precludes the exercise of individual taste,
+any more than the acceptance of the syllogism or of the laws of rhythm
+prevents new thinkers and new poets from saying what has never been
+said before. Once this is clearly understood, it will be seen that the
+supposed conflict between originality and tradition is no conflict at
+all.[5]
+
+In citing logic and poetry, those arts have been purposely chosen of
+which the laws will perhaps best help to explain and illustrate the
+character of architectural limitations. A building, for whatever
+purpose erected, must be built in strict accordance with the
+requirements of that purpose; in other words, it must have a reason
+for being as it is and must be as it is for that reason. Its
+decoration must harmonize with the structural limitations (which is by
+no means the same thing as saying that all decoration must be
+structural), and from this harmony of the general scheme of decoration
+with the building, and of the details of the decoration with each
+other, springs the rhythm that distinguishes architecture from mere
+construction. Thus all good architecture and good decoration (which,
+it must never be forgotten, _is only interior architecture_) must be
+based on rhythm and logic. A house, or room, must be planned as it is
+because it could not, in reason, be otherwise; must be decorated as it
+is because no other decoration would harmonize as well with the plan.
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE III._
+
+ FRENCH ARMOIRE, XVI CENTURY.]
+
+Many of the most popular features in modern house-planning and
+decoration will not be found to stand this double test. Often (as will
+be shown further on) they are merely survivals of earlier social
+conditions, and have been preserved in obedience to that instinct that
+makes people cling to so many customs the meaning of which is lost.
+In other cases they have been revived by the archæologizing spirit
+which is so characteristic of the present time, and which so often
+leads its possessors to think that a thing must be beautiful because
+it is old and appropriate because it is beautiful.
+
+But since the beauty of all such features depends on their
+appropriateness, they may in every case be replaced by a more suitable
+form of treatment without loss to the general effect of house or room.
+It is this which makes it important that each room (or, better still,
+all the rooms) in a house should receive the same style of decoration.
+To some people this may seem as meaningless a piece of archaism as the
+habit of using obsolete fragments of planning or decoration; but such
+is not the case. It must not be forgotten, in discussing the question
+of reproducing certain styles, that the essence of a style lies not in
+its use of ornament, but in its handling of proportion. Structure
+conditions ornament, not ornament structure. That is, a room with
+unsuitably proportioned openings, wall-spaces and cornice might
+receive a surface application of Louis XV or Louis XVI ornament and
+not represent either of those styles of decoration; whereas a room
+constructed according to the laws of proportion accepted in one or the
+other of those periods, in spite of a surface application of
+decorative detail widely different in character,--say Romanesque or
+Gothic,--would yet maintain its distinctive style, because the detail,
+in conforming with the laws of proportion governing the structure of
+the room, must necessarily conform with its style. In other words,
+decoration is always subservient to proportion; and a room, whatever
+its decoration may be, must represent the style to which its
+proportions belong. The less cannot include the greater. Unfortunately
+it is usually by ornamental details, rather than by proportion, that
+people distinguish one style from another. To many persons, garlands,
+bow-knots, quivers, and a great deal of gilding represent the Louis
+XVI style; if they object to these, they condemn the style. To an
+architect familiar with the subject the same style means something
+absolutely different. He knows that a Louis XVI room may exist without
+any of these or similar characteristics; and he often deprecates their
+use as representing the cheaper and more trivial effects of the
+period, and those that have most helped to vulgarize it. In fact, in
+nine cases out of ten his use of them is a concession to the client
+who, having asked for a Louis XVI room, would not know he had got it
+were these details left out.[6]
+
+Another thing which has perhaps contributed to make people distrustful
+of "styles" is the garbled form in which they are presented by some
+architects. After a period of eclecticism that has lasted long enough
+to make architects and decorators lose their traditional habits of
+design, there has arisen a sudden demand for "style." It necessarily
+follows that only the most competent are ready to respond to this
+unexpected summons. Much has to be relearned, still more to be
+unlearned. The essence of the great styles lay in proportion and the
+science of proportion is not to be acquired in a day. In fact, in such
+matters the cultivated layman, whether or not he has any special
+familiarity with the different schools of architecture, is often a
+better judge than the half-educated architect. It is no wonder that
+people of taste are disconcerted by the so-called "colonial" houses
+where stair-rails are used as roof-balustrades and mantel-friezes
+as exterior entablatures, or by Louis XV rooms where the wavy movement
+which, in the best rococo, was always an ornamental incident and never
+broke up the main lines of the design, is suffered to run riot through
+the whole treatment of the walls, so that the bewildered eye seeks in
+vain for a straight line amid the whirl of incoherent curves.
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE IV._
+
+ FRENCH SOFA AND ARMCHAIR, LOUIS XIV PERIOD.
+ FROM THE CHÂTEAU DE BERCY.]
+
+To conform to a style, then, is to accept those rules of proportion
+which the artistic experience of centuries has established as the
+best, while within those limits allowing free scope to the individual
+requirements which must inevitably modify every house or room adapted
+to the use and convenience of its occupants.
+
+There is one thing more to be said in defence of conformity to style;
+and that is, the difficulty of getting rid of style. Strive as we may
+for originality, we are hampered at every turn by an artistic
+tradition of over two thousand years. Does any but the most
+inexperienced architect really think that he can ever rid himself of
+such an inheritance? He may mutilate or misapply the component parts
+of his design, but he cannot originate a whole new architectural
+alphabet. The chances are that he will not find it easy to invent one
+wholly new moulding.
+
+The styles especially suited to modern life have already been roughly
+indicated as those prevailing in Italy since 1500, in France from the
+time of Louis XIV, and in England since the introduction of the
+Italian manner by Inigo Jones; and as the French and English styles
+are perhaps more familiar to the general reader, the examples given
+will usually be drawn from these. Supposing the argument in favor of
+these styles to have been accepted, at least as a working hypothesis,
+it must be explained why, in each room, the decoration and furniture
+should harmonize. Most people will admit the necessity of harmonizing
+the colors in a room, because a feeling for color is more general than
+a feeling for form; but in reality the latter is the more important in
+decoration, and it is the feeling for form, and not any archæological
+affectation, which makes the best decorators insist upon the necessity
+of keeping to the same style of furniture and decoration. Thus the
+massive dimensions and heavy panelling of a seventeenth-century room
+would dwarf a set of eighteenth-century furniture; and the wavy,
+capricious movement of Louis XV decoration would make the austere yet
+delicate lines of Adam furniture look stiff and mean.
+
+Many persons object not only to any attempt at uniformity of style,
+but to the use of any recognized style in the decoration of a room.
+They characterize it, according to their individual views, as
+"servile," "formal," or "pretentious."
+
+It has already been suggested that to conform within rational limits
+to a given style is no more servile than to pay one's taxes or to
+write according to the rules of grammar. As to the accusations of
+formality and pretentiousness (which are more often made in America
+than elsewhere), they may probably be explained by the fact that most
+Americans necessarily form their idea of the great European styles
+from public buildings and palaces. Certainly, if an architect were to
+propose to his client to decorate a room in a moderate-sized house in
+the Louis XIV style, and if the client had formed his idea of that
+style from the state apartments in the palace at Versailles, he would
+be justified in rejecting the proposed treatment as absolutely
+unsuitable to modern private life; whereas the architect who had gone
+somewhat more deeply into the subject might have singled out the style
+as eminently suitable, having in mind one of the simple panelled
+rooms, with tall windows, a dignified fireplace, large tables and
+comfortable arm-chairs, which were to be found in the private houses
+of the same period (see Plate V). It is the old story of the two
+knights fighting about the color of the shield. Both architect and
+client would be right, but they would be looking at the different
+sides of the question. As a matter of fact, the bed-rooms,
+sitting-rooms, libraries and other private apartments in the smaller
+dwelling-houses built in Europe between 1650 and 1800 were far
+simpler, less pretentious and more practical in treatment than those
+in the average modern house.
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE V._
+
+ ROOM IN THE GRAND TRIANON, VERSAILLES.
+ (EXAMPLE OF SIMPLE LOUIS XIV DECORATION.)]
+
+It is therefore hoped that the antagonists of "style," when they are
+shown that to follow a certain style is not to sacrifice either
+convenience or imagination, but to give more latitude to both, will
+withdraw an opposition which seems to be based on a misapprehension of
+facts.
+
+Hitherto architecture and decoration have been spoken of as one, as in
+any well-designed house they ought to be. Indeed, it is one of the
+numerous disadvantages of the present use of styles, that unless the
+architect who has built the house also decorates it, the most hopeless
+discord is apt to result. This was otherwise before our present desire
+for variety had thrown architects, decorators, and workmen out of the
+regular routine of their business. Before 1800 the decorator called
+upon to treat the interior of a house invariably found a suitable
+background prepared for his work, while much in the way of detail was
+intrusted to the workmen, who were trained in certain traditions
+instead of being called upon to carry out in each new house the
+vagaries of a different designer.
+
+But it is with the decorator's work alone that these pages are
+concerned, and the above digression is intended to explain why his
+task is now so difficult, and why his results are so often
+unsatisfactory to himself as well as to his clients. The decorator of
+the present day may be compared to a person who is called upon to
+write a letter in the English language, but is ordered, in so doing,
+to conform to the Chinese or Egyptian rules of grammar, or possibly to
+both together.
+
+By the use of a little common sense and a reasonable conformity to
+those traditions of design which have been tested by generations of
+architects, it is possible to produce great variety in the decoration
+of rooms without losing sight of the purpose for which they are
+intended. Indeed, the more closely this purpose is kept in view, and
+the more clearly it is expressed in all the details of each room, the
+more pleasing that room will be, so that it is easy to make a room
+with tinted walls, deal furniture and dimity curtains more beautiful,
+because more logical and more harmonious, than a ball-room lined with
+gold and marbles, in which the laws of rhythm and logic have been
+ignored.
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE VI._
+
+ FRENCH ARMCHAIR, LOUIS XV PERIOD.]
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[1] Charming as the Italian villa is, it can hardly be used in our
+Northern States without certain modifications, unless it is merely
+occupied for a few weeks in mid-summer; whereas the average French or
+English country house built after 1600 is perfectly suited to our
+climate and habits. The chief features of the Italian villa are the
+open central _cortile_ and the large saloon two stories high. An
+adaptation of these better suited to a cold climate is to be found in
+the English country houses built in the Palladian manner after its
+introduction by Inigo Jones. See Campbell's _Vitruvius Britannicus_
+for numerous examples.
+
+[2] The plan of the Hôtel Voguë has been greatly modified.
+
+[3] Cabinets retained this shape after the transporting of furniture
+had ceased to be a necessity (see Plate III).
+
+[4] It must be remembered that in describing the decoration of any
+given period, we refer to the private houses, not the royal palaces,
+of that period. Versailles was more splendid than any previous palace;
+but private houses at that date were less splendid, though far more
+luxurious, than during the Renaissance.
+
+[5] "Si l'on dispose un édifice d'une manière convenable à l'usage
+auquel on le destine, ne différera-t-il pas sensiblement d'un autre
+édifice destiné à un autre usage? N'aura-t-il pas naturellement un
+caractère, et, qui plus est, son caractère propre?" J. L. N. Durand.
+_Précis des Leçons d'Architecture données à l'École Royale
+Polytechnique._ Paris, 1823.
+
+[6] It must not be forgotten that the so-called "styles" of Louis XIV,
+Louis XV and Louis XVI were, in fact, only the gradual development of
+one organic style, and hence differed only in the superficial use of
+ornament.
+
+
+
+
+II
+
+ROOMS IN GENERAL
+
+
+Before beginning to decorate a room it is essential to consider for
+what purpose the room is to be used. It is not enough to ticket it
+with some such general designation as "library," "drawing-room," or
+"den." The individual tastes and habits of the people who are to
+occupy it must be taken into account; it must be not "a library," or
+"a drawing-room," but the library or the drawing-room best suited to
+the master or mistress of the house which is being decorated.
+Individuality in house-furnishing has seldom been more harped upon
+than at the present time. That cheap originality which finds
+expression in putting things to uses for which they were not intended
+is often confounded with individuality; whereas the latter consists
+not in an attempt to be different from other people at the cost of
+comfort, but in the desire to be comfortable in one's own way, even
+though it be the way of a monotonously large majority. It seems easier
+to most people to arrange a room like some one else's than to analyze
+and express their own needs. Men, in these matters, are less exacting
+than women, because their demands, besides being simpler, are
+uncomplicated by the feminine tendency to want things because other
+people have them, rather than to have things because they are wanted.
+
+But it must never be forgotten that every one is unconsciously
+tyrannized over by the wants of others,--the wants of dead and gone
+predecessors, who have an inconvenient way of thrusting their
+different habits and tastes across the current of later existences.
+The unsatisfactory relations of some people with their rooms are often
+to be explained in this way. They have still in their blood the
+traditional uses to which these rooms were put in times quite
+different from the present. It is only an unconscious extension of the
+conscious habit which old-fashioned people have of clinging to their
+parents' way of living. The difficulty of reconciling these instincts
+with our own comfort and convenience, and the various compromises to
+which they lead in the arrangement of our rooms, will be more fully
+dealt with in the following chapters. To go to the opposite extreme
+and discard things because they are old-fashioned is equally
+unreasonable. The golden mean lies in trying to arrange our houses
+with a view to our own comfort and convenience; and it will be found
+that the more closely we follow this rule the easier our rooms will be
+to furnish and the pleasanter to live in.
+
+People whose attention has never been specially called to the _raison
+d'être_ of house-furnishing sometimes conclude that because a thing is
+unusual it is artistic, or rather that through some occult process the
+most ordinary things become artistic by being used in an unusual
+manner; while others, warned by the visible results of this theory of
+furnishing, infer that everything artistic is unpractical. In the
+Anglo-Saxon mind beauty is not spontaneously born of material wants,
+as it is with the Latin races. We have to _make_ things beautiful;
+they do not grow so of themselves. The necessity of making this effort
+has caused many people to put aside the whole problem of beauty and
+fitness in household decoration as something mysterious and
+incomprehensible to the uninitiated. The architect and decorator are
+often aware that they are regarded by their clients as the possessors
+of some strange craft like black magic or astrology.
+
+This fatalistic attitude has complicated the simple and intelligible
+process of house-furnishing, and has produced much of the discomfort
+which causes so many rooms to be shunned by everybody in the house, in
+spite (or rather because) of all the money and ingenuity expended on
+their arrangement. Yet to penetrate the mystery of house-furnishing it
+is only necessary to analyze one satisfactory room and to notice
+wherein its charm lies. To the fastidious eye it will, of course, be
+found in fitness of proportion, in the proper use of each moulding and
+in the harmony of all the decorative processes; and even to those who
+think themselves indifferent to such detail, much of the sense of
+restfulness and comfort produced by certain rooms depends on the due
+adjustment of their fundamental parts. Different rooms minister to
+different wants and while a room may be made very livable without
+satisfying any but the material requirements of its inmates it is
+evident that the perfect room should combine these qualities with what
+corresponds to them in a higher order of needs. At present, however,
+the subject deals only with the material livableness of a room, and
+this will generally be found to consist in the position of the doors
+and fireplace, the accessibility of the windows, the arrangement of
+the furniture, the privacy of the room and the absence of the
+superfluous.
+
+The position of doors and fireplace, though the subject comes properly
+under the head of house-planning, may be included in this summary,
+because in rearranging a room it is often possible to change its
+openings, or at any rate, in the case of doors, to modify their
+dimensions.
+
+The fireplace must be the focus of every rational scheme of
+arrangement. Nothing is so dreary, so hopeless to deal with, as a room
+in which the fireplace occupies a narrow space between two doors, so
+that it is impossible to sit about the hearth.[7] Next in importance
+come the windows. In town houses especially, where there is so little
+light that every ray is precious to the reader or worker, window-space
+is invaluable. Yet in few rooms are the windows easy of approach, free
+from useless draperies and provided with easy-chairs so placed that
+the light falls properly on the occupant's work.
+
+It is no exaggeration to say that many houses are deserted by the men
+of the family for lack of those simple comforts which they find at
+their clubs: windows unobscured by layers of muslin, a fireplace
+surrounded by easy-chairs and protected from draughts, well-appointed
+writing-tables and files of papers and magazines. Who cannot call to
+mind the dreary drawing-room, in small town houses the only possible
+point of reunion for the family, but too often, in consequence of its
+exquisite discomfort, of no more use as a meeting-place than the
+vestibule or the cellar? The windows in this kind of room are
+invariably supplied with two sets of muslin curtains, one hanging
+against the panes, the other fulfilling the supererogatory duty of
+hanging against the former; then come the heavy stuff curtains, so
+draped as to cut off the upper light of the windows by day, while it
+is impossible to drop them at night: curtains that have thus ceased to
+serve the purpose for which they exist. Close to the curtains
+stands the inevitable lamp or jardinière, and the wall-space
+between the two windows, where a writing-table might be put, is
+generally taken up by a cabinet or console, surmounted by a picture
+made invisible by the dark shadow of the hangings. The writing-table
+might find place against the side-wall near either window; but these
+spaces are usually sacred to the piano and to that modern futility,
+the silver-table. Thus of necessity the writing-table is either
+banished or put in some dark corner, where it is little wonder that
+the ink dries unused and a vase of flowers grows in the middle of the
+blotting-pad.
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE VII._
+
+ FRENCH BERGÈRE, LOUIS XVI PERIOD.]
+
+The hearth should be the place about which people gather; but the
+mantelpiece in the average American house, being ugly, is usually
+covered with inflammable draperies; the fire is, in consequence,
+rarely lit, and no one cares to sit about a fireless hearth. Besides,
+on the opposite side of the room is a gap in the wall eight or ten
+feet wide, opening directly upon the hall, and exposing what should be
+the most private part of the room to the scrutiny of messengers,
+servants and visitors. This opening is sometimes provided with doors;
+but these, as a rule, are either slid into the wall or are unhung and
+replaced by a curtain through which every word spoken in the room must
+necessarily pass. In such a room it matters very little how the rest
+of the furniture is arranged, since it is certain that no one will
+ever sit in it except the luckless visitor who has no other refuge.
+
+Even the visitor might be thought entitled to the solace of a few
+books; but as all the tables in the room are littered with
+knick-knacks, it is difficult for the most philanthropic hostess to
+provide even this slight alleviation.
+
+When the town-house is built on the basement plan, and the
+drawing-room or parlor is up-stairs, the family, to escape from its
+discomforts, habitually take refuge in the small room opening off the
+hall on the ground floor; so that instead of sitting in a room twenty
+or twenty-five feet wide, they are packed into one less than half that
+size and exposed to the frequent intrusions from which, in basement
+houses, the drawing-room is free. But too often even the "little room
+down-stairs" is arranged less like a sitting-room in a private house
+than a waiting-room at a fashionable doctor's or dentist's. It has the
+inevitable yawning gap in the wall, giving on the hall close to the
+front door, and is either the refuge of the ugliest and most
+uncomfortable furniture in the house, or, even if furnished with
+taste, is arranged with so little regard to comfort that one might as
+well make it part of the hall, as is often done in rearranging old
+houses. This habit of sacrificing a useful room to the useless
+widening of the hall is indeed the natural outcome of furnishing rooms
+of this kind in so unpractical a way that their real usefulness has
+ceased to be apparent. The science of restoring wasted rooms to their
+proper uses is one of the most important and least understood branches
+of house-furnishing.
+
+Privacy would seem to be one of the first requisites of civilized
+life, yet it is only necessary to observe the planning and arrangement
+of the average house to see how little this need is recognized. Each
+room in a house has its individual uses: some are made to sleep in,
+others are for dressing, eating, study, or conversation; but whatever
+the uses of a room, they are seriously interfered with if it be not
+preserved as a small world by itself. If the drawing-room be a part of
+the hall and the library a part of the drawing-room, all three will be
+equally unfitted to serve their special purpose. The indifference to
+privacy which has sprung up in modern times, and which in France, for
+instance, has given rise to the grotesque conceit of putting sheets
+of plate-glass between two rooms, and of replacing doorways by
+openings fifteen feet wide, is of complex origin. It is probably due
+in part to the fact that many houses are built and decorated by people
+unfamiliar with the habits of those for whom they are building. It may
+be that architect and decorator live in a simpler manner than their
+clients, and are therefore ready to sacrifice a kind of comfort of
+which they do not feel the need to the "effects" obtainable by vast
+openings and extended "vistas." To the untrained observer size often
+appeals more than proportion and costliness than suitability. In a
+handsome house such an observer is attracted rather by the ornamental
+detail than by the underlying purpose of planning and decoration. He
+sees the beauty of the detail, but not its relation to the whole. He
+therefore regards it as elegant but useless; and his next step is to
+infer that there is an inherent elegance in what is useless.
+
+Before beginning to decorate a house it is necessary to make a
+prolonged and careful study of its plan and elevations, both as a
+whole and in detail. The component parts of an undecorated room are
+its floor, ceiling, wall-spaces and openings. The openings consist of
+the doors, windows and fireplace; and of these, as has already been
+pointed out, the fireplace is the most important in the general scheme
+of decoration.
+
+No room can be satisfactory unless its openings are properly placed
+and proportioned, and the decorator's task is much easier if he has
+also been the architect of the house he is employed to decorate; but
+as this seldom happens his ingenuity is frequently taxed to produce a
+good design upon the background of a faulty and illogical structure.
+Much may be done to overcome this difficulty by making slight changes
+in the proportions of the openings; and the skilful decorator, before
+applying his scheme of decoration, will do all that he can to correct
+the fundamental lines of the room. But the result is seldom so
+successful as if he had built the room, and those who employ different
+people to build and decorate their houses should at least try to
+select an architect and a decorator trained in the same school of
+composition, so that they may come to some understanding with regard
+to the general harmony of their work.
+
+In deciding upon a scheme of decoration, it is necessary to keep in
+mind the relation of furniture to ornament, and of the room as a whole
+to other rooms in the house. As in a small house a very large room
+dwarfs all the others, so a room decorated in a very rich manner will
+make the simplicity of those about it look mean. Every house should be
+decorated according to a carefully graduated scale of ornamentation
+culminating in the most important room of the house; but this plan
+must be carried out with such due sense of the relation of the rooms
+to each other that there shall be no violent break in the continuity
+of treatment. If a white-and-gold drawing-room opens on a hall with a
+Brussels carpet and papered walls, the drawing-room will look too fine
+and the hall mean.
+
+In the furnishing of each room the same rule should be as carefully
+observed. The simplest and most cheaply furnished room (provided the
+furniture be good of its kind, and the walls and carpet
+unobjectionable in color) will be more pleasing to the fastidious eye
+than one in which gilded consoles and cabinets of buhl stand side by
+side with cheap machine-made furniture, and delicate old marquetry
+tables are covered with trashy china ornaments.
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE VIII._
+
+ FRENCH BERGÈRE, LOUIS XVI PERIOD.]
+
+It is, of course, not always possible to refurnish a room when it is
+redecorated. Many people must content themselves with using their
+old furniture, no matter how ugly and ill-assorted it may be; and it
+is the decorator's business to see that his background helps the
+furniture to look its best. It is a mistake to think that because the
+furniture of a room is inappropriate or ugly a good background will
+bring out these defects. It will, on the contrary, be a relief to the
+eye to escape from the bad lines of the furniture to the good lines of
+the walls; and should the opportunity to purchase new furniture ever
+come, there will be a suitable background ready to show it to the best
+advantage.
+
+Most rooms contain a mixture of good, bad, and indifferent furniture.
+It is best to adapt the decorative treatment to the best pieces and to
+discard those which are in bad taste, replacing them, if necessary, by
+willow chairs and stained deal tables until it is possible to buy
+something better. When the room is to be refurnished as well as
+redecorated the client often makes his purchases without regard to the
+decoration. Besides being an injustice to the decorator, inasmuch as
+it makes it impossible for him to harmonize his decoration with the
+furniture, this generally produces a result unsatisfactory to the
+owner of the house. Neither decoration nor furniture, however good of
+its kind, can look its best unless each is chosen with reference to
+the other. It is therefore necessary that the decorator, before
+planning his treatment of a room, should be told what it is to
+contain. If a gilt set is put in a room the walls of which are treated
+in low relief and painted white, the high lights of the gilding will
+destroy the delicate values of the mouldings, and the walls, at a
+little distance, will look like flat expanses of whitewashed plaster.
+
+When a room is to be furnished and decorated at the smallest possible
+cost, it must be remembered that the comfort of its occupants depends
+more on the nature of the furniture than of the wall-decorations or
+carpet. In a living-room of this kind it is best to tint the walls and
+put a cheerful drugget on the floor, keeping as much money as possible
+for the purchase of comfortable chairs and sofas and substantial
+tables. If little can be spent in buying furniture, willow
+arm-chairs[8] with denim cushions and solid tables with stained legs
+and covers of denim or corduroy will be more satisfactory than the
+"parlor suit" turned out in thousands by the manufacturer of cheap
+furniture, or the pseudo-Georgian or pseudo-Empire of the dealer in
+"high-grade goods." Plain bookcases may be made of deal, painted or
+stained; and a room treated in this way, with a uniform color on the
+wall, and plenty of lamps and books, is sure to be comfortable and can
+never be vulgar.
+
+It is to be regretted that, in this country and in England, it should
+be almost impossible to buy plain but well-designed and substantial
+furniture. Nothing can exceed the ugliness of the current designs: the
+bedsteads with towering head-boards fretted by the versatile jig-saw;
+the "bedroom suits" of "mahoganized" cherry, bird's-eye maple, or some
+other crude-colored wood; the tables with meaninglessly turned legs;
+the "Empire" chairs and consoles stuck over with ornaments of cast
+bronze washed in liquid gilding; and, worst of all, the supposed
+"Colonial" furniture, that unworthy travesty of a plain and dignified
+style. All this showy stuff has been produced in answer to the
+increasing demand for cheap "effects" in place of unobtrusive merit in
+material and design; but now that an appreciation of better things in
+architecture is becoming more general, it is to be hoped that the
+"artistic" furniture disfiguring so many of our shop-windows will no
+longer find a market.
+
+There is no lack of models for manufacturers to copy, if their
+customers will but demand what is good. France and England, in the
+eighteenth century, excelled in the making of plain, inexpensive
+furniture of walnut, mahogany, or painted beechwood (see Plates
+VII-X). Simple in shape and substantial in construction, this kind of
+furniture was never tricked out with moulded bronzes and machine-made
+carving, or covered with liquid gilding, but depended for its effect
+upon the solid qualities of good material, good design and good
+workmanship. The eighteenth-century cabinet-maker did not attempt
+cheap copies of costly furniture; the common sense of his patrons
+would have resented such a perversion of taste. Were the modern public
+as fastidious, it would soon be easy to buy good furniture for a
+moderate price; but until people recognize the essential vulgarity of
+the pinchbeck article flooding our shops and overflowing upon our
+sidewalks, manufacturers will continue to offer such wares in
+preference to better but less showy designs.
+
+The worst defects of the furniture now made in America are due to an
+Athenian thirst for novelty, not always regulated by an Athenian sense
+of fitness. No sooner is it known that beautiful furniture was made in
+the time of Marie-Antoinette than an epidemic of supposed
+"Marie-Antoinette" rooms breaks out over the whole country. Neither
+purchaser nor manufacturer has stopped to inquire wherein the
+essentials of the style consist. They know that the rooms of the
+period were usually painted in light colors, and that the furniture
+(in palaces) was often gilt and covered with brocade; and it is taken
+for granted that plenty of white paint, a pale wall-paper with
+bow-knots, and fragile chairs dipped in liquid gilding and covered
+with a flowered silk-and-cotton material, must inevitably produce a
+"Marie-Antoinette" room. According to the creed of the modern
+manufacturer, you have only to combine certain "goods" to obtain a
+certain style.
+
+This quest of artistic novelties would be encouraging were it based on
+the desire for something better, rather than for something merely
+different. The tendency to dash from one style to another, without
+stopping to analyze the intrinsic qualities of any, has defeated the
+efforts of those who have tried to teach the true principles of
+furniture-designing by a return to the best models. If people will buy
+the stuff now offered them as Empire, Sheraton or Louis XVI, the
+manufacturer is not to blame for making it. It is not the maker but
+the purchaser who sets the standard; and there will never be any
+general supply of better furniture until people take time to study the
+subject, and find out wherein lies the radical unfitness of what now
+contents them.
+
+Until this golden age arrives the householder who cannot afford to buy
+old pieces, or to have old models copied by a skilled cabinet-maker,
+had better restrict himself to the plainest of furniture, relying for
+the embellishment of his room upon good bookbindings and one or two
+old porcelain vases for his lamps.
+
+Concerning the difficult question of color, it is safe to say that the
+fewer the colors used in a room, the more pleasing and restful the
+result will be. A multiplicity of colors produces the same effect as a
+number of voices talking at the same time. The voices may not be
+discordant, but continuous chatter is fatiguing in the long run. Each
+room should speak with but one voice: it should contain one color,
+which at once and unmistakably asserts its predominance, in obedience
+to the rule that where there is a division of parts one part shall
+visibly prevail over all the others.
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE IX._
+
+ FRENCH SOFA, LOUIS XV PERIOD.
+ TAPESTRY DESIGNED BY BOUCHER.]
+
+To attain this result, it is best to use the same color and, if
+possible, the same material, for curtains and chair-coverings. This
+produces an impression of unity and gives an air of spaciousness to
+the room. When the walls are simply panelled in oak or walnut, or are
+painted in some neutral tones, such as gray and white, the carpet may
+contrast in color with the curtains and chair-coverings. For instance,
+in an oak-panelled room crimson curtains and chair-coverings may be
+used with a dull green carpet, or with one of dark blue patterned in
+subdued tints; or the color-scheme may be reversed, and green hangings
+and chair-coverings combined with a plain crimson carpet.
+
+Where the walls are covered with tapestry, or hung with a large number
+of pictures, or, in short, are so treated that they present a variety
+of colors, it is best that curtains, chair-coverings and carpet should
+all be of one color and without pattern. Graduated shades of the same
+color should almost always be avoided; theoretically they seem
+harmonious, but in reality the light shades look faded in proximity
+with the darker ones. Though it is well, as a rule, that carpet and
+hangings should match, exception must always be made in favor of a
+really fine old Eastern rug. The tints of such rugs are too subdued,
+too subtly harmonized by time, to clash with any colors the room may
+contain; but those who cannot cover their floors in this way will do
+well to use carpets of uniform tint, rather than the gaudy rugs now
+made in the East. The modern red and green Smyrna or Turkey carpet is
+an exception. Where the furniture is dark and substantial, and the
+predominating color is a strong green or crimson, such a carpet is
+always suitable. These Smyrna carpets are usually well designed; and
+if their colors be restricted to red and green, with small admixture
+of dark blue, they harmonize with almost any style of decoration. It
+is well, as a rule, to shun the decorative schemes concocted by the
+writers who supply our newspapers with hints for "artistic interiors."
+The use of such poetic adjectives as jonquil-yellow, willow-green,
+shell-pink, or ashes-of-roses, gives to these descriptions of the
+"unique boudoir" or "ideal summer room" a charm which the reality
+would probably not possess. The arrangements suggested are usually
+cheap devices based upon the mistaken idea that defects in structure
+or design may be remedied by an overlaying of color or ornament. This
+theory often leads to the spending of much more money than would have
+been required to make one or two changes in the plan of the room, and
+the result is never satisfactory to the fastidious.
+
+There are but two ways of dealing with a room which is fundamentally
+ugly: one is to accept it, and the other is courageously to correct
+its ugliness. Half-way remedies are a waste of money and serve rather
+to call attention to the defects of the room than to conceal them.
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE X._
+
+ FRENCH MARQUETRY TABLE, LOUIS XVI PERIOD.]
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[7] There is no objection to putting a fireplace between two doors,
+provided both doors be at least six feet from the chimney.
+
+[8] Not rattan, as the models are too bad.
+
+
+
+
+III
+
+WALLS
+
+
+Proportion is the good breeding of architecture. It is that something,
+indefinable to the unprofessional eye, which gives repose and
+distinction to a room: in its origin a matter of nice mathematical
+calculation, of scientific adjustment of voids and masses, but in its
+effects as intangible as that all-pervading essence which the ancients
+called the soul.
+
+It is not proposed to enter here into a technical discussion of the
+delicate problem of proportion. The decorator, with whom this book is
+chiefly concerned, is generally not consulted until the house that he
+is to decorate has been built--and built, in all probability, quite
+without reference to the interior treatment it is destined to receive.
+All he can hope to do is, by slight modifications here and there in
+the dimensions or position of the openings, to re-establish that
+harmony of parts so frequently disregarded in modern house-planning.
+It often happens, however, that the decorator's desire to make these
+slight changes, upon which the success of his whole scheme depends, is
+a source of perplexity and distress to his bewildered client, who sees
+in it merely the inclination to find fault with another's work.
+Nothing can be more natural than this attitude on the part of the
+client. How is he to decide between the architect, who has possibly
+disregarded in some measure the claims of symmetry and proportion in
+planning the interior of the house, and the decorator who insists upon
+those claims without being able to justify his demands by any
+explanation comprehensible to the unprofessional? It is inevitable
+that the decorator, who comes last, should fare worse, especially as
+he makes his appearance at a time when contractors' bills are pouring
+in, and the proposition to move a mantelpiece or change the dimensions
+of a door opens fresh vistas of expense to the client's terrified
+imagination.
+
+Undoubtedly these difficulties have diminished in the last few years.
+Architects are turning anew to the lost tradition of symmetry and to a
+scientific study of the relation between voids and masses, and the
+decorator's task has become correspondingly easier. Still, there are
+many cases where his work is complicated by some trifling obstacle,
+the removal of which the client opposes only because he cannot in
+imagination foresee the improvement which would follow. If the client
+permits the change to be made, he has no difficulty in appreciating
+the result: he cannot see it in advance.
+
+A few words from Isaac Ware's admirable chapter on "The Origin of
+Proportions in the Orders"[9] may serve to show the importance of
+proportion in all schemes of decoration, and the necessity of
+conforming to certain rules that may at first appear both arbitrary
+and incomprehensible.
+
+"An architect of genius," Ware writes (alluding to the latitude which
+the ancients allowed themselves in using the orders), "will think
+himself happy, in designing a building that is to be enriched with the
+Doric order, that he has all the latitude between two and a half and
+seventeen for the projecture of its capital; that he can proportion
+this projecture to the general idea of his building anywhere between
+these extremes and show his authority. This is an happiness to the
+person of real genius;... but as all architects are not, nor can be
+expected to be, of this stamp, it is needful some standard should be
+established, founded upon what a good taste shall most admire in the
+antique, and fixed as a model from which to work, or as a test to
+which we may have recourse in disputes and controversies."
+
+If to these words be added his happy definition of the sense of
+proportion as "fancy under the restraint and conduct of judgment," and
+his closing caution that "it is mean in the undertaker of a great work
+to copy strictly, and it is dangerous to give a loose to fancy
+_without a perfect knowledge how far a variation may be justified_,"
+the unprofessional reader may form some idea of the importance of
+proportion and of the necessity for observing its rules.
+
+If proportion is the good breeding of architecture, symmetry, or the
+answering of one part to another, may be defined as the sanity of
+decoration. The desire for symmetry, for balance, for rhythm in form
+as well as in sound, is one of the most inveterate of human instincts.
+Yet for years Anglo-Saxons have been taught that to pay any regard to
+symmetry in architecture or decoration is to truckle to one of the
+meanest forms of artistic hypocrisy. The master who has taught this
+strange creed, in words magical enough to win acceptance for any
+doctrine, has also revealed to his generation so many of the forgotten
+beauties of early art that it is hard to dispute his principles of
+æsthetics. As a guide through the byways of art, Mr. Ruskin is
+entitled to the reverence and gratitude of all; but as a logical
+exponent of the causes and effects of the beauty he discovers, his
+authority is certainly open to question. For years he has spent the
+full force of his unmatched prose in denouncing the enormity of
+putting a door or a window in a certain place in order that it may
+correspond to another; nor has he scrupled to declare to the victims
+of this practice that it leads to abysses of moral as well as of
+artistic degradation.
+
+Time has taken the terror from these threats and architects are
+beginning to see that a regard for external symmetry, far from
+interfering with the requirements of house-planning, tends to produce
+a better, because a more carefully studied, plan, as well as a more
+convenient distribution of wall-space; but in the lay mind there still
+lingers not only a vague association between outward symmetry and
+interior discomfort, between a well-balanced facade and badly
+distributed rooms, but a still vaguer notion that regard for symmetry
+indicates poverty of invention, lack of ingenuity and weak
+subservience to a meaningless form.
+
+What the instinct for symmetry means, philosophers may be left to
+explain; but that it does exist, that it means something, and that it
+is most strongly developed in those races which have reached the
+highest artistic civilization, must be acknowledged by all students of
+sociology. It is, therefore, not superfluous to point out that, in
+interior decoration as well as in architecture, a regard for symmetry,
+besides satisfying a legitimate artistic requirement, tends to make
+the average room not only easier to furnish, but more comfortable to
+live in.
+
+ [Illustration _PLATE XI._
+
+ DRAWING-ROOM IN BERKELEY SQUARE, LONDON. XVIII CENTURY.]
+
+As the effect produced by a room depends chiefly upon the distribution
+of its openings, it will be well to begin by considering the treatment
+of the walls. It has already been said that the decorator can often
+improve a room, not only from the artistic point of view, but as
+regards the comfort of its inmates, by making some slight change in
+the position of its openings. Take, for instance, a library in which
+it is necessary to put the two principal bookcases one on each side of
+a door or fireplace. If this opening is in the _centre_ of one side of
+the room, the wall-decorations may be made to balance, and the
+bookcases may be of the same width,--an arrangement which will give to
+the room an air of spaciousness and repose. Should the wall-spaces on
+either side of the opening be of unequal extent, both decorations and
+bookcases must be modified in size and design; and not only does the
+problem become more difficult, but the result, because necessarily
+less simple, is certain to be less satisfactory. Sometimes, on the
+other hand, convenience is sacrificed to symmetry; and in such cases
+it is the decorator's business to remedy this defect, while preserving
+to the eye the aspect of symmetry. A long narrow room may be taken as
+an example. If the fireplace is in the centre of one of the long sides
+of the room, with a door directly opposite, the hearth will be without
+privacy and the room virtually divided into two parts, since, in a
+narrow room, no one cares to sit in a line with the doorway. This
+division of the room makes it more difficult to furnish and less
+comfortable to live in, besides wasting all the floor-space between
+the chimney and the door. One way of overcoming the difficulty is to
+move the door some distance down the long side of the room, so that
+the space about the fireplace is no longer a thoroughfare, and the
+privacy of the greater part of the room is preserved, even if the door
+be left open. The removal of the door from the centre of one side of
+the room having disturbed the equilibrium of the openings, this
+equilibrium may be restored by placing in a line with the door, at the
+other end of the same side-wall, a piece of furniture corresponding as
+nearly as possible in height and width to the door. This will satisfy
+the eye, which in matters of symmetry demands, not absolute similarity
+of detail, but merely correspondence of outline and dimensions.
+
+It is idle to multiply examples of the various ways in which such
+readjustments of the openings may increase the comfort and beauty of a
+room. Every problem in house decoration demands a slightly different
+application of the same general principles, and the foregoing
+instances are intended only to show how much depends upon the placing
+of openings and how reasonable is the decorator's claim to have a
+share in planning the background upon which his effects are to be
+produced.
+
+It may surprise those whose attention has not been turned to such
+matters to be told that in all but the most cheaply constructed houses
+the interior walls are invariably treated as an order. In all houses,
+even of the poorest kind, the walls of the rooms are finished by a
+plain projecting board adjoining the floor, surmounted by one or more
+mouldings. This base, as it is called, is nothing more nor less than
+the part of an order between shaft and floor, or shaft and pedestal,
+as the case may be. If it be next remarked that the upper part of the
+wall, adjoining the ceiling, is invariably finished by a moulded
+projection corresponding with the crowning member of an order, it will
+be clear that the shaft, with its capital, has simply been omitted, or
+that the uniform wall-space between the base and cornice has been
+regarded as replacing it. In rooms of a certain height and importance
+the column or pilaster is frequently restored to its proper place
+between base and cornice; but where such treatment is too monumental
+for the dimensions of the room, the main lines of the wall-space
+should none the less be regarded as distinctly architectural, and the
+decoration applied should be subordinate to the implied existence of
+an order. (For the application of an order to walls, see Plates XLII
+and L.)
+
+Where the shafts are omitted, the eye undoubtedly feels a lack of
+continuity in the treatment: the cornice seems to hang in air and the
+effect produced is unsatisfactory. This is obviated by the use of
+panelling, the vertical lines carried up at intervals from base to
+cornice satisfying the need for some visible connection between the
+upper and lower members of the order. Moreover, if the lines of the
+openings are carried up to the cornice (as they are in all
+well-designed schemes of decoration), the openings may be considered
+as intercolumniations and the intermediate wall-spaces as the shafts
+or piers supporting the cornice.
+
+In well-finished rooms the order is usually imagined as resting, not
+on the floor, but on pedestals, or rather on a continuous pedestal.
+This continuous pedestal, or "dado" as it is usually called, is
+represented by a plinth surmounted by mouldings, by an intermediate
+member often decorated with tablets or sunk panels with moulded
+margins, and by a cornice. The use of the dado raises the chief
+wall-decoration of the room to a level with the eye and prevents its
+being interrupted or concealed by the furniture which may be placed
+against the walls. This fact makes it clear that in all well-designed
+rooms there should be a dado about two and a half feet high. If lower
+than this, it does not serve its purpose of raising the
+wall-decoration to a line above the furniture; while the high dado
+often seen in modern American rooms throws all the rest of the
+panelling out of scale and loses its own significance as the pedestal
+supporting an order.
+
+In rooms of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, when little
+furniture was used, the dado was often richly ornamented, being
+sometimes painted with delicate arabesques corresponding with those on
+the doors and inside shutters. As rooms grew smaller and the quantity
+of furniture increased so much that the dado was almost concealed, the
+treatment of the latter was wisely simplified, being reduced, as a
+rule, to sunk panels and a few strongly marked mouldings. The
+decorator cannot do better than plan the ornamentation of his dado
+according to the amount of furniture to be placed against the walls.
+In corridor or antechamber, or in a ball-room, the dado may receive a
+more elaborate treatment than is necessary in a library or
+drawing-room, where probably much less of it will be seen. It was not
+unusual, in the decoration of lobbies and corridors in old French and
+Italian houses, to omit the dado entirely if an order was used, thus
+bringing the wall-decoration down to the base-board; but this was done
+only in rooms or passage-ways not meant to contain any furniture.
+
+The three noblest forms of wall-decoration are fresco-painting,
+panelling, and tapestry hangings. In the best period of decoration all
+three were regarded as subordinate to the architectural lines of the
+room. The Italian fresco-painters, from Giotto to Tiepolo, never lost
+sight of the interrelation between painting and architecture. It
+matters not if the connection between base and cornice be maintained
+by actual pilasters or mouldings, or by their painted or woven
+imitations. The line, and not the substance, is what the eye demands.
+It is a curious perversion of artistic laws that has led certain
+critics to denounce painted architecture or woven mouldings. As in
+imaginative literature the author may present to his reader as
+possible anything that he has the talent to make the reader accept, so
+in decorative art the artist is justified in presenting to the eye
+whatever his skill can devise to satisfy its requirements; nor is
+there any insincerity in this proceeding. Decorative art is not an
+exact science. The decorator is not a chemist or a physiologist; it is
+part of his mission, not to explain illusions, but to produce them.
+Subject only to laws established by the limitations of the eye, he is
+master of the domain of fancy, of that _pays bleu_ of the impossible
+that it is his privilege to throw open to the charmed imagination.
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE XII._
+
+ ROOM IN THE VILLA VERTEMATI, NEAR CHIAVENNA.
+ XVI OR EARLY XVII CENTURY.
+ (EXAMPLE OF FRESCOED CEILING.)]
+
+Of the means of wall-decoration already named, fresco-painting and
+stucco-panelling were generally preferred by Italian decorators, and
+wood-panelling and tapestries by those of northern Europe. The use of
+arras naturally commended itself to the northern noble, shivering in
+his draughty castles and obliged to carry from one to another the
+furniture and hangings that the unsettled state of the country made it
+impossible to leave behind him. Italy, however, long supplied the
+finest designs to the tapestry-looms of northern Europe, as the
+Italian painters provided ready-made backgrounds of peaked hills,
+winding torrents and pinnacled cities to the German engravers and the
+Flemish painters of their day.
+
+Tapestry, in the best periods of house-decoration, was always
+subordinated to the architectural lines of the room (see Plate XI).
+Where it was not specially woven for the panels it was intended to
+fill, the subdivisions of the wall-spaces were adapted to its
+dimensions. It was carefully fitted into the panelling of the room,
+and never made to turn an angle, as wall-paper does in modern rooms,
+nor combined with other odds and ends of decoration. If a room was
+tapestried, it was tapestried, not decorated in some other way, with
+bits of tapestry hung here and there at random over the fundamental
+lines of the decoration. Nothing can be more beautiful than tapestry
+properly used; but hung up without regard to the composition of the
+room, here turning an angle, there covering a part of the dado or
+overlapping a pilaster, it not only loses its own value, but destroys
+the whole scheme of decoration with which it is thus unmeaningly
+combined.
+
+Italian panelling was of stone, marble or stucco, while in northern
+Europe it was so generally of wood that (in England especially) the
+term _panelling_ has become almost synonymous with _wood-panelling_,
+and in some minds there is a curious impression that any panelling not
+of wood is a sham. As a matter of fact, wood-panelling was used in
+northern Europe simply because it kept the cold out more successfully
+than a _revêtement_ of stone or plaster; while south of the Alps its
+use was avoided for the equally good reason that in hot climates it
+attracts vermin.
+
+If priority of use be held as establishing a standard in decoration,
+wood-panelling should be regarded as a sham and plaster-panelling as
+its lawful prototype; for the use of stucco in the panelling of walls
+and ceilings is highly characteristic of Roman interior decoration,
+and wood-panelling as at present used is certainly of later origin.
+But nothing can be more idle than such comparisons, nor more
+misleading than the idea that stucco is a sham because it seeks to
+imitate wood. It does not seek to imitate wood. It is a recognized
+substance, of incalculable value for decorative effect, and no more
+owes its place in decoration to a fancied resemblance to some other
+material than the nave of a cathedral owes its place in architecture
+to the fancied resemblance to a ship.
+
+In the hands of a great race of artistic _virtuosi_ like the Italians,
+stucco has produced effects of beauty which in any other substance
+would have lost something of their freshness, their plastic
+spontaneity. From the delicate traceries of the Roman baths and the
+loveliness of Agostino da Duccio's chapel-front at Perugia, to the
+improvised bravura treatment of the Farnese theatre at Parma, it has
+served, through every phase of Italian art, to embody the most refined
+and studied, as well as the most audacious and ephemeral, of
+decorative conceptions.
+
+It must not be supposed that because painting, panelling and tapestry
+are the noblest forms of wall-decoration, they are necessarily the
+most unattainable. Good tapestry is, of course, very expensive, and
+even that which is only mediocre is beyond the reach of the average
+purchaser; while stuff hangings and wall-papers, its modern
+successors, have less to recommend them than other forms of
+wall-decoration. With painting and panelling the case is different.
+When painted walls were in fashion, there existed, below the great
+creative artists, schools of decorative designers skilled in the art
+of fresco-decoration, from the simplest kind to the most ornate. The
+demand for such decoration would now call forth the same order of
+talent, and many artists who are wasting their energies on the
+production of indifferent landscapes and unsuccessful portraits might,
+in the quite different field of decorative painting, find the true
+expression of their talent.
+
+To many minds the mention of a frescoed room suggests the image of a
+grandiose saloon, with gods and goddesses of heroic size crowding the
+domed ceiling and lofty walls; but the heroic style of fresco-painting
+is only one of its many phases. To see how well this form of
+decoration may be adapted to small modern rooms and to our present way
+of living, it is only necessary to study the walls of the little
+Pompeian houses, with their delicate arabesques and slender, fanciful
+figures, or to note the manner in which the Italian painters treated
+the small rooms of the casino or garden-pavilion which formed part of
+every Italian country-seat. Examples of this light style of decoration
+may be found in the Casino del grotto in the grounds of the Palazzo
+del T at Mantua, in some of the smaller rooms of the hunting-lodge of
+Stupinigi near Turin, and in the casino of the Villa Valmarana near
+Vicenza, where the frescoes are by Tiepolo; while in France a pleasing
+instance of the same style of treatment is seen in the small octagonal
+pavilion called the Belvédère, frescoed by Le Riche, in the gardens of
+the Petit Trianon at Versailles.
+
+As regards panelling, it has already been said that if the effect
+produced be satisfactory to the eye, the substance used is a matter of
+indifference. Stone-panelling has the merit of solidity, and the
+outlines of massive stone mouldings are strong and dignified; but the
+same effect may be produced in stucco, a material as well suited to
+the purpose as stone, save for its greater fragility. Wood-panelling
+is adapted to the most delicate carving, greater sharpness of edge and
+clearness of undercutting being obtainable than in stucco: though this
+qualification applies only to the moulded stucco ornaments used from
+economy, not to those modelled by hand. Used in the latter way, stucco
+may be made to produce the same effects as carved wood, and for
+delicacy of modelling in low relief it is superior to any other
+material. There is, in short, little to choose between the different
+substances, except in so far as one or the other may commend itself to
+the artist as more peculiarly suited to the special requirements of
+his design, or to the practical conditions regulating his work.
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE XIII._
+
+ DRAWING-ROOM AT EASTON NESTON HALL, ENGLAND.
+ BUILT BY NICHOLAS HAWKESMOOR, 1702.
+ (EXAMPLE OF STUCCO DECORATION.)]
+
+It is to this regard for practical conditions, and not to any fancied
+superiority over other materials, that the use of wood-panelling in
+northern Europe may most reasonably be attributed. Not only was wood
+easy to obtain, but it had the additional merit of keeping out the
+cold: two qualities sufficient to recommend it to the common sense of
+French and English architects. From the decorative point of view it
+has, when unpainted, one undeniable advantage over stucco--that is,
+beauty of color and veining. As a background for the dull gilding of
+old picture-frames, or as a setting for tapestry, nothing can surpass
+the soft rich tones of oak or walnut panelling, undefaced by the
+application of a shiny varnish.
+
+With the introduction of the orders into domestic architecture and the
+treatment of interior walls with dado and cornice, the panelling of
+the wall-space between those two members began to assume definite
+proportions. In England and France, before that time, wall-panels were
+often divided into small equal-sized rectangles which, from lack of
+any central motive, produced a most inadequate impression. Frequently,
+too, in the houses of the Renaissance the panelling, instead of being
+carried up to the ceiling, was terminated two or three feet below it a
+form of treatment that reduced the height of the room and broke the
+connection between walls and ceiling. This awkward device of stunted
+panelling, or, as it might be called, of an unduly heightened dado,
+has been revived by modern decorators; and it is not unusual to see
+the walls of a room treated, as regards their base-board and cornice,
+as part of an order, and then panelled up to within a foot or two of
+the cornice, without apparent regard to the true _raison d'être_ of
+the dado (see Plate XII).
+
+If, then, the design of the wall-panelling is good, it matters little
+whether stone, stucco, or wood be used. In all three it is possible to
+obtain effects ranging from the grandeur of the great loggia of the
+Villa Madama to the simplicity of any wood-panelled parlor in a New
+England country-house, and from the greatest costliness to an outlay
+little larger than that required for the purchase of a good
+wall-paper.
+
+It was well for the future of house-decoration when medical science
+declared itself against the use of wall-papers. These hangings have,
+in fact, little to recommend them. Besides being objectionable on
+sanitary grounds, they are inferior as a wall-decoration to any form
+of treatment, however simple, that maintains, instead of effacing, the
+architectural lines of a room. It was the use of wall-paper that led
+to the obliteration of the over-door and over-mantel, and to the
+gradual submerging under a flood of pattern of all the main lines of
+the wall-spaces. Its merits are that it is cheap, easy to put on and
+easy to remove. On the other hand, it is readily damaged, soon fades,
+and cannot be cleaned; while from the decorative point of view there
+can be no comparison between the flat meanderings of wall-paper
+pattern and the strong architectural lines of any scheme of panelling,
+however simple. Sometimes, of course, the use of wall-paper is a
+matter of convenience, since it saves both time and trouble; but a
+papered room can never, decoratively or otherwise, be as satisfactory
+as one in which the walls are treated in some other manner.
+
+The hanging of walls with chintz or any other material is even more
+objectionable than the use of wall-paper, since it has not the saving
+merit of cheapness. The custom is probably a survival of the time when
+wall-decorations had to be made in movable shape; and this facility of
+removal points to the one good reason for using stuff hangings. In a
+hired house, if the wall-decorations are ugly, and it is necessary to
+hide them, the rooms may be hung with stuff which the departing tenant
+can take away. In other words, stuff hangings are serviceable if used
+as a tent; as a permanent mode of decoration they are both unhealthy
+and inappropriate. There is something unpleasant in the idea of a
+dust-collecting fabric fixed to the wall, so that it cannot be shaken
+out at will like a curtain. Textile fabrics are meant to be moved,
+folded, shaken: they have none of the qualities of permanence and
+solidity which we associate with the walls of a room. The much-derided
+marble curtains of the Jesuit church in Venice are no more illogical
+than stuff wall-hangings.
+
+In decorating the walls of a room, the first point to be considered is
+whether they are to form a background for its contents, or to be in
+themselves its chief decoration. In many cases the disappointing
+effects of wall-decoration are due to the fact that this important
+distinction has been overlooked. In rooms that are to be hung with
+prints or pictures, the panelling or other treatment of the walls
+should be carefully designed with a view to the size and number of the
+pictures. Pictures should never be hung against a background of
+pattern. Nothing is more distressing than the sight of a large
+oil-painting in a ponderous frame seemingly suspended from a spray of
+wild roses or any of the other naturalistic vegetation of the modern
+wall-paper. The overlaying of pattern is always a mistake. It produces
+a confusion of line in which the finest forms lose their individuality
+and significance.
+
+It is also important to avoid hanging pictures or prints too close to
+each other. Not only do the colors clash, but the different designs of
+the frames, some of which may be heavy, with deeply recessed
+mouldings, while others are flat and carved in low relief, produce an
+equally discordant impression. Every one recognizes the necessity of
+selecting the mouldings and other ornamental details of a room with a
+view to their position in the scheme of decoration; but few stop to
+consider that in a room hung with pictures, the frames take the place
+of wall-mouldings, and consequently must be chosen and placed as
+though they were part of a definite decorative composition.
+
+Pictures and prints should be fastened to the wall, not hung by a cord
+or wire, nor allowed to tilt forward at an angle. The latter
+arrangement is specially disturbing since it throws the picture-frames
+out of the line of the wall. It must never be forgotten that pictures
+on a wall, whether set in panels or merely framed and hung, inevitably
+become a part of the wall-decoration. In the seventeenth and
+eighteenth centuries, in rooms of any importance, pictures were always
+treated as a part of the decoration, and frequently as panels sunk in
+the wall in a setting of carved wood or stucco mouldings (see
+paintings in Plates V and XIX). Even when not set in panels, they were
+always fixed to the wall, and their frames, whether of wood or stucco,
+were made to correspond with the ornamental detail of the rest of the
+room. Beautiful examples of this mode of treatment are seen in many
+English interiors of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries,[10] and
+some of the finest carvings of Grinling Gibbons were designed for this
+purpose.
+
+Even where the walls are not to be hung with pictures, it is necessary
+to consider what kind of background the furniture and objects of art
+require. If the room is to be crowded with cabinets, bookcases and
+other tall pieces, and these, as well as the tables and mantel-shelf,
+are to be covered with porcelain vases, bronze statuettes, ivories,
+Chinese monsters and Chelsea groups, a plain background should be
+provided for this many-colored medley. Should the room contain only a
+few important pieces of furniture, and one or two vases or busts, the
+walls against which these strongly marked objects are to be placed may
+receive a more decorative treatment. It is only in rooms used for
+entertaining, dining, or some special purpose for which little
+furniture is required, that the walls should receive a more elaborate
+scheme of decoration.
+
+Where the walls are treated in an architectural manner, with a
+well-designed dado and cornice, and an over-mantel and over-doors
+connecting the openings with the cornice, it will be found that in a
+room of average size the intervening wall-spaces may be tinted in a
+uniform color and left unornamented. If the fundamental lines are
+right, very little decorative detail is needed to complete the effect;
+whereas, when the lines are wrong, no overlaying of ornamental odds
+and ends, in the way of pictures, bric-à-brac and other improvised
+expedients, will conceal the structural deficiencies.
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[9] _A Complete Body of Architecture_, Book II, chap. iii.
+
+[10] See the saloon at Easton Neston, built by Nicholas Hawkesmoor
+(Plate XIII), and various examples given in Pyne's _Royal Residences_.
+
+
+
+
+IV
+
+DOORS
+
+
+The fate of the door in America has been a curious one, and had the
+other chief features of the house--such as windows, fireplaces, and
+stairs--been pursued with the same relentless animosity by architects
+and decorators, we should no longer be living in houses at all. First,
+the door was slid into the wall; then even its concealed presence was
+resented, and it was unhung and replaced by a portière; while of late
+it has actually ceased to form a part of house-building, and many
+recently built houses contain doorways _without doors_. Even the front
+door, which might seem to have too valid a reason for existence to be
+disturbed by the variations of fashion, has lately had to yield its
+place, in the more pretentious kind of house, to a wrought-iron
+gateway lined with plate-glass, against which, as a climax of
+inconsequence, a thick curtain is usually hung.
+
+It is not difficult to explain such architectural vagaries. In
+general, their origin is to be found in the misapplication of some
+serviceable feature and its consequent rejection by those who did not
+understand that it had ceased to be useful only because it was not
+properly used.
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE XIV._
+
+ DOORWAY WITH MARBLE ARCHITRAVE,
+ DUCAL PALACE, MANTUA. XVI CENTURY.]
+
+In the matter of doors, such an explanation at once presents itself.
+During the latter half of the eighteenth century it occurred to
+some ingenious person that when two adjoining rooms were used for
+entertaining, and it was necessary to open the doors between them,
+these doors might be in the way; and to avoid this possibility, a
+recess was formed in the thickness of the wall, and the door was made
+to slide into it.
+
+This idea apparently originated in England, for sliding doors, even in
+the present day, are virtually unknown on the continent; and Isaac
+Ware, in the book already quoted, speaks of the sliding door as having
+been used "at the house, late Mr. de Pestre's, near Hanover Square,"
+and adds that "the manner of it there may serve as an example to other
+builders," showing it to have been a novelty which he thought worthy
+of imitation.
+
+English taste has never been so sure as that of the Latin races; and
+it has, moreover, been perpetually modified by a passion for
+contriving all kinds of supposed "conveniences," which instead of
+simplifying life not unfrequently tend to complicate it. Americans
+have inherited this trait, and in both countries the architect or
+upholsterer who can present a new and more intricate way of planning a
+house or of making a piece of furniture, is more sure of a hearing
+than he who follows the accepted lines.
+
+It is doubtful if the devices to which so much is sacrificed in
+English and American house-planning always offer the practical
+advantages attributed to them. In the case of the sliding door these
+advantages are certainly open to question, since there is no reason
+why a door should not open into a room. Under ordinary circumstances,
+doors should always be kept shut; it is only, as Ware points out, when
+two adjoining rooms are used for entertaining that it is necessary to
+leave the door between them open. Now, between two rooms destined for
+entertaining, a double door (_à deux battants_) is always preferable
+to a single one; and as an opening four feet six inches wide is
+sufficient in such cases, each of the doors will be only two feet
+three inches wide, and therefore cannot encroach to any serious extent
+on the floor-space of the room. On the other hand, much has been
+sacrificed to the supposed "convenience" of the sliding door: first,
+the decorative effect of a well-panelled door, with hinges, box-locks
+and handle of finely chiselled bronze; secondly, the privacy of both
+rooms, since the difficulty of closing a heavy sliding door always
+leads to its being left open, with the result that two rooms are
+necessarily used as one. In fact, the absence of privacy in modern
+houses is doubtless in part due to the difficulty of closing the doors
+between the rooms.
+
+The sliding door has led to another abuse in house-planning: the
+exaggerated widening of the doorway. While doors were hung on hinges,
+doorways were of necessity restricted to their proper dimensions; but
+with the introduction of the sliding door, openings eight or ten feet
+wide became possible. The planning of a house is often modified by a
+vague idea on the part of its owners that they may wish to give
+entertainments on a large scale. As a matter of fact, general
+entertainments are seldom given in a house of average size; and those
+who plan their houses with a view to such possibilities sacrifice
+their daily comfort to an event occurring perhaps once a year. But
+even where many entertainments are to be given large doorways are of
+little use. Any architect of experience knows that ease of circulation
+depends far more on the planning of the house and on the position of
+the openings than on the actual dimensions of the latter. Indeed, two
+moderate-sized doorways leading from one room to another are of much
+more use in facilitating the movements of a crowd than one opening ten
+feet wide.
+
+Sliding doors have been recommended on the ground that their use
+preserves a greater amount of wall-space; but two doorways of moderate
+dimensions, properly placed, will preserve as much wall-space as one
+very large opening and will probably permit a better distribution of
+panelling and furniture. There was far more wall-space in seventeenth
+and eighteenth-century rooms than there is in rooms of the same
+dimensions in the average modern American house; and even where this
+space was not greater in actual measurement, more furniture could be
+used, since the openings were always placed with a view to the proper
+arrangement of what the room was to contain.
+
+According to the best authorities, the height of a well-proportioned
+doorway should be twice its width; and as the height is necessarily
+regulated by the stud of the room, it follows that the width varies;
+but it is obvious that no doorway should be less than six feet high
+nor less than three feet wide.
+
+When a doorway is over three feet six inches wide, a pair of doors
+should always be used; while a single door is preferable in a narrow
+opening.
+
+In rooms twelve feet or less in height, doorways should not be more
+than nine feet high. The width of openings in such rooms is therefore
+restricted to four feet six inches; indeed, it is permissible to make
+the opening lower and thus reduce its width to four feet; six inches
+of additional wall-space are not to be despised in a room of average
+dimensions.
+
+The treatment of the door forms one of the most interesting chapters
+in the history of house-decoration. In feudal castles the interior
+doorway, for purposes of defense, was made so small and narrow that
+only one person could pass through at a time, and was set in a plain
+lintel or architrave of stone, the door itself being fortified by
+bands of steel or iron, and by heavy bolts and bars. Even at this
+early period it seems probable that in the chief apartments the lines
+of the doorway were carried up to the ceiling by means of an over-door
+of carved wood, or of some painted decorative composition.[11] This
+connection between the doorway and the ceiling, maintained through all
+the subsequent phases of house-decoration, was in fact never
+disregarded until the beginning of the present century.
+
+It was in Italy that the door, in common with the other features of
+private dwellings, first received a distinctly architectural
+treatment. In Italian palaces of the fifteenth century the doorways
+were usually framed by architraves of marble, enriched with
+arabesques, medallions and processional friezes in low relief,
+combined with disks of colored marble. Interesting examples of this
+treatment are seen in the apartments of Isabella of Este in the ducal
+palace at Mantua (see Plate XIV), in the ducal palace at Urbino, and
+in the Certosa of Pavia--some of the smaller doorways in this
+monastery being decorated with medallion portraits of the Sforzas, and
+with other low reliefs of extraordinary beauty.
+
+The doors in Italian palaces were usually of inlaid wood, elaborate in
+composition and affording in many cases beautiful instances of that
+sense of material limitation that preserves one art from infringing
+upon another. The intarsia doors of the palace at Urbino are among the
+most famous examples of this form of decoration. It should be noted
+that many of the woods used in Italian marquetry were of a light
+shade, so that the blending of colors in Renaissance doors produces a
+sunny golden-brown tint in perfect harmony with the marble architrave
+of the doorway. The Italian decorator would never have permitted so
+harsh a contrast as that between the white trim and the mahogany doors
+of English eighteenth-century houses. This juxtaposition of colors was
+disapproved by French decorators also, and was seldom seen except in
+England and in the American houses built under English influence. It
+should be observed, too, that the polish given to hard-grained wood in
+England, and imitated in the wood-varnish of the present day, was
+never in favor in Italy and France. Shiny surfaces were always
+disliked by the best decorators.
+
+The classic revival in Italy necessarily modified the treatment of the
+doorway. Flat arabesques and delicately chiselled medallions gave way
+to a plain architrave, frequently masked by an order; while the
+over-door took the form of a pediment, or, in the absence of shafts,
+of a cornice or entablature resting on brackets. The use of a pediment
+over interior doorways was characteristic of Italian decoration.
+
+In studying Italian interiors of this period from photographs or
+modern prints, or even in visiting the partly dilapidated palaces
+themselves, it may at first appear that the lines of the doorway were
+not always carried up to the cornice. Several causes have combined to
+produce this impression. In the first place, the architectural
+treatment of the over-door was frequently painted on the wall, and has
+consequently disappeared with the rest of the wall-decoration (see
+Plate XV). Then, again, Italian rooms were often painted with
+landscapes and out-of-door architectural effects, and when this was
+done the doorways were combined with these architectural compositions,
+and were not treated as part of the room, but as part of what the room
+_pretended to be_. In the suppressed Scuola della Carità (now the
+Academy of Fine Arts) at Venice, one may see a famous example of this
+treatment in the doorway under the stairs leading up to the temple, in
+Titian's great painting of the "Presentation of the Virgin."[12]
+Again, in the high-studded Italian saloons containing a musician's
+gallery, or a clerestory, a cornice was frequently carried around the
+walls at suitable height above the lower range of openings, and the
+decorative treatment above the doors, windows and fireplace extended
+only to this cornice, not to the actual ceiling of the room.
+
+Thus it will be seen that the relation between the openings and
+cornice in Italian decoration was in reality always maintained except
+where the decorator chose to regard them as forming a part, not of the
+room, but of some other architectural composition.
+
+In the sixteenth century the excessive use of marquetry was abandoned,
+doors being panelled, and either left undecorated or painted with
+those light animated combinations of figure and arabesque which
+Raphael borrowed from the Roman fresco-painters, and which since his
+day have been peculiarly characteristic of Italian decorative
+painting.[13]
+
+Wood-carving in Italy was little used in house-decoration, and, as a
+rule, the panelling of doors was severely architectural in character,
+with little of the delicate ornamentation marking the French work of
+the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.[14]
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE XV._
+
+ SALA DEI CAVALLI, PALAZZO DEL T, MANTUA. XVI CENTURY.
+ (EXAMPLE OF PAINTED ARCHITECTURAL DECORATION.)]
+
+In France the application of the orders to interior doorways was never
+very popular, though it figures in French architectural works of
+the eighteenth century. The architrave, except in houses of great
+magnificence, was usually of wood, sometimes very richly carved. It
+was often surmounted by an entablature with a cornice resting on
+carved brackets; while the panel between this and the ceiling-cornice
+was occupied by an over-door consisting either of a painting, of a
+carved panel or of a stucco or marble bas-relief. These over-doors
+usually corresponded with the design of the over-mantel.
+
+Great taste and skill were displayed in the decoration of door-panels
+and embrasure. In the earlier part of the seventeenth century, doors
+and embrasures were usually painted, and nothing in the way of
+decorative painting can exceed in beauty and fitness the French
+compositions of this period.[15]
+
+During the reign of Louis XIV, doors were either carved or painted,
+and their treatment ranged from the most elaborate decoration to the
+simplest panelling set in a plain wooden architrave. In some French
+doors of this period painting and carving were admirably combined; and
+they were further ornamented by the chiselled locks and hinges for
+which French locksmiths were famous. So important a part did these
+locks and hinges play in French decoration that Lebrun himself is said
+to have designed those in the Galerie d'Apollon, in the Louvre, when
+he composed the decoration of the room. Even in the simplest private
+houses, where chiselled bronze was too expensive a luxury, and
+wrought-iron locks and hinges, with plain knobs of brass or iron, were
+used instead, such attention was paid to both design and execution
+that it is almost impossible to find in France an old lock or hinge,
+however plain, that is not well designed and well made (see Plate
+XVII). The miserable commercial article that disgraces our modern
+doors would not have been tolerated in the most unpretentious
+dwelling.
+
+The mortise-lock now in use in England and America first made its
+appearance toward the end of the eighteenth century in England, where
+it displaced the brass or iron box-lock; but on the Continent it has
+never been adopted. It is a poor substitute for the box-lock, since it
+not only weakens but disfigures the door, while a well-designed
+box-lock is both substantial and ornamental (see Plate XVII).
+
+In many minds the Louis XV period is associated with a general
+waviness of line and excess of carving. It has already been pointed
+out that even when the rocaille manner was at its height the main
+lines of a room were seldom allowed to follow the capricious movement
+of the ornamental accessories. Openings being the leading features of
+a room, their main lines were almost invariably respected; and while
+considerable play of movement was allowed in some of the accessory
+mouldings of the over-doors and over-mantels, the plan of the panel,
+in general symmetrical, was in many cases a plain rectangle.[16]
+
+During the Louis XV period the panelling of doors was frequently
+enriched with elaborate carving; but such doors are to be found only
+in palaces, or in princely houses like the Hôtels de Soubise, de
+Rohan, or de Toulouse (see Plate XVIII). In the most magnificent
+apartments, moreover, plain panelled doors were as common as those
+adorned with carving; while in the average private hôtel, even where
+much ornament was lavished on the panelling of the walls, the doors
+were left plain.
+
+Towards the close of this reign, when the influence of Gabriel began
+to simplify and restrain the ornamental details of house-decoration,
+the panelled door was often made without carving and was sometimes
+painted with attenuated arabesques and grisaille medallions, relieved
+against a gold ground. Gabriel gave the key-note of what is known as
+Louis XVI decoration, and the treatment of the door in France followed
+the same general lines until the end of the eighteenth century. As the
+classic influence became more marked, paintings in the over-door and
+over-mantel were replaced by low or high reliefs in stucco: and
+towards the end of the Louis XVI period a processional frieze in the
+classic manner often filled the entablature above the architrave of
+the door (see Plate XVI).
+
+Doors opening upon a terrace, or leading from an antechamber into a
+summer-parlor, or _salon frais_, were frequently made of glass; while
+in gala rooms, doors so situated as to correspond with the windows of
+the room were sometimes made of looking-glass. In both these instances
+the glass was divided into small panes, with such strongly marked
+mouldings that there could not be a moment's doubt of the apparent, as
+well as the actual, solidity of the door. In good decorative art first
+impressions are always taken into account, and the immediate
+satisfaction of the eye is provided for.
+
+In England the treatment of doorway and door followed in a general way
+the Italian precedent. The architrave, as a rule, was severely
+architectural, and in the eighteenth century the application of an
+order was regarded as almost essential in rooms of a certain
+importance. The door itself was sometimes inlaid,[17] but oftener
+simply panelled (see Plate XI).
+
+In the panelling of doors, English taste, except when it closely
+followed Italian precedents, was not always good. The use of a pair of
+doors in one opening was confined to grand houses, and in the average
+dwelling single doors were almost invariably used, even in openings
+over three feet wide. The great width of some of these single doors
+led to a curious treatment of the panels, the door being divided by a
+central stile, which was sometimes beaded, as though, instead of a
+single door, it were really a pair held together by some invisible
+agency. This central stile is almost invariably seen in the doors of
+modern American houses.
+
+Towards the middle of the eighteenth century the use of highly
+polished mahogany doors became general in England. It has already been
+pointed out that the juxtaposition of a dark-colored door and a white
+architrave was not approved by French and Italian architects. Blondel,
+in fact, expressly states that such contrasts are to be avoided, and
+that where walls are pale in tint the door should never be dark: thus
+in vestibules and antechambers panelled with Caen stone he recommends
+painting the doors a pale shade of gray.
+
+In Italy, when doors were left unpainted they were usually made of
+walnut, a wood of which the soft, dull tone harmonizes well with
+almost any color, whether light or dark; while in France it would not
+be easy to find an unpainted door, except in rooms where the
+wall-panelling is also of natural wood.
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE XVI._
+
+ DOOR IN THE SALA DELLO ZODIACO,
+ DUCAL PALACE, MANTUA. XVIII CENTURY.]
+
+In the better type of house lately built in America there is seen a
+tendency to return to the use of doors hung on hinges. These, however,
+have been so long out of favor that the rules regulating their
+dimensions have been lost sight of, and the modern door and architrave
+are seldom satisfactory in these respects. The principles of
+proportion have been further disturbed by a return to the confused
+and hesitating system of panelling prevalent in England during the
+Tudor and Elizabethan periods.
+
+The old French and Italian architects never failed to respect that
+rule of decorative composition which prescribes that where there is
+any division of parts, one part shall unmistakably predominate. In
+conformity with this rule, the principal panel in doors of French or
+Italian design is so much higher than the others that these are at
+once seen to be merely accessory; whereas many of our modern doors are
+cut up into so many small panels, and the central one so little
+exceeds the others in height, that they do not "compose."
+
+The architrave of the modern door has been neglected for the same
+reasons as the window-architrave. The use of the heavy sliding door,
+which could not be opened or shut without an effort, led to the
+adoption of the portière; and the architrave, being thus concealed,
+was no longer regarded as a feature of any importance in the
+decoration of the room.
+
+The portière has always been used, as old prints and pictures show;
+but, like the curtain, in earlier days it was simply intended to keep
+out currents of air, and was consequently seldom seen in well-built
+houses, where double sets of doors served far better to protect the
+room from draughts. In less luxurious rooms, where there were no
+double doors, and portières had to be used, these were made as scant
+and unobtrusive as possible. The device of draping stuffs about the
+doorway, thus substituting a textile architrave for one of wood or
+stone, originated with the modern upholsterer; and it is now not
+unusual to see a wide opening with no door in it, enclosed in yards
+and yards of draperies which cannot even be lowered at will.
+
+The portière, besides causing a break in architectural lines, has
+become one of the chief expenses in the decoration of the modern room;
+indeed, the amount spent in buying yards of plush or damask, with the
+addition of silk cord, tassels, gimp and fringe, often makes it
+necessary to slight the essential features of the room; so that an
+ugly mantelpiece or ceiling is preserved because the money required to
+replace it has been used in the purchase of portières. These
+superfluous draperies are, in fact, more expensive than a well-made
+door with hinges and box-lock of chiselled bronze.
+
+The general use of the portière has also caused the disappearance of
+the over-door. The lines of the opening being hidden under a mass of
+drapery, the need of connecting them with the cornice was no longer
+felt, and one more feature of the room passed out of the architect's
+hands into those of the upholsterer, or, as he might more fitly be
+called, the house-dressmaker.
+
+The return to better principles of design will do more than anything
+else to restore the architectural lines of the room. Those who use
+portières generally do so from an instinctive feeling that a door is
+an ugly thing that ought to be hidden, and modern doors are in fact
+ugly; but when architects give to the treatment of openings the same
+attention they formerly received, it will soon be seen that this
+ugliness is not a necessity, and portières will disappear with the
+return of well-designed doors.
+
+Some general hints concerning the distribution of openings have been
+given in the chapter on walls. It may be noted in addition that while
+all doorways in a room should, as a rule, be of one height, there are
+cases where certain clearly subordinate openings may be lower than
+those which contain doors _à deux battants_. In such cases the
+panelling of the door must be carefully modified in accordance with
+the dimensions of the opening, and the treatment of the over-doors
+in their relation to each other must be studied with equal attention.
+Examples of such adaptations are to be found in many old French and
+Italian rooms.[18]
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE XVII._
+
+ EXAMPLES OF MODERN FRENCH LOCKSMITHS' WORK.]
+
+Doors should always swing _into_ a room. This facilitates entrance and
+gives the hospitable impression that everything is made easy to those
+who are coming in. Doors should furthermore be so hung that they
+screen that part of the room in which the occupants usually sit. In
+small rooms, especially those in town houses, this detail cannot be
+too carefully considered. The fact that so many doors open in the
+wrong way is another excuse for the existence of portières.
+
+A word must also be said concerning the actual making of the door.
+There is a general impression that veneered doors or furniture are
+cheap substitutes for articles made of solid blocks of wood. As a
+matter of fact, owing to the high temperature of American houses, all
+well-made wood-work used in this country is of necessity composed of
+at least three, and often of five, layers of wood. This method of
+veneering, in which the layers are so placed that the grain runs in
+different directions, is the only way of counteracting the shrinking
+and swelling of the wood under artificial heat.
+
+To some minds the concealed door represents one of those architectural
+deceptions which no necessity can excuse. It is certain that the
+concealed door is an expedient, and that in a well-planned house there
+should be no need for expedients, unless the architect is hampered by
+limitations of space, as is the case in designing the average American
+town house. Architects all know how many principles of beauty and
+fitness must be sacrificed to the restrictions of a plot of ground
+twenty-five feet wide by seventy-five or a hundred in length. Under
+such conditions, every device is permissible that helps to produce an
+effect of spaciousness and symmetry without interfering with
+convenience: chief among these contrivances being the concealed door.
+
+Such doors are often useful in altering or adding to a badly planned
+house. It is sometimes desirable to give increased facilities of
+communication without adding to the visible number of openings in any
+one room; while in other cases the limited amount of wall-space may
+make it difficult to find place for a doorway corresponding in
+dimensions with the others; or, again, where it is necessary to make a
+closet under the stairs, the architrave of a visible door may clash
+awkwardly with the stringboard.
+
+Under such conditions the concealed door naturally suggests itself. To
+those who regard its use as an offense against artistic integrity, it
+must once more be pointed out that architecture addresses itself not
+to the moral sense, but to the eye. The existing confusion on this
+point is partly due to the strange analogy drawn by modern critics
+between artistic sincerity and moral law. Analogies are the most
+dangerous form of reasoning: they connect resemblances, but disguise
+facts; and in this instance nothing can be more fallacious than to
+measure the architect's action by an ethical standard.
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE XVIII._
+
+ CARVED DOOR, PALACE OF VERSAILLES.
+ LOUIS XV PERIOD.
+ (SHOWING PAINTED OVER-DOOR.)]
+
+"Sincerity," in many minds, is chiefly associated with speaking the
+truth; but architectural sincerity is simply obedience to certain
+visual requirements, one of which demands that what are at once seen
+to be the main lines of a room or house shall be acknowledged as such
+in the application of ornament. The same architectural principles
+demand that the main lines of a room shall not be unnecessarily
+interrupted; and in certain cases it would be bad taste to disturb the
+equilibrium of wall-spaces and decoration by introducing a visible
+door leading to some unimportant closet or passageway, of which the
+existence need not be known to any but the inmates of the house. It is
+in such cases that the concealed door is a useful expedient. It can
+hardly be necessary to point out that it would be a great mistake to
+place a concealed door in a main opening. These openings should always
+be recognized as one of the chief features of the room, and so treated
+by the decorator; but this point has already been so strongly insisted
+upon that it is reverted to here only in order to show how different
+are the requirements which justify concealment.
+
+The concealed door has until recently been used so little by American
+architects that its construction is not well understood, and it is
+often hung on ordinary visible hinges, instead of being swung on a
+pivot. There is no reason why, with proper care, a door of this kind
+should not be so nicely adjusted to the wall-panelling as to be
+practically invisible; and to fulfil this condition is the first
+necessity of its construction (see concealed door in Plate XLV).
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[11] See Viollet-le-Duc, _Dictionnaire raisonné de l'Architecture
+française_, under _Porte_.
+
+[12] This painting has now been restored to its proper position in the
+Scuola della Carità, and the door which had been _painted in_ under
+the stairs has been removed to make way for the actual doorway around
+which the picture was originally painted.
+
+[13] See the doors of the Sala dello Zodiaco in the ducal palace at
+Mantua (Plate XVI).
+
+[14] Some rooms of the rocaille period, however, contain doors as
+elaborately carved as those seen in France (see the doors in the royal
+palace at Genoa, Plate XXXIV).
+
+[15] See the doors at Vaux-le-Vicomte and in the Palais de Justice at
+Rennes.
+
+[16] Only in the most exaggerated German baroque were the vertical
+lines of the door-panels sometimes irregular.
+
+[17] The inlaid doors of Houghton Hall, the seat of Sir Robert
+Walpole, were noted for their beauty and costliness. The price of each
+was £200.
+
+[18] See a room in the Ministère de la Marine at Paris, where a
+subordinate door is cleverly treated in connection with one of more
+importance.
+
+
+
+
+V
+
+WINDOWS
+
+
+In the decorative treatment of a room the importance of openings can
+hardly be overestimated. Not only do they represent the three chief
+essentials of its comfort,--light, heat and means of access,--but they
+are the leading features in that combination of voids and masses that
+forms the basis of architectural harmony. In fact, it is chiefly
+because the decorative value of openings has ceased to be recognized
+that modern rooms so seldom produce a satisfactory and harmonious
+impression. It used to be thought that the effect of a room depended
+on the treatment of its wall-spaces and openings; now it is supposed
+to depend on its curtains and furniture. Accessory details have
+crowded out the main decorative features; and, as invariably happens
+when the relation of parts is disturbed, everything in the modern room
+has been thrown out of balance by this confusion between the essential
+and the incidental in decoration.[19]
+
+The return to a more architectural treatment of rooms and to a
+recognition of the decorative value of openings, besides producing
+much better results, would undoubtedly reduce the expense of
+house-decoration. A small quantity of ornament, properly applied, will
+produce far more effect than ten times its amount used in the wrong
+way; and it will be found that when decorators rely for their effects
+on the treatment of openings, the rest of the room will require little
+ornamentation. The crowding of rooms with furniture and bric-à-brac is
+doubtless partly due to an unconscious desire to fill up the blanks
+caused by the lack of architectural composition in the treatment of
+the walls.
+
+The importance of connecting the main lines of the openings with the
+cornice having been explained in the previous chapter, it is now
+necessary to study the different openings in turn, and to see in how
+many ways they serve to increase the dignity and beauty of their
+surroundings.
+
+As light-giving is the main purpose for which windows are made, the
+top of the window should be as near the ceiling as the cornice will
+allow. Ventilation, the secondary purpose of the window, is also
+better served by its being so placed, since an opening a foot wide
+near the ceiling will do more towards airing a room than a space twice
+as large near the floor. In our northern States, where the dark winter
+days and the need of artificial heat make light and ventilation so
+necessary, these considerations are especially important. In Italian
+palaces the windows are generally lower than in more northern
+countries, since the greater intensity of the sunshine makes a much
+smaller opening sufficient; moreover, in Italy, during the summer,
+houses are not kept cool by letting in the air, but by shutting it
+out.
+
+Windows should not exceed five feet in width, while in small rooms
+openings three feet wide will be found sufficient. There are
+practical as well as artistic reasons for observing this rule, since a
+sash-window containing a sheet of glass more than five feet wide
+cannot be so hung that it may be raised without effort; while a
+casement, or French window, though it may be made somewhat wider, is
+not easy to open if its width exceeds six feet.
+
+The next point to consider is the distance between the bottom of the
+window and the floor. This must be decided by circumstances, such as
+the nature of the view, the existence of a balcony or veranda, or the
+wish to have a window-seat. The outlook must also be considered, and
+the window treated in one way if it looks upon the street, and in
+another if it gives on the garden or informal side of the house. In
+the country nothing is more charming than the French window opening to
+the floor. On the more public side of the house, unless the latter
+gives on an enclosed court, it is best that the windows should be
+placed about three feet from the floor, so that persons approaching
+the house may not be able to look in. Windows placed at this height
+should be provided with a fixed seat, or with one of the little
+settees with arms, but without a back, formerly used for this purpose.
+
+Although for practical reasons it may be necessary that the same room
+should contain some windows opening to the floor and others raised
+several feet above it, the tops of all the windows should be on a
+level. To place them at different heights serves no useful end, and
+interferes with any general scheme of decoration and more specially
+with the arrangement of curtains.
+
+Mullions dividing a window in the centre should be avoided whenever
+possible, since they are an unnecessary obstruction to the view. The
+chief drawback to a casement window is that its sashes join in the
+middle; but as this is a structural necessity, it is less
+objectionable. If mullions are required, they should be so placed as
+to divide the window into three parts, thus preserving an unobstructed
+central pane. The window called Palladian illustrates this point.
+
+Now that large plate-glass windows have ceased to be a novelty, it
+will perhaps be recognized that the old window with subdivided panes
+had certain artistic and practical merits that have of late been
+disregarded.
+
+Where there is a fine prospect, windows made of a single plate of
+glass are often preferred; but it must be remembered that the
+subdivisions of a sash, while obstructing the view, serve to establish
+a relation between the inside of the house and the landscape, making
+the latter what, _as seen from a room_, it logically ought to be: a
+part of the wall-decoration, in the sense of being subordinated to the
+same general lines. A large unbroken sheet of plate-glass interrupts
+the decorative scheme of the room, just as in verse, if the distances
+between the rhymes are so great that the ear cannot connect them, the
+continuity of sound is interrupted. Decoration must rhyme to the eye,
+and to do so must be subject to the limitations of the eye, as verse
+is subject to the limitations of the ear. Success in any art depends
+on a due regard for the limitations of the sense to which it appeals.
+
+The effect of a perpetually open window, produced by a large sheet of
+plate-glass, while it gives a sense of coolness and the impression of
+being out of doors, becomes for these very reasons a disadvantage in
+cold weather.
+
+It is sometimes said that the architects of the eighteenth century
+would have used large plates of glass in their windows had they been
+able to obtain them; but as such plates were frequently used for
+mirrors, it is evident that they were not difficult to get, and that
+there must have been other reasons for not employing them in windows;
+while the additional expense could hardly have been an obstacle in an
+age when princes and nobles built with such royal disregard of cost.
+The French, always logical in such matters, having tried the effect of
+plate-glass, are now returning to the old fashion of smaller panes;
+and in many of the new houses in Paris, where the windows at first
+contained large plates of glass, the latter have since been subdivided
+by a network of narrow mouldings applied to the glass.
+
+As to the comparative merits of French, or casement, and sash windows,
+both arrangements have certain advantages. In houses built in the
+French or Italian style, casement windows are best adapted to the
+general treatment; while the sash-window is more in keeping in English
+houses. Perhaps the best way of deciding the question is to remember
+that "les fenêtres sont intimement liées aux grandes lignes de
+l'architecture," and to conform to the rule suggested by this axiom.
+
+The two common objections to French windows--that they are less
+convenient for ventilation, and that they cannot be opened without
+letting in cold air near the floor--are both unfounded. All properly
+made French windows have at the top an impost or stationary part
+containing small panes, one of which is made to open, thus affording
+perfect ventilation without draught. Another expedient, seen in one of
+the rooms of Mesdames de France at Versailles, is a small pane in the
+main part of the window, opening on hinges of its own. (For examples
+of well-designed French windows, see Plates XXX and XXXI.)
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE XIX._
+
+ SALON DES MALACHITES, GRAND TRIANON, VERSAILLES.
+ LOUIS XIV PERIOD.
+ (SHOWING WELL-DESIGNED WINDOW WITH SOLID INSIDE SHUTTER, AND
+ PICTURES FORMING PART OF WALL-DECORATION.)]
+
+Sash-windows have the disadvantage of not opening more than half-way,
+a serious drawback in our hot summer climate. It is often said that
+French windows cannot be opened wide without interfering with the
+curtains; but this difficulty is easily met by the use of curtains
+made with cords and pulleys, in the sensible old-fashioned manner. The
+real purpose of the window-curtain is to regulate the amount of light
+admitted to the room, and a curtain so arranged that it cannot be
+drawn backward and forward at will is but a meaningless accessory. It
+was not until the beginning of the present century that curtains were
+used without regard to their practical purpose. The window-hangings of
+the middle ages and of the Renaissance were simply straight pieces of
+cloth or tapestry hung across the window without any attempt at
+drapery, and regarded not as part of the decoration of the room, but
+as a necessary protection against draughts. It is probably for this
+reason that in old prints and pictures representing the rooms of
+wealthy people, curtains are so seldom seen. The better the house, the
+less need there was for curtains. In the engravings of Abraham Bosse,
+which so faithfully represent the interior decoration of every class
+of French house during the reign of Louis XIII, it will be noticed
+that in the richest apartments there are no window-curtains. In all
+the finest rooms of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries the
+inside shutters and embrasures of the windows were decorated with a
+care which proves that they were not meant to be concealed by curtains
+(see the painted embrasures of the saloon in the Villa Vertemati,
+Plate XLIV). The shutters in the state apartments of Fouquet's château
+of Vaux-le-Vicomte, near Melun, are painted on both sides with
+exquisite arabesques; while those in the apartments of Mesdames de
+France, on the ground floor of the palace of Versailles, are examples
+of the most beautiful carving. In fact, it would be more difficult to
+cite a room of any importance in which the windows were not so
+treated, than to go on enumerating examples of what was really a
+universal custom until the beginning of the present century. It is
+known, of course, that curtains were used in former times: prints,
+pictures and inventories alike prove this fact; but the care expended
+on the decorative treatment of windows makes it plain that the
+curtain, like the portière, was regarded as a necessary evil rather
+than as part of the general scheme of decoration. The meagreness and
+simplicity of the curtains in old pictures prove that they were used
+merely as window shades or sun-blinds. The scant straight folds pushed
+back from the tall windows of the Prince de Conti's salon, in
+Olivier's charming picture of "Le Thé à l'Anglaise chez le Prince de
+Conti," are as obviously utilitarian as the strip of green woollen
+stuff hanging against the leaded casement of the mediæval bed-chamber
+in Carpaccio's "Dream of St. Ursula."
+
+Another way of hanging window-curtains in the seventeenth and
+eighteenth centuries was to place them inside the architrave, so that
+they did not conceal it. The architectural treatment of the trim, and
+the practice prevalent at that period of carrying the windows up to
+the cornice, made this a satisfactory way of arranging the curtain;
+but in the modern American house, where the trim is usually bad, and
+where there is often a dreary waste of wall-paper between the window
+and the ceiling, it is better to hang the curtains close under the
+cornice.
+
+It was not until the eighteenth century that the window-curtain was
+divided in the middle; and this change was intended only to facilitate
+the drawing of the hangings, which, owing to the increased size of the
+windows, were necessarily wider and heavier. The curtain continued to
+hang down in straight folds, pulled back at will to permit the opening
+of the window, and drawn at night. Fixed window-draperies, with
+festoons and folds so arranged that they cannot be lowered or raised,
+are an invention of the modern upholsterer. Not only have these fixed
+draperies done away with the true purpose of the curtain, but they
+have made architects and decorators careless in their treatment of
+openings. The architrave and embrasure of a window are now regarded as
+of no more importance in the decorative treatment of a room than the
+inside of the chimney.
+
+The modern use of the lambrequin as an ornamental finish to
+window-curtains is another instance of misapplied decoration. Its
+history is easy to trace. The mediæval bed was always enclosed in
+curtains hanging from a wooden framework, and the lambrequin was used
+as a kind of cornice to conceal it. When the use of gathered
+window-shades became general in Italy, the lambrequin was transferred
+from the bed to the window, in order to hide the clumsy bunches of
+folds formed by these shades when drawn up. In old prints, lambrequins
+over windows are almost always seen in connection with Italian shades,
+and this is the only logical way of using them; though they are often
+of service in concealing the defects of badly-shaped windows and
+unarchitectural trim.
+
+Those who criticize the architects and decorators of the past are
+sometimes disposed to think that they worked in a certain way because
+they were too ignorant to devise a better method; whereas they were
+usually controlled by practical and artistic considerations which
+their critics are prone to disregard, not only in judging the work of
+the past, but in the attempt to make good its deficiencies. Thus the
+cabinet-makers of the Renaissance did not make straight-backed wooden
+chairs because they were incapable of imagining anything more
+comfortable, but because the former were better adapted than cushioned
+arm-chairs to the _déplacements_ so frequent at that period. In like
+manner, the decorator who regarded curtains as a necessity rather than
+as part of the decoration of the room knew (what the modern
+upholsterer fails to understand) that, the beauty of a room depending
+chiefly on its openings, to conceal these under draperies is to hide
+the key of the whole decorative scheme.
+
+The muslin window-curtain is a recent innovation. Its only purpose is
+to protect the interior of the room from public view: a need not felt
+before the use of large sheets of glass, since it is difficult to look
+through a subdivided sash from the outside. Under such circumstances
+muslin curtains are, of course, useful; but where they may be
+dispensed with, owing to the situation of the room or the subdivision
+of panes, they are no loss. Lingerie effects do not combine well with
+architecture, and the more architecturally a window is treated, the
+less it need be dressed up in ruffles. To put such curtains in a
+window, and then loop them back so that they form a mere frame to the
+pane, is to do away with their real purpose, and to substitute a
+textile for an architectural effect. Where muslin curtains are
+necessary, they should be a mere transparent screen hung against the
+glass. In town houses especially all outward show of richness should
+be avoided; the use of elaborate lace-figured curtains, besides
+obstructing the view, seems an attempt to protrude the luxury of the
+interior upon the street. It is needless to point out the futility of
+the second layer of muslin which, in some houses, hangs inside the
+sash-curtains.
+
+The solid inside shutter, now so generally discarded, save in France,
+formerly served the purposes for which curtains and shades are used,
+and, combined with outside blinds, afforded all the protection that a
+window really requires (see Plate XIX). These shutters should be made
+with solid panels, not with slats, their purpose being to darken the
+room and keep out the cold, while the light is regulated by the
+outside blinds. The best of these is the old-fashioned hand-made
+blind, with wide fixed slats, still to be seen on old New England
+houses and always used in France and Italy: the frail machine-made
+substitute now in general use has nothing to recommend it.
+
+FOOTNOTE:
+
+[19] As an example of the extent to which openings have come to be
+ignored as factors in the decorative composition of a room, it is
+curious to note that in Eastlake's well-known _Hints on Household
+Taste_ no mention is made of doors, windows or fireplaces. Compare
+this point of view with that of the earlier decorators, from Vignola
+to Roubo and Ware.
+
+
+
+
+VI
+
+FIREPLACES
+
+
+The fireplace was formerly always regarded as the chief feature of the
+room, and so treated in every well-thought-out scheme of decoration.
+
+The practical reasons which make it important that the windows in a
+room should be carried up to the cornice have already been given, and
+it has been shown that the lines of the other openings should be
+extended to the same height. This applies to fireplaces as well as to
+doors, and, indeed, as an architectural principle concerning all kinds
+of openings, it has never been questioned until the present day. The
+hood of the vast Gothic fireplace always descended from the springing
+of the vaulted roof, and the monumental chimney-pieces of the
+Renaissance followed the same lines (see Plate XX). The importance of
+giving an architectural character to the chimney-piece is insisted on
+by Blondel, whose remark, "Je voudrais n'appliquer à une cheminée que
+des ornements convenables à l'architecture," is a valuable axiom for
+the decorator. It is a mistake to think that this treatment
+necessitates a large mantel-piece and a monumental style of panelling.
+The smallest mantel, surmounted by a picture or a mirror set in simple
+mouldings, may be as architectural as the great chimney-pieces at
+Urbino or Cheverny: all depends on the spirit of the treatment and
+on the proper relation of the different members used. Pajou's monument
+to Madame du Barry's canary-bird is far more architectural than the
+Albert Memorial.
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE XX._
+
+ MANTELPIECE IN DUCAL PALACE, URBINO.
+ XV CENTURY.
+ (TRANSITION BETWEEN GOTHIC AND RENAISSANCE.)]
+
+When, in the middle ages, the hearth in the centre of the room was
+replaced by the wall-chimney, the fireplace was invariably constructed
+with a projecting hood of brick or stone, generally semicircular in
+shape, designed to carry off the smoke which in earlier times had
+escaped through a hole in the roof. The opening of the fireplace, at
+first of moderate dimensions, was gradually enlarged to an enormous
+size, from the erroneous idea that the larger the fire the greater
+would be the warmth of the room. By degrees it was discovered that the
+effect of the volume of heat projected into the room was counteracted
+by the strong draught and by the mass of cold air admitted through the
+huge chimney; and to obviate this difficulty iron doors were placed in
+the opening and kept closed when the fire was not burning (see Plate
+XXI). But this was only a partial remedy, and in time it was found
+expedient to reduce the size of both chimney and fireplace.
+
+In Italy the strong feeling for architectural lines and the invariable
+exercise of common sense in construction soon caused the fireplace to
+be sunk into the wall, thus ridding the room of the Gothic hood, while
+the wall-space above the opening received a treatment of panelling,
+sometimes enclosed in pilasters, and usually crowned by an entablature
+and pediment. When the chimney was not sunk in the wall, the latter
+was brought forward around the opening, thus forming a flat
+chimney-breast to which the same style of decoration could be applied.
+This projection was seldom permitted in Italy, where the thickness of
+the walls made it easy to sink the fireplace, while an unerring
+feeling for form rejected the advancing chimney-breast as a needless
+break in the wall-surface of the room. In France, where Gothic
+methods of construction persisted so long after the introduction of
+classic ornament, the habit of building out the chimney-breast
+continued until the seventeenth century, and even a hundred years
+later French decorators described the plan of sinking the fireplace
+into the thickness of the wall as the "Italian manner." The thinness
+of modern walls has made the projecting chimney-breast a structural
+necessity; but the composition of the room is improved by "furring
+out" the wall on each side of the fireplace in such a way as to
+conceal the projection and obviate a break in the wall-space. Where
+the room is so small that every foot of space is valuable, a niche may
+be formed in either angle of the chimney-breast, thus preserving the
+floor-space which would be sacrificed by advancing the wall, and yet
+avoiding the necessity of a break in the cornice. The Italian plan of
+panelling the space between mantel and cornice continued in favor,
+with various modifications, until the beginning of the present
+century. In early Italian Renaissance over-mantels the central panel
+was usually filled by a bas-relief; but in the sixteenth century this
+was frequently replaced by a picture, not hung on the panelling, but
+forming a part of it.[20] In France the sculptured over-mantel
+followed the same general lines of development, though the treatment,
+until the time of Louis XIII, showed traces of the Gothic tendency to
+overload with ornament without regard to unity of design, so that the
+main lines of the composition were often lost under a mass of
+ill-combined detail.
+
+In Italy the early Renaissance mantels were usually of marble. French
+mantels of the same period were of stone; but this material was so
+unsuited to the elaborate sculpture then in fashion that wood was
+sometimes used instead. For a season richly carved wooden
+chimney-pieces, covered with paint and gilding, were in favor; but
+when the first marble mantels were brought from Italy, that sense of
+fitness in the use of material for which the French have always been
+distinguished, led them to recognize the superiority of marble, and
+the wooden mantel-piece was discarded: nor has it since been used in
+France.
+
+With the seventeenth century, French mantel-pieces became more
+architectural in design and less florid in ornament, and the ponderous
+hood laden with pinnacles, escutcheons, fortified castles and statues
+of saints and warriors, was replaced by a more severe decoration.
+
+Thackeray's gibe at Louis XIV and his age has so long been accepted by
+the English-speaking races as a serious estimate of the period, that
+few now appreciate the artistic preponderance of France in the
+seventeenth century. As a matter of fact, it is to the schools of art
+founded by Louis XIV and to his magnificent patronage of the
+architects and decorators trained in these schools that we owe the
+preservation, in northern Europe, of that sense of form and spirit of
+moderation which mark the great classic tradition. To disparage the
+work of men like Levau, Mansart, de Cotte and Lebrun, shows an
+insufficient understanding, not only of what they did, but of the
+inheritance of confused and turgid ornament from which they freed
+French art.[21] Whether our individual tastes incline us to the Gothic
+or to the classic style, it is easy to see that a school which tried
+to combine the structure of the one with the ornament of the other was
+likely to fall into incoherent modes of expression; and this was
+precisely what happened to French domestic architecture at the end of
+the Renaissance period. It has been the fashion to describe the art of
+the Louis XIV period as florid and bombastic; but a comparison of the
+designs of Philibert de Lorme and Androuet Ducerceau with those of
+such men as Levau and Robert de Cotte will show that what the latter
+did was not to introduce a florid and bombastic manner, but to discard
+it for what Viollet-le-Duc, who will certainly not be suspected of
+undue partiality for this school of architects, calls "une grandeur
+solide, sans faux ornements." No better illustration of this can be
+obtained than by comparing the mantel-pieces of the respective
+periods.[22] The Louis XIV mantel-pieces are much simpler and more
+coherent in design. The caryatides supporting the entablature above
+the opening of the earlier mantels, and the full-length statues
+flanking the central panel of the over-mantel, are replaced by massive
+and severe mouldings of the kind which the French call _mâle_ (see
+mantels in Plates V and XXXVI). Above the entablature there is usually
+a kind of attic or high concave member of marble, often fluted, and
+forming a ledge or shelf just wide enough to carry the row of
+porcelain vases with which it had become the fashion to adorn the
+mantel. These vases, and the bas-relief or picture occupying the
+central panel above, form the chief ornament of the chimney-piece,
+though occasionally the crowning member of the over-mantel is treated
+with a decoration of garlands, masks, trophies or other strictly
+architectural ornament, while in Italy and England the broken
+pediment is frequently employed. The use of a mirror over the
+fireplace is said to have originated with Mansart; but according to
+Blondel it was Robert de Cotte who brought about this innovation, thus
+producing an immediate change in the general scheme of composition.
+The French were far too logical not to see the absurdity of placing a
+mirror too high to be looked into; and the concave Louis XIV member,
+which had raised the mantel-shelf six feet from the floor, was
+removed[23] and the shelf placed directly over the entablature.
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE XXI._
+
+ MANTELPIECE IN THE VILLA GIACOMELLI,
+ AT MASER, NEAR TREVISO. XVI CENTURY.
+ (SHOWING IRON DOORS IN OPENING.)]
+
+Somewhat later the introduction of clocks and candelabra as mantel
+ornaments made it necessary to widen the shelf, and this further
+modified the general design; while the suites of small rooms which had
+come into favor under the Regent led to a reduction in the size of
+mantel-pieces, and to the use of less massive and perhaps less
+architectural ornament.
+
+In the eighteenth century, mantel-pieces in Italy and France were
+almost always composed of a marble or stone architrave surmounted by a
+shelf of the same material, while the over-mantel consisted of a
+mirror, framed in mouldings varying in design from the simplest style
+to the most ornate. This over-mantel, which was either of the exact
+width of the mantel-shelf or some few inches narrower, ended under the
+cornice, and its upper part was usually decorated in the same way as
+the over-doors in the room. If these contained paintings, a picture
+carrying out the same scheme of decoration was often placed in the
+upper part of the over-mantel; or the ornaments of carved wood or
+stucco filling the panels over the doors were repeated in the upper
+part of the mirror-frame.
+
+In France, mirrors had by this time replaced pictures in the central
+panel of the over-mantel; but in Italian decoration of the same period
+oval pictures were often applied to the centre of the mirror, with
+delicate lines of ornament connecting the picture and mirror
+frames.[24]
+
+The earliest fireplaces were lined with stone or brick, but in the
+sixteenth century the more practical custom of using iron fire-backs
+was introduced. At first this fire-back consisted of a small plaque of
+iron, shaped like a headstone, and fixed at the back of the fireplace,
+where the brick or stone was most likely to be calcined by the fire.
+When chimney-building became more scientific, the size of the
+fireplace was reduced, and the sides of the opening were brought much
+nearer the flame, thus making it necessary to extend the fire-back
+into a lining for the whole fireplace.
+
+It was soon seen that besides resisting the heat better than any other
+substance, the iron lining served to radiate it into the room. The
+iron back consequently held its own through every subsequent change in
+the treatment of the fireplace; and the recent return, in England and
+America, to brick or stone is probably due to the fact that the modern
+iron lining is seldom well designed. Iron backs were adopted because
+they served their purpose better than any others; and as no new
+substance offering greater advantages has since been discovered, there
+is no reason for discarding them, especially as they are not only more
+practical but more decorative than any other lining. The old
+fire-backs (of which reproductions are readily obtained) were
+decorated with charming bas-reliefs, and their dark bosses, in the
+play of the firelight, form a more expressive background than the
+dead and unresponsive surface of brick or stone.
+
+It was not uncommon in England to treat the mantel as an order crowned
+by its entablature. Where this was done, an intermediate space was
+left between mantel and over-mantel, an arrangement which somewhat
+weakened the architectural effect. A better plan was that of
+surmounting the entablature with an attic, and making the over-mantel
+spring directly from the latter. Fine examples of this are seen at
+Holkham, built by Brettingham for the Earl of Leicester about the
+middle of the eighteenth century.
+
+The English fireplace was modified at the end of the seventeenth
+century, when coal began to replace wood. Chippendale gives many
+designs for beautiful basket-grates, such as were set in the large
+fireplaces originally intended for wood; for it was not until later
+that chimneys with smaller openings were specially constructed to
+receive the fixed grate and the hob-grate.
+
+It was in England that the architectural treatment of the over-mantel
+was first abandoned. The use of a mirror framed in a panel over the
+fireplace had never become general in England, and toward the end of
+the eighteenth century the mantel-piece was frequently surmounted by a
+blank wall-space, on which a picture or a small round mirror was hung
+high above the shelf (see Plate XLVII). Examples are seen in
+Moreland's pictures, and in prints of simple eighteenth-century
+English interiors; but this treatment is seldom found in rooms of any
+architectural pretensions.
+
+The early American fireplace was merely a cheap provincial copy of
+English models of the same period. The application of the word
+"Colonial" to pre-Revolutionary architecture and decoration has
+created a vague impression that there existed at that time an American
+architectural style. As a matter of fact, "Colonial" architecture is
+simply a modest copy of Georgian models; and "Colonial" mantel-pieces
+were either imported from England by those who could afford it, or
+were reproduced in wood from current English designs. Wooden mantels
+were, indeed, not unknown in England, where the use of a wooden
+architrave led to the practice of facing the fireplace with Dutch
+tiles; but wood was used, both in England and America, only from
+motives of cheapness, and the architrave was set back from the opening
+only because it was unsafe to put an inflammable material so near the
+fire.
+
+After 1800 all the best American houses contained imported marble
+mantel-pieces. These usually consisted of an entablature resting on
+columns or caryatides, with a frieze in low relief representing some
+classic episode, or simply ornamented with bucranes and garlands. In
+the general decline of taste which marked the middle of the present
+century, these dignified and well-designed mantel-pieces were replaced
+by marble arches containing a fixed grate. The hideousness of this
+arched opening soon produced a distaste for marble mantels in the
+minds of a generation unacquainted with the early designs. This
+distaste led to a reaction in favor of wood, resulting in the
+displacement of the architrave and the facing of the space between
+architrave and opening with tiles, iron or marble.
+
+People are beginning to see that the ugliness of the marble
+mantel-pieces of 1840-60 does not prove that wood is the more suitable
+material to employ. There is indeed something of unfitness in the use
+of an inflammable material surrounding a fireplace. Everything about
+the hearth should not only be, but _look_, fire-proof. The chief
+objection to wood is that its use necessitates the displacement of the
+architrave, thus leaving a flat intermediate space to be faced with
+some fire-proof material. This is an architectural fault. A door of
+which the architrave should be set back eighteen inches or more to
+admit of a facing of tiles or marble would be pronounced
+unarchitectural; and it is usually admitted that all classes of
+openings should be subject to the same general treatment.
+
+Where the mantel-piece is of wood, the setting back of the architrave
+is a necessity; but, curiously enough, the practice has become so
+common in England and America that even where the mantel is made of
+marble or stone it is set back in the same way; so that it is unusual
+to see a modern fireplace in which the architrave defines the opening.
+In France, also, the use of an inner facing (called a _retrécissement_)
+has become common, probably because such a device makes it possible to
+use less fuel, while not disturbing the proportions of the mantel as
+related to the room.
+
+The reaction from the bare stiff rooms of the first quarter of the
+present century--the era of mahogany and horsehair--resulted, some
+twenty years since, in a general craving for knick-knacks; and the
+latter soon spread from the tables to the mantel, especially in
+England and America, where the absence of the architectural
+over-mantel left a bare expanse of wall above the chimney-piece.
+
+The use of the mantel as a bric-à-brac shelf led in time to the
+lengthening and widening of this shelf, and in consequence to the
+enlargement of the whole chimney-piece.
+
+Mantels which in the eighteenth century would have been thought in
+scale with rooms of certain dimensions would now be considered too
+small and insignificant. The use of large mantel-pieces, besides
+throwing everything in the room out of scale, is a structural mistake,
+since the excessive projection of the mantel has a tendency to make
+the fire smoke; indeed, the proportions of the old mantels, far from
+being arbitrary, were based as much on practical as on artistic
+considerations. Moreover, the use of long, wide shelves has brought
+about the accumulation of superfluous knick-knacks, whereas a smaller
+mantel, if architecturally designed, would demand only its
+conventional _garniture_ of clock and candlesticks.
+
+The device of concealing an ugly mantel-piece by folds of drapery
+brings an inflammable substance so close to the fire that there is a
+suggestion of danger even where there is no actual risk. The lines of
+a mantel, however bad, represent some kind of solid architrave,--a
+more suitable setting for an architectural opening than flimsy
+festoons of brocade or plush. Any one who can afford to replace an
+ugly chimney-piece by one of good design will find that this change
+does more than any other to improve the appearance of a room. Where a
+badly designed mantel cannot be removed, the best plan is to leave it
+unfurbelowed, simply placing above it a mirror or panel to connect the
+lines of the opening with the cornice.
+
+The effect of a fireplace depends much upon the good taste and
+appropriateness of its accessories. Little attention is paid at
+present to the design and workmanship of these and like necessary
+appliances; yet if good of their kind they add more to the adornment
+of a room than a multiplicity of useless knick-knacks.
+
+Andirons should be of wrought-iron, bronze or ormolu. Substances which
+require constant polishing, such as steel or brass, are unfitted to a
+fireplace. It is no longer easy to buy the old bronze andirons of
+French or Italian design, with pedestals surmounted by statuettes of
+nymph or faun, to which time has given the iridescence that modern
+bronze-workers vainly try to reproduce with varnish. These bronzes,
+and the old ormolu andirons, are now almost _introuvables_; but the
+French artisan still copies the old models with fair success (see
+Plates V and XXXVI). Andirons should not only harmonize with the
+design of the mantel but also be in scale with its dimensions. In the
+fireplace of a large drawing-room, boudoir andirons would look
+insignificant; while the monumental Renaissance fire-dogs would dwarf
+a small mantel and make its ornamentation trivial.
+
+If andirons are gilt, they should be of ormolu. The cheaper kinds of
+gilding are neither durable nor good in tone, and plain iron is
+preferable to anything but bronze or fire-gilding. The design of
+shovel and tongs should accord with that of the andirons: in France
+such details are never disregarded. The shovel and tongs should be
+placed upright against the mantel-piece, or rest upon hooks inserted
+in the architrave: the brass or gilt stands now in use are seldom well
+designed. Fenders, being merely meant to protect the floor from
+sparks, should be as light and easy to handle as possible: the folding
+fender of wire-netting is for this reason preferable to any other,
+since it may be shut and put away when not in use. The low guards of
+solid brass in favor in England and America not only fail to protect
+the floor, but form a permanent barrier between the fire and those who
+wish to approach it; and the latter objection applies also to the
+massive folding fender that is too heavy to be removed.
+
+Coal-scuttles, like andirons, should be made of bronze, ormolu or
+iron. The unnecessary use of substances which require constant
+polishing is one of the mysteries of English and American
+housekeeping: it is difficult to see why a housemaid should spend
+hours in polishing brass or steel fenders, andirons, coal-scuttles and
+door-knobs, when all these articles might be made of some substance
+that does not need daily cleaning.
+
+Where wood is burned, no better wood-box can be found than an old
+carved chest, either one of the Italian _cassoni_, with their painted
+panels and gilded volutes, or a plain box of oak or walnut with
+well-designed panels and old iron hasps. The best substitute for such
+a chest is a plain wicker basket, without ornamentation, enamel paint
+or gilding. If an article of this kind is not really beautiful, it had
+better be as obviously utilitarian as possible in design and
+construction.
+
+A separate chapter might be devoted to the fire-screen, with its
+carved frame and its panel of tapestry, needlework, or painted
+arabesques. Of all the furniture of the hearth, it is that upon which
+most taste and variety of invention have been spent; and any of the
+numerous French works on furniture and house-decoration will supply
+designs which the modern decorator might successfully reproduce (see
+Plate XXII). So large is the field from which he may select his
+models, that it is perhaps more to the purpose to touch upon the
+styles of fire-screens to be avoided: such as the colossal brass or
+ormolu fan, the stained-glass screen, the embroidered or painted
+banner suspended on a gilt rod, or the stuffed bird spread out in a
+broiled attitude against a plush background.
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE XXII._
+
+ FRENCH FIRE-SCREEN, LOUIS XIV PERIOD.
+ FROM THE CHÂTEAU OF ANET.]
+
+In connection with the movable fire-screen, a word may be said of the
+fire-boards which, until thirty or forty years ago, were used to close
+the opening of the fireplace in summer. These fire-boards are now
+associated with old-fashioned boarding-house parlors, where they are
+still sometimes seen, covered with a paper like that on the walls, and
+looking ugly enough to justify their disuse. The old fire-boards
+were very different: in rooms of any importance they were beautifully
+decorated, and in Italian interiors, where the dado was often painted,
+the same decoration was continued on the fire-boards. Sometimes the
+latter were papered; but the paper used was designed expressly for the
+purpose, with a decorative composition of flowers, landscapes, or the
+ever-amusing _chinoiseries_ on which the eighteenth-century designer
+played such endless variations.
+
+Whether the fireplace in summer should be closed by a board, or left
+open, with the logs laid on the irons, is a question for individual
+taste; but it is certain that if the painted fire-board were revived,
+it might form a very pleasing feature in the decoration of modern
+rooms. The only possible objection to its use is that it interferes
+with ventilation by closing the chimney-opening; but as fire-boards
+are used only at a season when all the windows are open, this drawback
+is hardly worth considering.
+
+In spite of the fancied advancement in refinement and luxury of
+living, the development of the modern heating apparatus seems likely,
+especially in America, to do away with the open fire. The temperature
+maintained in most American houses by means of hot-air or hot-water
+pipes is so high that even the slight additional warmth of a wood fire
+would be unendurable. Still there are a few exceptions to this rule,
+and in some houses the healthy glow of open fires is preferred to the
+parching atmosphere of steam. Indeed, it might almost be said that the
+good taste and _savoir-vivre_ of the inmates of a house may be guessed
+from the means used for heating it. Old pictures, old furniture and
+fine bindings cannot live in a furnace-baked atmosphere; and those who
+possess such treasures and know their value have an additional motive
+for keeping their houses cool and well ventilated.
+
+No house can be properly aired in winter without the draughts produced
+by open fires. Fortunately, doctors are beginning to call attention to
+this neglected detail of sanitation; and as dry artificial heat is the
+main source of throat and lung diseases, it is to be hoped that the
+growing taste for open-air life and out-door sports will bring about a
+desire for better ventilation, and a dislike for air-tight stoves,
+gas-fires and steam-heat.
+
+Aside from the question of health and personal comfort, nothing can be
+more cheerless and depressing than a room without fire on a winter
+day. The more torrid the room, the more abnormal is the contrast
+between the cold hearth and the incandescent temperature. Without a
+fire, the best-appointed drawing-room is as comfortless as the shut-up
+"best parlor" of a New England farm-house. The empty fireplace shows
+that the room is not really lived in and that its appearance of luxury
+and comfort is but a costly sham prepared for the edification of
+visitors.
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[20] In Italy, where the walls were frescoed, the architectural
+composition over the mantel was also frequently painted. Examples of
+this are to be seen at the Villa Vertemati, near Chiavenna, and at the
+Villa Giacomelli, at Maser, near Treviso. This practice accounts for
+the fact that in many old architectural drawings of Italian interiors
+a blank wall-space is seen over the mantel.
+
+[21] It is to be hoped that the recently published English translation
+of M. Émile Bourgeois's book on Louis XIV will do much to remove this
+prejudice.
+
+[22] It is curious that those who criticize the ornateness of the
+Louis XIV style are often the warmest admirers of the French
+Renaissance, the style of all others most remarkable for its excessive
+use of ornament, exquisite in itself, but quite unrelated to structure
+and independent of general design.
+
+[23] It is said to have been put at this height in order that the
+porcelain vases should be out of reach. See Daviler, "Cours
+d'Architecture."
+
+[24] Examples are to be seen in several rooms of the hunting-lodge of
+the kings of Savoy, at Stupinigi, near Turin.
+
+
+
+
+VII
+
+CEILINGS AND FLOORS
+
+
+To attempt even an outline of the history of ceilings in domestic
+architecture would exceed the scope of this book; nor would it serve
+any practical purpose to trace the early forms of vaulting and
+timbering which preceded the general adoption of the modern plastered
+ceiling. To understand the development of the modern ceiling, however,
+one must trace the two very different influences by which it has been
+shaped: that of the timber roof of the North and that of the brick or
+stone vault of the Latin builders. This twofold tradition has
+curiously affected the details of the modern ceiling. During the
+Renaissance, flat plaster ceilings were not infrequently coffered with
+stucco panels exactly reproducing the lines of timber framing; and in
+the Villa Vertemati, near Chiavenna, there is a curious and
+interesting ceiling of carved wood made in imitation of stucco (see
+Plate XXIII); while one of the rooms in the Palais de Justice at
+Rennes contains an elaborate vaulted ceiling constructed entirely of
+wood, with mouldings nailed on (see Plate XXIV).
+
+In northern countries, where the ceiling was simply the under side of
+the wooden floor,[25] it was natural that its decoration should
+follow the rectangular subdivisions formed by open timber-framing. In
+the South, however, where the floors were generally of stone, resting
+on stone vaults, the structural conditions were so different that
+although the use of caissons based on the divisions of timber-framing
+was popular both in the Roman and Renaissance periods, the architect
+always felt himself free to treat the ceiling as a flat, undivided
+surface prepared for the application of ornament.
+
+The idea that there is anything unarchitectural in this method comes
+from an imperfect understanding of the construction of Roman ceilings.
+The vault was the typical Roman ceiling, and the vault presents a
+smooth surface, without any structural projections to modify the
+ornament applied to it. The panelling of a vaulted or flat ceiling was
+as likely to be agreeable to the eye as a similar treatment of the
+walls; but the Roman coffered ceiling and its Renaissance successors
+were the result of a strong sense of decorative fitness rather than of
+any desire to adhere to structural limitations.
+
+Examples of the timbered ceiling are, indeed, to be found in Italy as
+well as in France and England; and in Venice the flat wooden ceiling,
+panelled upon structural lines, persisted throughout the Renaissance
+period; but in Rome, where the classic influences were always much
+stronger, and where the discovery of the stucco ceilings of ancient
+baths and palaces produced such lasting effects upon the architecture
+of the early Renaissance, the decorative treatment of the stone vault
+was transferred to the flat or coved Renaissance ceiling without a
+thought of its being inapplicable or "insincere." The fear of
+insincerity, in the sense of concealing the anatomy of any part of a
+building, troubled the Renaissance architect no more than it did his
+Gothic predecessor, who had never hesitated to stretch a "ciel" of
+cloth or tapestry over the naked timbers of the mediæval ceiling. The
+duty of exposing structural forms--an obligation that weighs so
+heavily upon the conscience of the modern architect--is of very recent
+origin. Mediæval as well as Renaissance architects thought first of
+adapting their buildings to the uses for which they were intended and
+then of decorating them in such a way as to give pleasure to the eye;
+and the maintenance of that relation which the eye exacts between main
+structural lines and their ornamentation was the only form of
+sincerity which they knew or cared about.
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE XXIII._
+
+ CARVED WOODEN CEILING, VILLA VERTEMATI.
+ XVI CENTURY.
+ (SHOWING INFLUENCE OF STUCCO DECORATION.)]
+
+If a flat ceiling rested on a well-designed cornice, or if a vaulted
+or coved ceiling sprang obviously from walls capable of supporting it,
+the Italian architect did not allow himself to be hampered by any
+pedantic conformity to structural details. The eye once satisfied that
+the ceiling had adequate support, the fit proportioning of its
+decoration was considered far more important than mere technical
+fidelity to the outline of floor-beams and joists. If the Italian
+decorator wished to adorn a ceiling with carved or painted panels he
+used the lines of the timbering to frame his panels, because they
+naturally accorded with his decorative scheme; while, were a large
+central painting to be employed, or the ceiling to be covered with
+reliefs in stucco, he felt no more hesitation in deviating from the
+lines of the timbering than he would have felt in planning the pattern
+of a mosaic or a marble floor without reference to the floor-beams
+beneath it.
+
+In France and England it was natural that timber-construction should
+long continue to regulate the design of the ceiling. The Roman vault
+lined with stone caissons, or with a delicate tracery of stucco-work,
+was not an ever-present precedent in northern Europe. Tradition
+pointed to the open-timbered roof; and as Italy furnished numerous and
+brilliant examples of decorative treatment adapted to this form of
+ceiling, it was to be expected that both in France and England the
+national form should be preserved long after Italian influences had
+established themselves in both countries. In fact, it is interesting
+to note that in France, where the artistic feeling was much finer, and
+the sense of fitness and power of adaptation were more fully
+developed, than in England, the lines of the timbered ceiling
+persisted throughout the Renaissance and Louis XIII periods; whereas
+in England the Elizabethan architects, lost in the mazes of Italian
+detail, without a guiding perception of its proper application,
+abandoned the timbered ceiling, with its eminently architectural
+subdivisions, for a flat plaster surface over which geometrical
+flowers in stucco meandered in endless sinuosities, unbroken by a
+single moulding, and repeating themselves with the maddening
+persistency of wall-paper pattern. This style of ornamentation was
+done away with by Inigo Jones and his successors, who restored the
+architectural character of the ceiling, whether flat or vaulted; and
+thereafter panelling persisted in England until the French Revolution
+brought about the general downfall of taste.[26]
+
+In France, at the beginning of the eighteenth century, the liking for
+_petits appartements_ led to greater lightness in all kinds of
+decorative treatment; and the ceilings of the Louis XV period, while
+pleasing in detail, are open to the criticism of being somewhat weak
+in form. Still, they are always _compositions_, and their light
+traceries, though perhaps too dainty and fragile in themselves, are so
+disposed as to form a clearly marked design, instead of being allowed
+to wander in a monotonous network over the whole surface of the
+ceiling, like the ubiquitous Tudor rose. Isaac Ware, trained in the
+principles of form which the teachings of Inigo Jones had so deeply
+impressed upon English architects, ridicules the "petty wildnesses" of
+the French style; but if the Louis XV ceiling lost for a time its
+architectural character, this was soon to be restored by Gabriel and
+his followers, while at the same period in England the forcible
+mouldings of Inigo Jones's school were fading into the ineffectual
+grace of Adam's laurel-wreaths and velaria.
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE XXIV._
+
+ CEILING IN THE PALAIS DE JUSTICE, RENNES.
+ LOUIS XIV PERIOD.
+ (WOODEN CEILING IMITATING MASONRY VAULTING AND STUCCO
+ ORNAMENTATION.)]
+
+In the general effect of the room, the form of the ceiling is of more
+importance than its decoration. In rooms of a certain size and height,
+a flat surface overhead looks monotonous, and the ceiling should be
+vaulted or coved.[27] Endless modifications of this form of treatment
+are to be found in the architectural treatises of the seventeenth and
+eighteenth centuries, as well as in the buildings of that period.
+
+A coved ceiling greatly increases the apparent height of a low-studded
+room; but rooms of this kind should not be treated with an order,
+since the projection of the cornice below the springing of the cove
+will lower the walls so much as to defeat the purpose for which the
+cove has been used. In such rooms the cove should rise directly from
+the walls; and this treatment suggests the important rule that where
+the cove is not supported by a cornice the ceiling decoration should
+be of very light character. A heavy panelled ceiling should not rest
+on the walls without the intervention of a strongly profiled cornice.
+The French Louis XV decoration, with its fanciful embroidery of stucco
+ornament, is well suited to coved ceilings springing directly from
+the walls in a room of low stud; while a ceiling divided into panels
+with heavy architectural mouldings, whether it be flat or vaulted,
+looks best when the walls are treated with a complete order.
+
+Durand, in his lectures on architecture, in speaking of cornices lays
+down the following excellent rules: "Interior cornices must
+necessarily differ more or less from those belonging to the orders as
+used externally, though in rooms of reasonable height these
+differences need be but slight; but if the stud be low, as sometimes
+is inevitable, the cornice must be correspondingly narrowed, and given
+an excessive projection, in order to increase the apparent height of
+the room. Moreover, as in the interior of the house the light is much
+less bright than outside, the cornice should be so profiled that the
+juncture of the mouldings shall form not right angles, but acute
+angles, with spaces between the mouldings serving to detach the latter
+still more clearly from each other."
+
+The choice of the substance out of which a ceiling is to be made
+depends somewhat upon the dimensions of the room, the height of the
+stud and the decoration of the walls. A heavily panelled wooden
+ceiling resting upon walls either frescoed or hung with stuff is
+likely to seem oppressive; but, as in all other kinds of decoration,
+the effect produced depends far more upon the form and the choice of
+ornamental detail than upon the material used. Wooden ceilings,
+however, both from the nature of the construction and the kind of
+ornament which may most suitably be applied to them, are of necessity
+rather heavy in appearance, and should therefore be used only in large
+and high-studded rooms the walls of which are panelled in wood.[28]
+
+Stucco and fresco-painting are adapted to every variety of decoration,
+from the light traceries of a boudoir ceiling to the dome of the
+_salon à l'Italienne_; but the design must be chosen with strict
+regard to the size and height of the room and to the proposed
+treatment of its walls. The cornice forms the connecting link between
+walls and ceiling and it is essential to the harmony of any scheme of
+decoration that this important member should be carefully designed. It
+is useless to lavish money on the adornment of walls and ceiling
+connected by an ugly cornice.
+
+The same objections extend to the clumsy plaster mouldings which in
+many houses disfigure the ceiling. To paint or gild a ceiling of this
+kind only attracts attention to its ugliness. When the expense of
+removing the mouldings and filling up the holes in the plaster is
+considered too great, it is better to cover the bulbous rosettes and
+pendentives with kalsomine than to attempt their embellishment by
+means of any polychrome decoration. The cost of removing plaster
+ornaments is not great, however, and a small outlay will replace an
+ugly cornice by one of architectural design; so that a little economy
+in buying window-hangings or chair-coverings often makes up for the
+additional expense of these changes. One need only look at the
+ceilings in the average modern house to see what a thing of horror
+plaster may become in the hands of an untrained "designer."
+
+The same general principles of composition suggested for the treatment
+of walls may be applied to ceiling-decoration. Thus it is essential
+that where there is a division of parts, one part shall perceptibly
+predominate; and this, in a ceiling, should be the central division.
+The chief defect of the coffered Renaissance ceiling is the lack of
+this predominating part. Great as may have been the decorative skill
+expended on the treatment of beams and panels, the coffered ceiling
+of equal-sized divisions seems to press down upon the spectator's
+head; whereas the large central panel gives an idea of height that the
+great ceiling-painters were quick to enhance by glimpses of cloud and
+sky, or some aerial effect, as in Mantegna's incomparable ceiling of
+the Sala degli Sposi in the ducal palace of Mantua.
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE XXV._
+
+ CEILING OF THE SALA DEGLI SPOSI, DUCAL PALACE, MANTUA.
+ BY ANDREA MANTEGNA, 1474.]
+
+Ceiling-decoration should never be a literal reproduction of
+wall-decoration. The different angle and greater distance at which
+ceilings are viewed demand a quite different treatment and it is to
+the disregard of this fact that most badly designed ceilings owe their
+origin. Even in the high days of art there was a tendency on the part
+of some decorators to confound the two plane surfaces of wall and
+ceiling, and one might cite many wall-designs which have been
+transferred to the ceiling without being rearranged to fit their new
+position. Instances of this kind have never been so general as in the
+present day. The reaction from the badly designed mouldings and
+fungoid growths that characterized the ceilings of forty years ago has
+led to the use of attenuated laurel-wreaths combined with other puny
+attributes taken from Sheraton cabinets and Adam mantel-pieces. These
+so-called ornaments, always somewhat lacking in character, become
+absolutely futile when viewed from below.
+
+This pressed-flower ornamentation is a direct precedent to the modern
+ceiling covered with wall-paper. One would think that the
+inappropriateness of this treatment was obvious; but since it has
+become popular enough to warrant the manufacture of specially designed
+ceiling-papers, some protest should be made. The necessity for hiding
+cracks in the plaster is the reason most often given for papering
+ceilings; but the cost of mending cracks is small and a plaster
+ceiling lasts much longer than is generally thought. It need never
+be taken down unless it is actually falling; and as well-made repairs
+strengthen and improve the entire surface, a much-mended ceiling is
+stronger than one that is just beginning to crack. If the cost of
+repairing must be avoided, a smooth white lining-paper should be
+chosen in place of one of the showy and vulgar papers which serve only
+to attract attention.
+
+Of all forms of ceiling adornment painting is the most beautiful.
+Italy, which contains the three perfect ceilings of the world--those
+of Mantegna in the ducal palace of Mantua (see Plate XXV), of Perugino
+in the Sala del Cambio at Perugia and of Araldi in the Convent of St.
+Paul at Parma--is the best field for the study of this branch of art.
+From the semi-classical vaults of the fifteenth century, with their
+Roman arabesques and fruit-garlands framing human figures detached as
+mere ornament against a background of solid color, to the massive
+goddesses and broad Virgilian landscapes of the Carracci and to the
+piled-up perspectives of Giordano's school of prestidigitators,
+culminating in the great Tiepolo, Italian art affords examples of
+every temperament applied to the solution of one of the most
+interesting problems in decoration.
+
+Such ceilings as those on which Raphael and Giovanni da Udine worked
+together, combining painted arabesques and medallions with stucco
+reliefs, are admirably suited to small low-studded rooms and might
+well be imitated by painters incapable of higher things.
+
+There is but one danger in adapting this decoration to modern
+use--that is, the temptation to sacrifice scale and general
+composition to the search after refinement of detail. It cannot be
+denied that some of the decorations of the school of Giovanni da Udine
+are open to this criticism. The ornamentation of the great loggia of
+the Villa Madama is unquestionably out of scale with the dimensions
+of the structure. Much exquisite detail is lost in looking up past the
+great piers and the springing of the massive arches to the lace-work
+that adorns the vaulting. In this case the composition is less at
+fault than the scale: the decorations of the semi-domes at the Villa
+Madama, if transferred to a small mezzanin room, would be found to
+"compose" perfectly. Charming examples of the use of this style in
+small apartments may be studied in the rooms of the Casino del Grotto,
+near Mantua.
+
+The tendency of many modern decorators to sacrifice composition to
+detail, and to neglect the observance of proportion between ornament
+and structure, makes the adaptation of Renaissance stucco designs a
+somewhat hazardous undertaking; but the very care required to preserve
+the scale and to accentuate the general lines of the design affords
+good training in the true principles of composition.
+
+Equally well suited to modern use are the designs in arabesque with
+which, in France, Bérain and his followers painted the ceilings of
+small rooms during the Louis XIV period (see Plate XXVI). With the
+opening of the eighteenth century the Bérain arabesques, animated by
+the touch of Watteau, Huet and J.-B. Leprince, blossomed into
+trellis-like designs alive with birds and monkeys, Chinese mandarins
+balancing umbrellas, and nymphs and shepherdesses under slender
+classical ruins. Side by side with the monumental work of such artists
+as Lebrun and Lesueur, Coypel, Vouet and Natoire, this light style of
+composition was always in favor for the decoration of _petits
+appartements_: the most famous painters of the day did not think it
+beneath them to furnish designs for such purposes (see Plate XXVII).
+
+In moderate-sized rooms which are to be decorated in a simple and
+inexpensive manner, a plain plaster ceiling with well-designed
+cornice is preferable to any device for producing showy effects at
+small cost. It may be laid down as a general rule in house-decoration
+that what must be done cheaply should be done simply. It is better to
+pay for the best plastering than to use a cheaper quality and then to
+cover the cracks with lincrusta or ceiling-paper. This is true of all
+such expedients: let the fundamental work be good in design and
+quality and the want of ornament will not be felt.
+
+In America the return to a more substantial way of building and the
+tendency to discard wood for brick or stone whenever possible will
+doubtless lead in time to the use of brick, stone or marble floors.
+These floors, associated in the minds of most Americans with shivering
+expeditions through damp Italian palaces, are in reality perfectly
+suited to the dry American climate, and even the most anæmic person
+could hardly object to brick or marble covered by heavy rugs.
+
+The inlaid marble floors of the Italian palaces, whether composed of
+square or diamond-shaped blocks, or decorated with a large design in
+different colors, are unsurpassed in beauty; while in high-studded
+rooms where there is little pattern on the walls and a small amount of
+furniture, elaborately designed mosaic floors with sweeping arabesques
+and geometrical figures are of great decorative value.
+
+Floors of these substances have the merit of being not only more
+architectural in character, more solid and durable, but also easier to
+keep clean. This should especially commend them to the
+hygienically-minded American housekeeper, since floors that may be
+washed are better suited to our climate than those which must be
+covered with a nailed-down carpet.
+
+Next in merit to brick or marble comes the parquet of oak or other
+hard wood; but even this looks inadequate in rooms of great
+architectural importance. In ball-rooms a hard-wood floor is generally
+regarded as a necessity; but in vestibule, staircase, dining-room or
+saloon, marble is superior to anything else. The design of the parquet
+floor should be simple and unobtrusive. The French, who brought this
+branch of floor-laying to perfection, would never have tolerated the
+crudely contrasted woods that make the modern parquet so aggressive.
+Like the walls of a room, the floor is a background: it should not
+furnish pattern, but set off whatever is placed upon it. The
+perspective effects dear to the modern floor-designer are the climax
+of extravagance. A floor should not only be, but appear to be, a
+perfectly level surface, without simulated bosses or concavities.
+
+In choosing rugs and carpets the subject of design should be carefully
+studied. The Oriental carpet-designers have always surpassed their
+European rivals. The patterns of Eastern rugs are invariably well
+composed, with skilfully conventionalized figures in flat unshaded
+colors. Even the Oriental rug of the present day is well drawn; but
+the colors used by Eastern manufacturers since the introduction of
+aniline dyes are so discordant that these rugs are inferior to most
+modern European carpets.
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE XXVI._
+
+ CEILING IN THE STYLE OF BÉRAIN.
+ LOUIS XIV PERIOD.]
+
+In houses with deal floors, nailed-down carpets are usually considered
+a necessity, and the designing of such carpets has improved so much in
+the last ten or fifteen years that a sufficient choice of unobtrusive
+geometrical patterns may now be found. The composition of European
+carpets woven in one piece, like rugs, has never been satisfactory.
+Even the splendid _tapis de Savonnerie_ made in France at the royal
+manufactory during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries were not
+so true to the best principles of design as the old Oriental rugs. In
+Europe there was always a tendency to transfer wall or ceiling-decoration
+to floor-coverings. Such incongruities as architectural mouldings,
+highly modelled trophies and human masks appear in most of the
+European carpets from the time of Louis XIV to the present day; and
+except when copying Eastern models the European designers were subject
+to strange lapses from taste. There is no reason why a painter should
+not simulate loggia and sky on a flat plaster ceiling, since no one
+will try to use this sham opening as a means of exit; but the
+carpet-designer who puts picture-frames and human faces under foot,
+though he does not actually deceive, produces on the eye a momentary
+startling sense of obstruction. Any _trompe-l'oeil_ is permissible in
+decorative art if it gives an impression of pleasure; but the inherent
+sense of fitness is shocked by the act of walking upon upturned faces.
+
+Recent carpet-designs, though usually free from such obvious
+incongruities, have seldom more than a negative merit. The
+unconventionalized flower still shows itself, and even when banished
+from the centre of the carpet lingers in the border which accompanies
+it. The vulgarity of these borders is the chief objection to using
+carpets of European manufacture as rugs, instead of nailing them to
+the floor. It is difficult to find a border that is not too wide, and
+of which the design is a simple conventional figure in flat unshaded
+colors. If used at all, a carpet with a border should always be in the
+form of a rug, laid in the middle of the room, and not cut to follow
+all the ins and outs of the floor, as such adaptation not only narrows
+the room but emphasizes any irregularity in its plan.
+
+In houses with deal floors, where nailed-down carpets are used in all
+the rooms, a restful effect is produced by covering the whole of each
+story with the same carpet, the door-sills being removed so that the
+carpet may extend from one room to another. In small town houses,
+especially, this will be found much less fatiguing to the eye than the
+usual manner of covering the floor of each room with carpets differing
+in color and design.
+
+Where several rooms are carpeted alike, the floor-covering chosen
+should be quite plain, or patterned with some small geometrical figure
+in a darker shade of the foundation color; and green, dark blue or red
+will be found most easy to combine with the different color-schemes of
+the rooms.
+
+Pale tints should be avoided in the selection of carpets. It is better
+that the color-scale should ascend gradually from the dark tone of
+floor or carpet to the faint half-tints of the ceiling. The opposite
+combination--that of a pale carpet with a dark ceiling--lowers the
+stud and produces an impression of top-heaviness and gloom; indeed, in
+a room where the ceiling is overladen, a dark rich-toned carpet will
+do much to lighten it, whereas a pale floor-covering will bring it
+down, as it were, on the inmates' heads.
+
+Stair-carpets should be of a strong full color and, if possible,
+without pattern. It is fatiguing to see a design meant for a
+horizontal surface constrained to follow the ins and outs of a flight
+of steps; and the use of pattern where not needed is always
+meaningless, and interferes with a decided color-effect where the
+latter might have been of special advantage to the general scheme of
+decoration.
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE XXVII._
+
+ CEILING IN THE CHÂTEAU OF CHANTILLY.
+ LOUIS XV PERIOD.
+ (EXAMPLE OF CHINOISERIE DECORATION.)]
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[25] In France, until the sixteenth century, the same
+word--_plancher_--was used to designate both floor and ceiling.
+
+[26] For a fine example of an English stucco ceiling, see Plate XIII.
+
+[27] The flat Venetian ceilings, such as those in the ducal palace,
+with their richly carved wood-work and glorious paintings, beautiful
+as they have been made by art, are not so fine architecturally as a
+domed or coved ceiling.
+
+[28] For an example of a wooden ceiling which is too heavy for the
+wall-decoration below it, see Plate XLIV.
+
+
+
+
+VIII
+
+ENTRANCE AND VESTIBULE
+
+
+The decoration of the entrance necessarily depends on the nature of
+the house and its situation. A country house, where visitors are few
+and life is simple, demands a less formal treatment than a house in a
+city or town; while a villa in a watering-place where there is much in
+common with town life has necessarily many points of resemblance to a
+town house.
+
+It should be borne in mind of entrances in general that, while the
+main purpose of a door is to admit, its secondary purpose is to
+exclude. The outer door, which separates the hall or vestibule from
+the street, should clearly proclaim itself an effectual barrier. It
+should look strong enough to give a sense of security, and be so plain
+in design as to offer no chance of injury by weather and give no
+suggestion of interior decoration.
+
+The best ornamentation for an entrance-door is simple panelling, with
+bold architectural mouldings and as little decorative detail as
+possible. The necessary ornament should be contributed by the design
+of locks, hinges and handles. These, like the door itself, should be
+strong and serviceable, with nothing finikin in their treatment, and
+made of a substance which does not require cleaning. For the latter
+reason, bronze and iron are more fitting than brass or steel.
+
+In treating the vestibule, careful study is required to establish a
+harmony between the decorative elements inside and outside the house.
+The vestibule should form a natural and easy transition from the plain
+architecture of the street to the privacy of the interior (see Plate
+XXVIII).
+
+No portion of the inside of the house being more exposed to the
+weather, great pains should be taken to avoid using in its decoration
+materials easily damaged by rain or dust, such as carpets or
+wall-paper. The decoration should at once produce the impression of
+being weather-proof.
+
+Marble, stone, scagliola, or painted stucco are for this reason the
+best materials. If wood is used, it should be painted, as dust and
+dirt soon soil it, and unless its finish be water-proof it will
+require continual varnishing. The decorations of the vestibule should
+be as permanent as possible in character, in order to avoid incessant
+small repairs.
+
+The floor should be of stone, marble, or tiles; even a linoleum or
+oil-cloth of sober pattern is preferable to a hard-wood floor in so
+exposed a situation. For the same reason, it is best to treat the
+walls with a decoration of stone or marble. In simpler houses the same
+effect may be produced at much less cost by dividing the wall-spaces
+into panels, with wooden mouldings applied directly to the plaster,
+the whole being painted in oil, either in one uniform tint or in
+varying shades of some cold sober color. This subdued color-scheme
+will produce an agreeable contrast with the hall or staircase, which,
+being a degree nearer the centre of the house, should receive a gayer
+and more informal treatment than the vestibule.
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE XXVIII._
+
+ ANTECHAMBER IN THE VILLA CAMBIASO, GENOA.
+ BUILT BY ALESSI, XVI CENTURY.]
+
+The vestibule usually has two doors: an outer one opening toward the
+street and an inner one giving into the hall; but when the outer is
+entirely of wood, without glass, and must therefore be left open
+during the day, the vestibule is usually subdivided by an inner glass
+door placed a few feet from the entrance. This arrangement has the
+merit of keeping the house warm and of affording a shelter to the
+servants who, during an entertainment, are usually compelled to wait
+outside. The French architect always provides an antechamber for this
+purpose.
+
+No furniture which is easily soiled or damaged, or difficult to keep
+clean, is appropriate in a vestibule. In large and imposing houses
+marble or stone benches and tables should be used, and the
+ornamentation may consist of statues, vases, or busts on pedestals
+(see Plate XXIX). When the decoration is simpler and wooden benches
+are used, they should resemble those made for French gardens, with
+seats of one piece of wood, or of broad thick slats; while in small
+vestibules, benches and chairs with cane seats are appropriate.
+
+The excellent reproductions of Robbia ware made by Cantagalli of
+Florence look well against painted walls; while plaster or terra-cotta
+bas-reliefs are less expensive and equally decorative, especially
+against a pale-blue or green background.
+
+The lantern, the traditional form of fixture for lighting vestibules,
+is certainly the best in so exposed a situation; and though where
+electric light is used draughts need not be considered, the sense of
+fitness requires that a light in such a position should always have
+the semblance of being protected.
+
+
+
+
+IX
+
+HALL AND STAIRS
+
+
+What is technically known as the staircase (in German the
+_Treppenhaus_) has, in our lax modern speech, come to be designated as
+the hall.
+
+In Gwilt's _Encyclopedia of Architecture_ the staircase is defined as
+"that part or subdivision of a building containing the stairs which
+enable people to ascend or descend from one floor to another"; while
+the hall is described as follows: "The first large apartment on
+entering a house.... In magnificent edifices, where the hall is larger
+and loftier than usual, and is placed in the middle of the house, it
+is called a saloon; and a royal apartment consists of a hall, or
+chamber of guards, etc."
+
+It is clear that, in the technical acceptance of the term, a hall is
+something quite different from a staircase; yet the two words were
+used interchangeably by so early a writer as Isaac Ware, who, in his
+_Complete Body of Architecture_, published in 1756, continually speaks
+of the staircase as the hall. This confusion of terms is difficult to
+explain, for in early times the staircase was as distinct from the
+hall as it continued to be in France and Italy, and, with rare
+exceptions, in England also, until the present century.
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE XXIX._
+
+ ANTECHAMBER IN THE DURAZZO PALACE, GENOA.
+ DECORATED BY TORRIGIANI. LATE XVIII CENTURY.]
+
+In glancing over the plans of the feudal dwellings of northern Europe
+it will be seen that, far from being based on any definite
+conception, they were made up of successive accretions about the
+nobleman's keep. The first room to attach itself to the keep was the
+"hall," a kind of microcosm in which sleeping, eating, entertaining
+guests and administering justice succeeded each other or went on
+simultaneously. In the course of time various rooms, such as the
+parlor, the kitchen, the offices, the muniment-room and the lady's
+bower, were added to the primitive hall; but these were rather
+incidental necessities than parts of an organized scheme of
+planning.[29] In this agglomeration of apartments the stairs found a
+place where they could. Space being valuable, they were generally
+carried up spirally in the thickness of the wall, or in an
+angle-turret. Owing to enforced irregularity of plan, and perhaps to
+the desire to provide numerous separate means of access to the
+different parts of the dwelling, each castle usually contained several
+staircases, no one of which was more important than the others.
+
+It was in Italy that stairs first received attention as a feature in
+the general composition of the house. There, from the outset, all the
+conditions had been different. The domestic life of the upper classes
+having developed from the eleventh century onward in the comparative
+security of the walled town, it was natural that house-planning should
+be less irregular,[30] and that more regard should be given to
+considerations of comfort and dignity. In early Italian palaces the
+stairs either ascended through the open central _cortile_ to an
+arcaded gallery on the first floor, as in the Gondi palace and the
+Bargello at Florence, or were carried up in straight flights between
+walls.[31] This was, in fact, the usual way of building stairs in
+Italy until the end of the fifteenth century. These enclosed stairs
+usually started near the vaulted entranceway leading from the street
+to the _cortile_. Gradually the space at the foot of the stairs, which
+at first was small, increased in size and in importance of decorative
+treatment; while the upper landing opened into an antechamber which
+became the centre of the principal suite of apartments. With the
+development of the Palladian style, the whole staircase (provided the
+state apartments were not situated on the ground floor) assumed more
+imposing dimensions; though it was not until a much later date that
+the monumental staircase so often regarded as one of the chief
+features of the Italian Renaissance began to be built. Indeed, a
+detailed examination of the Italian palaces shows that even in the
+seventeenth and eighteenth centuries such staircases as were built by
+Fontana in the royal palace at Naples, by Juvara in the Palazzo Madama
+at Turin and by Vanvitelli at Caserta, were seen only in royal
+palaces. Even Morelli's staircase in the Braschi palace in Rome,
+magnificent as it is, hardly reaches the popular conception of the
+Italian state staircase--a conception probably based rather upon the
+great open stairs of the Genoese _cortili_ than upon any actually
+existing staircases. It is certain that until late in the seventeenth
+century (as Bernini's Vatican staircase shows) inter-mural stairs were
+thought grand enough for the most splendid palaces of Italy (see Plate
+XXX).
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE XXX._
+
+ STAIRCASE IN THE PARODI PALACE, GENOA.
+ XVI CENTURY.
+ (SHOWING INTER-MURAL STAIRS AND MARBLE FLOOR.)]
+
+The spiral staircase, soon discarded by Italian architects save as
+a means of secret communication or for the use of servants, held
+its own in France throughout the Renaissance. Its structural
+difficulties afforded scope for the exercise of that marvellous, if
+sometimes superfluous, ingenuity which distinguished the Gothic
+builders. The spiral staircase in the court-yard at Blois is an
+example of this kind of skilful engineering and of the somewhat
+fatiguing use of ornament not infrequently accompanying it; while such
+anomalies as the elaborate out-of-door spiral staircase enclosed
+within the building at Chambord are still more in the nature of a
+_tour de force_,--something perfect in itself, but not essential to
+the organism of the whole.
+
+Viollet-le-Duc, in his dictionary of architecture, under the heading
+_Château_, has given a sympathetic and ingenious explanation of the
+tenacity with which the French aristocracy clung to the obsolete
+complications of Gothic house-planning and structure long after
+frequent expeditions across the Alps had made them familiar with the
+simpler and more rational method of the Italian architects. It may be,
+as he suggests, that centuries of feudal life, with its surface of
+savagery and violence and its undercurrent treachery, had fostered in
+the nobles of northern Europe a desire for security and isolation that
+found expression in the intricate planning of their castles long after
+the advance of civilization had made these precautions unnecessary. It
+seems more probable, however, that the French architects of the
+Renaissance made the mistake of thinking that the essence of the
+classic styles lay in the choice and application of ornamental
+details. This exaggerated estimate of the importance of detail is very
+characteristic of an imperfect culture; and the French architects who
+in the fifteenth century were eagerly taking their first lessons from
+their contemporaries south of the Alps, had behind them nothing like
+the great synthetic tradition of the Italian masters. Certainly it
+was not until the Northern builders learned that the beauty of the old
+buildings was, above all, a matter of proportion, that their own
+style, freed from its earlier incoherencies, set out on the line of
+unbroken national development which it followed with such harmonious
+results until the end of the eighteenth century.
+
+In Italy the staircase often gave directly upon the entranceway; in
+France it was always preceded by a vestibule, and the upper landing
+invariably led into an antechamber.
+
+In England the relation between vestibule, hall and staircase was
+never so clearly established as on the Continent. The old English
+hall, so long the centre of feudal life, preserved its somewhat
+composite character after the _grand'salle_ of France and Italy had
+been broken up into the vestibule, the guard-room and the saloon. In
+the grandest Tudor houses the entrance-door usually opened directly
+into this hall. To obtain in some measure the privacy which a
+vestibule would have given, the end of the hall nearest the
+entrance-door was often cut off by a screen that supported the
+musicians' gallery. The corridor formed by this screen led to the
+staircase, usually placed behind the hall, and the gallery opened on
+the first landing of the stairs. This use of the screen at one end of
+the hall had so strong a hold upon English habits that it was never
+quite abandoned. Even after French architecture and house-planning had
+come into fashion in the eighteenth century, a house with a vestibule
+remained the rarest of exceptions in England; and the relative privacy
+afforded by the Gothic screen was then lost by substituting for the
+latter an open arcade, of great decorative effect, but ineffectual in
+shutting off the hall from the front door.
+
+The introduction of the Palladian style by Inigo Jones transformed
+the long and often narrow Tudor hall into the many-storied central
+saloon of the Italian villa, with galleries reached by concealed
+staircases, and lofty domed ceiling; but it was still called the hall,
+it still served as a vestibule, or means of access to the rest of the
+house, and, curiously enough, it usually adjoined another apartment,
+often of the same dimensions, called a saloon. Perhaps the best way of
+defining the English hall of this period is to say that it was really
+an Italian saloon, but that it was used as a vestibule and called a
+hall.
+
+Through all these changes the staircase remained shut off from the
+hall, upon which it usually opened. It was very unusual, except in
+small middle-class houses or suburban villas, to put the stairs in the
+hall, or, more correctly speaking, to make the front door open into
+the staircase. There are, however, several larger houses in which the
+stairs are built in the hall. Inigo Jones, in remodelling Castle Ashby
+for the Earl of Northampton, followed this plan; though this is
+perhaps not a good instance to cite, as it may have been difficult to
+find place for a separate staircase. At Chevening, in Kent, built by
+Inigo Jones for the Earl of Sussex, the stairs are also in the hall;
+and the same arrangement is seen at Shobden Court, at West Wycombe,
+built by J. Donowell for Lord le Despencer (where the stairs are shut
+off by a screen) and at Hurlingham, built late in the eighteenth
+century by G. Byfield.
+
+This digression has been made in order to show the origin of the
+modern English and American practice of placing the stairs in the hall
+and doing away with the vestibule. The vestibule never formed part of
+the English house, but the stairs were usually divided from the hall
+in houses of any importance; and it is difficult to see whence the
+modern architect has derived his idea of the combined hall and
+staircase. The tendency to merge into one any two apartments designed
+for different uses shows a retrogression in house-planning; and while
+it is fitting that the vestibule or hall should adjoin the staircase,
+there is no good reason for uniting them and there are many for
+keeping them apart.
+
+The staircase in a private house is for the use of those who inhabit
+it; the vestibule or hall is necessarily used by persons in no way
+concerned with the private life of the inmates. If the stairs, the
+main artery of the house, be carried up through the vestibule, there
+is no security from intrusion. Even the plan of making the vestibule
+precede the staircase, though better, is not the best. In a properly
+planned house the vestibule should open on a hall or antechamber of
+moderate size, giving access to the rooms on the ground floor, and
+this antechamber should lead into the staircase. It is only in houses
+where all the living-rooms are up-stairs that the vestibule may open
+directly into the staircase without lessening the privacy of the
+house.
+
+In Italy, where wood was little employed in domestic architecture,
+stairs were usually of stone. Marble came into general use in the
+grander houses when, in the seventeenth century, the stairs, instead
+of being carried up between walls, were often placed in an open
+staircase. The balustrade was usually of stone or marble, iron being
+much less used than in France.
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE XXXI._
+
+ STAIRCASE OF THE HÔTEL DE VILLE, NANCY.
+ LOUIS XV PERIOD.
+ BUILT BY HÉRÉ DE CORNY; STAIR-RAIL BY JEAN LAMOUR.]
+
+In the latter country the mediæval stairs, especially in the houses of
+the middle class, were often built of wood; but this material was soon
+abandoned, and from the time of Louis XIV stairs of stone with
+wrought-iron rails are a distinctive feature of French domestic
+architecture. The use of wrought-iron in French decoration received a
+strong impulse from the genius of Jean Lamour, who, when King
+Stanislas of Poland remodelled the town of Nancy early in the reign of
+Louis XV, adorned its streets and public buildings with specimens
+of iron-work unmatched in any other part of the world. Since then
+French decorators have expended infinite talent in devising the
+beautiful stair-rails and balconies which are the chief ornament of
+innumerable houses throughout France (see Plates XXXI and XXXII).
+
+Stair-rails of course followed the various modifications of taste
+which marked the architecture of the day. In the seventeenth and early
+eighteenth centuries they were noted for severe richness of design.
+With the development of the rocaille manner their lines grew lighter
+and more fanciful, while the influence of Gabriel, which, toward the
+end of the reign of Louis XV, brought about a return to classic
+models, manifested itself in a simplified mode of treatment. At this
+period the outline of a classic baluster formed a favorite motive for
+the iron rail. Toward the close of the eighteenth century the designs
+for these rails grew thin and poor, with a predominance of upright
+iron bars divided at long intervals by some meagre medallion or
+geometrical figure. The exuberant sprays and volutes of the rococo
+period and the architectural lines of the Louis XVI style were alike
+absent from these later designs, which are chiefly marked by the
+negative merit of inoffensiveness.
+
+In the old French stair-rails steel was sometimes combined with gilded
+iron. The famous stair-rail of the Palais Royal, designed by Coutant
+d'Ivry, is made of steel and iron, and the Duc d'Aumale copied this
+combination in the stair-rail at Chantilly. There is little to
+recommend the substitution of steel for iron in such cases. It is
+impossible to keep a steel stair-rail clean and free from rust, except
+by painting it; and since it must be painted, iron is the more
+suitable material.
+
+In France the iron rail is usually painted black, though a very dark
+blue is sometimes preferred. Black is the better color, as it forms a
+stronger contrast with the staircase walls, which are presumably
+neutral in tint and severe in treatment. Besides, as iron is painted,
+not to improve its appearance, but to prevent its rusting, the color
+which most resembles its own is more appropriate. In French houses of
+a certain importance the iron stair-rail often had a few touches of
+gilding, but these were sparingly applied.
+
+In England wooden stair-rails were in great favor during the Tudor and
+Elizabethan period. These rails were marked rather by fanciful
+elaboration of detail than by intrinsic merit of design, and are
+doubtless more beautiful now that time has given them its patina, than
+they were when first made.
+
+With the Palladian style came the classic balustrade of stone or
+marble, or sometimes, in simpler houses, of wood. Iron rails were
+seldom used in England, and those to be found in some of the great
+London houses (as in Carlton House, Chesterfield House and Norfolk
+House) were probably due to the French influence which made itself
+felt in English domestic architecture during the eighteenth century.
+This influence, however, was never more than sporadic; and until the
+decline of decorative art at the close of the eighteenth century,
+Italian rather than French taste gave the note to English decoration.
+
+The interrelation of vestibule, hall and staircase having been
+explained, the subject of decorative detail must next be considered;
+but before turning to this, it should be mentioned that hereafter the
+space at the foot of the stairs, though properly a part of the
+staircase, will for the sake of convenience be called _the hall_,
+since in the present day it goes by that name in England and America.
+
+In contrasting the vestibule with the hall, it was pointed out that
+the latter might be treated in a gayer and more informal manner than
+the former. It must be remembered, however, that as the vestibule is
+the introduction to the hall, so the hall is the introduction to the
+living-rooms of the house; and it follows that the hall must be as
+much more formal than the living-rooms as the vestibule is more formal
+than the hall. It is necessary to emphasize this because the tendency
+of recent English and American decoration has been to treat the hall,
+not as a hall, but as a living-room. Whatever superficial attractions
+this treatment may possess, its inappropriateness will be seen when
+the purpose of the hall is considered. The hall is a means of access
+to all the rooms on each floor; on the ground floor it usually leads
+to the chief living-rooms of the house as well as to the vestibule and
+street; in addition to this, in modern houses even of some importance
+it generally contains the principal stairs of the house, so that it is
+the centre upon which every part of the house directly or indirectly
+opens. This publicity is increased by the fact that the hall must be
+crossed by the servant who opens the front door, and by any one
+admitted to the house. It follows that the hall, in relation to the
+rooms of the house, is like a public square in relation to the private
+houses around it. For some reason this obvious fact has been ignored
+by many recent decorators, who have chosen to treat halls like rooms
+of the most informal character, with open fireplaces, easy-chairs for
+lounging and reading, tables with lamps, books and magazines, and all
+the appointments of a library. This disregard of the purpose of the
+hall, like most mistakes in household decoration, has a very natural
+origin. When, in the first reaction from the discomfort and formality
+of sixty years ago, people began, especially in England, to study the
+arrangement of the old Tudor and Elizabethan houses, many of these
+were found to contain large panelled halls opening directly upon the
+porch or the terrace. The mellow tones of the wood-work; the bold
+treatment of the stairs, shut off as they were merely by a screen; the
+heraldic imagery of the hooded stone chimney-piece and of the carved
+or stuccoed ceiling, made these halls the chief feature of the house;
+while the rooms opening from them were so often insufficient for the
+requirements of modern existence, that the life of the inmates
+necessarily centred in the hall. Visitors to such houses saw only the
+picturesqueness of the arrangement--the huge logs glowing on the
+hearth, the books and flowers on the old carved tables, the family
+portraits on the walls; and, charmed with the impression received,
+they ordered their architects to reproduce for them a hall which, even
+in the original Tudor houses, was a survival of older social
+conditions.
+
+One might think that the recent return to classic forms of
+architecture would have done away with the Tudor hall; but, except in
+a few instances, this has not been the case. In fact, in the greater
+number of large houses, and especially of country houses, built in
+America since the revival of Renaissance and Palladian architecture, a
+large many-storied hall communicating directly with the vestibule, and
+containing the principal stairs of the house, has been the distinctive
+feature. If there were any practical advantages in this overgrown
+hall, it might be regarded as one of those rational modifications in
+plan which mark the difference between an unreasoning imitation of a
+past style and the intelligent application of its principles; but the
+Tudor hall, in its composite character as vestibule, parlor and
+dining-room, is only another instance of the sacrifice of convenience
+to archaism.
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE XXXII._
+
+ STAIRCASE IN THE PALACE OF FONTAINEBLEAU.
+ LOUIS XV PERIOD.]
+
+The abnormal development of the modern staircase-hall cannot be
+defended on the plea sometimes advanced that it is a roofed-in
+adaptation of the great open _cortile_ of the Genoese palace, since
+there is no reason for adapting a plan so useless and so unsuited to
+our climate and way of living. The beautiful central _cortile_ of the
+Italian palace, with its monumental open stairs, was in no sense part
+of a "private house" in our interpretation of the term. It was rather
+a thoroughfare like a public street, since the various stories of the
+Italian palace were used as separate houses by different branches of
+the family.
+
+In most modern houses the hall, in spite of its studied resemblance to
+a living-room, soon reverts to its original use as a passageway; and
+this fact should indicate the treatment best suited to it. In rooms
+where people sit, and where they are consequently at leisure to look
+about them, delicacy of treatment and refinement of detail are
+suitable; but in an anteroom or a staircase only the first impression
+counts, and forcible simple lines, with a vigorous massing of light
+and shade, are essential. These conditions point to the use of severe
+strongly-marked panelling, niches for vases or statues, and a
+stair-rail detaching itself from the background in vigorous decisive
+lines.[32]
+
+The furniture of the hall should consist of benches or straight-backed
+chairs, and marble-topped tables and consoles. If a press is used, it
+should be architectural in design, like the old French and Italian
+_armoires_ painted with arabesques and architectural motives, or the
+English seventeenth-century presses made of some warm-toned wood like
+walnut and surmounted by a broken pediment with a vase or bust in the
+centre (see Plate XXXIII).
+
+The walls of the staircase in large houses should be of panelled stone
+or marble, as in the examples given in the plates accompanying this
+chapter.
+
+In small houses, where an expensive decoration is out of the question,
+a somewhat similar architectural effect may be obtained by the use of
+a few plain mouldings fixed to the plaster, the whole being painted in
+one uniform tint, or in two contrasting colors, such as white for the
+mouldings, and buff, gray, or pale green for the wall. To this scheme
+may be added plaster medallions, as suggested for the vestibule, or
+garlands and other architectural motives made of staff, in imitation
+of the stucco ornaments of the old French and Italian decorators. When
+such ornaments are used, they should invariably be simple and strong
+in design. The modern decorator is too often tempted by mere
+prettiness of detail to forget the general effect of his composition.
+In a staircase, where only the general effect is seized, prettiness
+does not count, and the effect produced should be strong, clear and
+telling.
+
+For the same reason, a stair-carpet, if used, should be of one color,
+without pattern. Masses of plain color are one of the chief means of
+producing effect in any scheme of decoration.
+
+When the floor of the hall is of marble or mosaic,--as, if possible,
+it should be,--the design, like that of the walls, should be clear and
+decided in outline (see Plate XXX). On the other hand, if the hall is
+used as an antechamber and carpeted, the carpet should be of one
+color, matching that on the stairs.
+
+In many large houses the stairs are now built of stone or marble, while
+the floor of the landings is laid in wood, apparently owing to the
+idea that stone or marble floors are cold. In the tropically-heated
+American house not even the most sensitive person could be chilled by
+passing contact with a stone floor; but if it is thought to "look
+cold," it is better to lay a rug or a strip of carpet on the landing
+than to permit the proximity of two such different substances as wood
+and stone.
+
+Unless the stairs are of wood, that material should never be used for
+the rail; nor should wooden stairs be put in a staircase of which the
+walls are of stone, marble, or scagliola. If the stairs are of wood,
+it is better to treat the walls with wood or plaster panelling. In
+simple staircases the best wall-decoration is a wooden dado-moulding
+nailed on the plaster, the dado thus formed being painted white, and
+the wall above it in any uniform color. Continuous pattern, such as
+that on paper or stuff hangings, is specially objectionable on the
+walls of a staircase, since it disturbs the simplicity of composition
+best fitted to this part of the house.
+
+For the lighting of the hall there should be a lantern like that in
+the vestibule, but more elaborate in design. This mode of lighting
+harmonizes with the severe treatment of the walls and indicates at
+once that the hall is not a living-room, but a thoroughfare.[33]
+
+If lights be required on the stairs, they should take the form of
+fire-gilt bronze sconces, as architectural as possible in design,
+without any finikin prettiness of detail. (For good examples, see the
+_appliques_ in Plates V and XXXIV). It is almost impossible to obtain
+well-designed _appliques_ of this kind in America; but the increasing
+interest shown in house-decoration will in time doubtless cause a
+demand for a better type of gas and electric fixtures. Meantime,
+unless imported sconces can be obtained, the plainest brass fixtures
+should be chosen in preference to the more elaborate models now to be
+found here.
+
+Where the walls of a hall are hung with pictures, these should be few
+in number, and decorative in composition and coloring. No subject
+requiring thought and study is suitable in such a position. The
+mythological or architectural compositions of the Italian and French
+schools of the last two centuries, with their superficial graces of
+color and design, are for this reason well suited to the walls of
+halls and antechambers.
+
+The same may be said of prints. These should not be used in a large
+high-studded hall; but they look well in a small entranceway, if hung
+on plain-tinted walls. Here again such architectural compositions as
+Piranesi's, with their bold contrasts of light and shade, Marc
+Antonio's classic designs, or some frieze-like procession, such as
+Mantegna's "Triumph of Julius Caesar," are especially appropriate;
+whereas the subtle detail of the German Little Masters, the symbolism
+of Dürer's etchings and the graces of Marillier or Moreau le Jeune
+would be wasted in a situation where there is small opportunity for
+more than a passing glance.
+
+In most American houses, the warming of hall and stairs is so amply
+provided for that where there is a hall fireplace it is seldom used.
+In country houses, where it is sometimes necessary to have special
+means for heating the hall, the open fireplace is of more service; but
+it is not really suited to such a situation. The hearth suggests an
+idea of intimacy and repose that has no place in a thoroughfare like
+the hall; and, aside from this question of fitness, there is a
+practical objection to placing an open chimney-piece in a position
+where it is exposed to continual draughts from the front door and from
+the rooms giving upon the hall.
+
+The best way of heating a hall is by means of a faience stove--not the
+oblong block composed of shiny white or brown tiles seen in Swiss and
+German _pensions_, but one of the fine old stoves of architectural
+design still used on the Continent for heating the vestibule and
+dining-room. In Europe, increased attention has of late been given to
+the design and coloring of these stoves; and if better known here,
+they would form an important feature in the decoration of our halls.
+Admirable models may be studied in many old French and German houses
+and on the borders of Switzerland and Italy; while the museum at Parma
+contains several fine examples of the rocaille period.
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE XXXIII._
+
+ FRENCH ARMOIRE, LOUIS XIV PERIOD.
+ MUSEUM OF DECORATIVE ARTS, PARIS.]
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[29] Burckhardt, in his _Geschichte der Renaissance in Italien_,
+justly points out that the seeming inconsequence of mediæval
+house-planning in northern Europe was probably due in part to the fact
+that the feudal castle, for purposes of defence, was generally built
+on an irregular site. See also Viollet-le-Duc.
+
+[30] "Der gothische Profanbau in Italien ... steht im vollen Gegensatz
+zum Norden durch die rationelle Anlage." Burckhardt, _Geschichte der
+Renaissance in Italien_, p. 28.
+
+[31] See the stairs of the Riccardi palace in Florence, of the
+Piccolomini palace at Pienza and of the ducal palace at Urbino.
+
+[32] For a fine example of a hall-niche containing a statue, see Plate
+XXX.
+
+[33] In large halls the tall _torchère_ of marble or bronze may be
+used for additional lights (see Plate XXXII).
+
+
+
+
+X
+
+THE DRAWING-ROOM, BOUDOIR, AND MORNING-ROOM
+
+
+The "with-drawing-room" of mediæval England, to which the lady and her
+maidens retired from the boisterous festivities of the hall, seems at
+first to have been merely a part of the bedchamber in which the lord
+and lady slept. In time it came to be screened off from the
+sleeping-room; then, in the king's palaces, it became a separate room
+for the use of the queen and her damsels; and so, in due course,
+reached the nobleman's castle, and established itself as a permanent
+part of English house-planning.
+
+In France the evolution of the _salon_ seems to have proceeded on
+somewhat different lines. During the middle ages and the early
+Renaissance period, the more public part of the nobleman's life was
+enacted in the hall, or _grand'salle_, while the social and domestic
+side of existence was transferred to the bedroom. This was soon
+divided into two rooms, as in England. In France, however, both these
+rooms contained beds; the inner being the real sleeping-chamber, while
+in the outer room, which was used not only for administering justice
+and receiving visits of state, but for informal entertainments and the
+social side of family life, the bedstead represented the lord's _lit
+de parade_, traditionally associated with state ceremonial and feudal
+privileges.
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE XXXIV._
+
+ SALA DELLA MADDALENA, ROYAL PALACE, GENOA.
+ XVIII CENTURY.
+ (ITALIAN DRAWING-ROOM IN ROCAILLE STYLE.)]
+
+The custom of having a state bedroom in which no one slept (_chambre
+de parade_, as it was called) was so firmly established that even in
+the engravings of Abraham Bosse, representing French life in the reign
+of Louis XIII, the fashionable apartments in which card-parties,
+suppers, and other entertainments are taking place, invariably contain
+a bed.
+
+In large establishments the _chambre de parade_ was never used as a
+sleeping-chamber except by visitors of distinction; but in small
+houses the lady slept in the room which served as her boudoir and
+drawing-room. The Renaissance, it is true, had introduced from Italy
+the _cabinet_ opening off the lady's chamber, as in the palaces of
+Urbino and Mantua; but these rooms were at first seen only in kings'
+palaces, and were, moreover, too small to serve any social purpose.
+The _cabinet_ of Catherine de' Medici at Blois is a characteristic
+example.
+
+Meanwhile, the gallery had relieved the _grand'salle_ of some of its
+numerous uses; and these two apartments seem to have satisfied all the
+requirements of society during the Renaissance in France.
+
+In the seventeenth century the introduction of the two-storied Italian
+saloon produced a state apartment called a _salon_; and this, towards
+the beginning of the eighteenth century, was divided into two smaller
+rooms: one, the _salon de compagnie_, remaining a part of the gala
+suite used exclusively for entertaining (see Plate XXXIV), while the
+other--the _salon de famille_--became a family apartment like the
+English drawing-room.
+
+The distinction between the _salon de compagnie_ and the _salon de
+famille_ had by this time also established itself in England, where
+the state drawing-room retained its Italian name of _salone_, or
+saloon, while the living-apartment preserved, in abbreviated form, the
+mediæval designation of the lady's with-drawing-room.
+
+Pains have been taken to trace as clearly as possible the mixed
+ancestry of the modern drawing-room, in order to show that it is the
+result of two distinct influences--that of the gala apartment and that
+of the family sitting-room. This twofold origin has curiously affected
+the development of the drawing-room. In houses of average size, where
+there are but two living-rooms--the master's library, or "den," and
+the lady's drawing-room,--it is obvious that the latter ought to be
+used as a _salon de famille_, or meeting-place for the whole family;
+and it is usually regarded as such in England, where common sense
+generally prevails in matters of material comfort and convenience, and
+where the drawing-room is often furnished with a simplicity which
+would astonish those who associate the name with white-and-gold walls
+and uncomfortable furniture.
+
+In modern American houses both traditional influences are seen.
+Sometimes, as in England, the drawing-room is treated as a family
+apartment, and provided with books, lamps, easy-chairs and
+writing-tables. In other houses it is still considered sacred to
+gilding and discomfort, the best room in the house, and the
+convenience of all its inmates, being sacrificed to a vague feeling
+that no drawing-room is worthy of the name unless it is uninhabitable.
+This is an instance of the _salon de compagnie_ having usurped the
+rightful place of the _salon de famille_; or rather, if the bourgeois
+descent of the American house be considered, it may be more truly
+defined as a remnant of the "best parlor" superstition.
+
+Whatever the genealogy of the American drawing-room, it must be owned
+that it too often fails to fulfil its purpose as a family apartment.
+It is curious to note the amount of thought and money frequently spent
+on the one room in the house used by no one, or occupied at most for
+an hour after a "company" dinner.
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE XXXV._
+
+ CONSOLE IN THE PETIT TRIANON, VERSAILLES.
+ LATE LOUIS XV STYLE.
+ BUST OF LOUIS XVI, BY PAJOU.]
+
+To this drawing-room, from which the inmates of the house
+instinctively flee as soon as their social duties are discharged, many
+necessities are often sacrificed. The library, or den, where the
+members of the family sit, may be furnished with shabby odds and ends;
+but the drawing-room must have its gilt chairs covered with brocade,
+its _vitrines_ full of modern Saxe, its guipure curtains and velvet
+carpet.
+
+The _salon de compagnie_ is out of place in the average house. Such a
+room is needed only where the dinners or other entertainments given
+are so large as to make it impossible to use the ordinary living-rooms
+of the house. In the grandest houses of Europe the gala-rooms are
+never thrown open except for general entertainments, or to receive
+guests of exalted rank, and the spectacle of a dozen people
+languishing after dinner in the gilded wilderness of a state saloon is
+practically unknown.
+
+The purpose for which the _salon de compagnie_ is used necessitates
+its being furnished in the same formal manner as other gala
+apartments. Circulation must not be impeded by a multiplicity of small
+pieces of furniture holding lamps or other fragile objects, while at
+least half of the chairs should be so light and easily moved that
+groups may be formed and broken up at will. The walls should be
+brilliantly decorated, without needless elaboration of detail, since
+it is unlikely that the temporary occupants of such a room will have
+time or inclination to study its treatment closely. The chief
+requisite is a gay first impression. To produce this, the
+wall-decoration should be light in color, and the furniture should
+consist of a few strongly marked pieces, such as handsome cabinets and
+consoles, bronze or marble statues, and vases and candelabra of
+imposing proportions. Almost all modern furniture is too weak in
+design and too finikin in detail to look well in a gala
+drawing-room.[34] (For examples of drawing-room furniture, see Plates
+VI, IX, XXXIV, and XXXV.)
+
+Beautiful pictures or rare prints produce little effect on the walls
+of a gala room, just as an accumulation of small objects of art, such
+as enamels, ivories and miniatures, are wasted upon its tables and
+cabinets. Such treasures are for rooms in which people spend their
+days, not for those in which they assemble for an hour's
+entertainment.
+
+But the _salon de compagnie_, being merely a modified form of the
+great Italian saloon, is a part of the gala suite, and any detailed
+discussion of the decorative treatment most suitable to it would
+result in a repetition of what is said in the chapter on Gala Rooms.
+
+The lighting of the company drawing-room--to borrow its French
+designation--should be evenly diffused, without the separate centres
+of illumination needful in a family living-room. The proper light is
+that of wax candles. Nothing has done more to vulgarize interior
+decoration than the general use of gas and of electricity in the
+living-rooms of modern houses. Electric light especially, with its
+harsh white glare, which no expedients have as yet overcome, has taken
+from our drawing-rooms all air of privacy and distinction. In
+passageways and offices, electricity is of great service; but were it
+not that all "modern improvements" are thought equally applicable to
+every condition of life, it would be difficult to account for the
+adoption of a mode of lighting which makes the _salon_ look like a
+railway-station, the dining-room like a restaurant. That such light is
+not needful in a drawing-room is shown by the fact that electric bulbs
+are usually covered by shades of some deep color, in order that the
+glare may be made as inoffensive as possible.
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE XXXVI._
+
+ SALON, PALACE OF FONTAINEBLEAU.]
+
+The light in a gala apartment should be neither vivid nor
+concentrated: the soft, evenly diffused brightness of wax candles is
+best fitted to bring out those subtle modellings of light and shade to
+which old furniture and objects of art owe half their expressiveness.
+
+The treatment of the _salon de compagnie_ naturally differs from that
+of the family drawing-room: the latter is essentially a room in which
+people should be made comfortable. There must be a well-appointed
+writing-table; the chairs must be conveniently grouped about various
+tables, each with its lamp;--in short, the furniture should be so
+disposed that people are not forced to take refuge in their bedrooms
+for lack of fitting arrangements in the drawing-room.
+
+The old French cabinet-makers excelled in the designing and making of
+furniture for the _salon de famille_. The term "French furniture"
+suggests to the Anglo-Saxon mind the stiff appointments of the gala
+room--heavy gilt consoles, straight-backed arm-chairs covered with
+tapestry, and monumental marble-topped tables. Admirable furniture of
+this kind was made in France; but in the grand style the Italian
+cabinet-makers competed successfully with the French; whereas the
+latter stood alone in the production of the simpler and more
+comfortable furniture adapted to the family living-room. Among those
+who have not studied the subject there is a general impression that
+eighteenth-century furniture, however beautiful in design and
+execution, was not comfortable in the modern sense. This is owing to
+the fact that the popular idea of "old furniture" is based on the
+appointments of gala rooms in palaces: visitors to Versailles or
+Fontainebleau are more likely to notice the massive gilt consoles and
+benches in the state saloons than the simple easy-chairs and
+work-tables of the _petits appartements_. A visit to the Garde Meuble
+or to the Musée des Arts Décoratifs of Paris, or the inspection of any
+collection of French eighteenth-century furniture, will show the
+versatility and common sense of the old French cabinet-makers. They
+produced an infinite variety of small _meubles_, in which beauty of
+design and workmanship were joined to simplicity and convenience.
+
+The old arm-chair, or _bergère_, is a good example of this
+combination. The modern upholsterer pads and puffs his seats as though
+they were to form the furniture of a lunatic's cell; and then, having
+expanded them to such dimensions that they cannot be moved without
+effort, perches their dropsical bodies on four little casters. Any one
+who compares such an arm-chair to the eighteenth-century _bergère_,
+with its strong tapering legs, its snugly-fitting back and cushioned
+seat, must admit that the latter is more convenient and more beautiful
+(see Plates VIII and XXXVII).
+
+The same may be said of the old French tables--from desks, card and
+work-tables, to the small _guéridon_ just large enough to hold a book
+and candlestick. All these tables were simple and practical in design:
+even in the Louis XV period, when more variety of outline and ornament
+was permitted, the strong structural lines were carefully maintained,
+and it is unusual to see an old table that does not stand firmly on
+its legs and appear capable of supporting as much weight as its size
+will permit (see Louis XV writing-table in Plate XLVI).
+
+The French tables, cabinets and commodes used in the family apartments
+were usually of inlaid wood, with little ornamentation save the design
+of the marquetry--elaborate mounts of chiselled bronze being
+reserved for the furniture of gala rooms (see Plate X). Old French
+marquetry was exquisitely delicate in color and design, while Italian
+inlaying of the same period, though coarser, was admirable in
+composition. Old Italian furniture of the seventeenth and eighteenth
+centuries was always either inlaid or carved and painted in gay
+colors: chiselled mounts are virtually unknown in Italy.
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE XXXVII._
+
+ ROOM IN THE PALACE OF FONTAINEBLEAU.
+ LOUIS XV PANELLING, LOUIS XVI FURNITURE.]
+
+The furniture of the eighteenth century in England, while not
+comparable in design to the best French models, was well made and
+dignified; and its angularity of outline is not out of place against
+the somewhat cold and formal background of an Adam room.
+
+English marquetry suffered from the poverty of ornament marking the
+wall-decoration of the period. There was a certain timidity about the
+decorative compositions of the school of Adam and Sheraton, and in
+their scanty repertoire the laurel-wreath, the velarium and the
+cornucopia reappear with tiresome frequency.
+
+The use to which the family drawing-room is put should indicate the
+character of its decoration. Since it is a room in which many hours of
+the day are spent, and in which people are at leisure, it should
+contain what is best worth looking at in the way of pictures, prints,
+and other objects of art; while there should be nothing about its
+decoration so striking or eccentric as to become tiresome when
+continually seen. A fanciful style may be pleasing in apartments used
+only for stated purposes, such as the saloon or gallery; but in a
+living-room, decoration should be subordinate to the individual,
+forming merely a harmonious but unobtrusive background (see Plates
+XXXVI and XXXVII). Such a setting also brings out the full decorative
+value of all the drawing-room accessories--screens, andirons,
+_appliques_, and door and window-fastenings. A study of any old
+French interior will show how much these details contributed to the
+general effect of the room.
+
+Those who really care for books are seldom content to restrict them to
+the library, for nothing adds more to the charm of a drawing-room than
+a well-designed bookcase: an expanse of beautiful bindings is as
+decorative as a fine tapestry.
+
+The boudoir is, properly speaking, a part of the bedroom suite, and as
+such is described in the chapter on the Bedroom. Sometimes, however, a
+small sitting-room adjoins the family drawing-room, and this, if given
+up to the mistress of the house, is virtually the boudoir.
+
+The modern boudoir is a very different apartment from its
+eighteenth-century prototype. Though it may preserve the delicate
+decorations and furniture suggested by its name, such a room is now
+generally used for the prosaic purpose of interviewing servants, going
+over accounts and similar occupations. The appointments should
+therefore comprise a writing-desk, with pigeon-holes, drawers, and
+cupboards, and a comfortable lounge, or _lit de repos_, for resting
+and reading.
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE XXXVIII._
+
+ LIT DE REPOS, EARLY LOUIS XV PERIOD.]
+
+The _lit de repos_, which, except in France, has been replaced by the
+clumsy upholstered lounge, was one of the most useful pieces of
+eighteenth-century furniture (see Plate XXXVIII). As its name implies,
+it is shaped somewhat like a bed, or rather like a cradle that stands
+on four legs instead of swinging. It is made of carved wood, sometimes
+upholstered, but often seated with cane (see Plate XXXIX). In the
+latter case it is fitted with a mattress and with a pillow-like
+cushion covered with some material in keeping with the hangings of the
+room. Sometimes the _duchesse_, or upholstered _bergère_ with
+removable foot-rest in the shape of a square bench, is preferred
+to the _lit de repos_; but the latter is the more elegant and
+graceful, and it is strange that it should have been discarded in
+favor of the modern lounge, which is not only ugly, but far less
+comfortable.
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE XXXIX._
+
+ LIT DE REPOS, LOUIS XV PERIOD.]
+
+As the boudoir is generally a small room, it is peculiarly suited to
+the more delicate styles of painting or stucco ornamentation described
+in the third chapter. A study of boudoir-decoration in the last
+century, especially in France, will show the admirable sense of
+proportion regulating the treatment of these little rooms (see Plate
+XL). Their adornment was naturally studied with special care by the
+painters and decorators of an age in which women played so important a
+part.
+
+It is sometimes thought that the eighteenth-century boudoir was always
+decorated and furnished in a very elaborate manner. This idea
+originates in the fact, already pointed out, that the rooms usually
+seen by tourists are those in royal palaces, or in such princely
+houses as are thrown open to the public on account of their
+exceptional magnificence. The same type of boudoir is continually
+reproduced in books on architecture and decoration; and what is really
+a small private sitting-room for the lady of the house, corresponding
+with her husband's "den," has thus come to be regarded as one of the
+luxuries of a great establishment.
+
+The prints of Eisen, Marillier, Moreau le Jeune, and other
+book-illustrators of the eighteenth century, show that the boudoir in
+the average private house was, in fact, a simple room, gay and
+graceful in decoration, but as a rule neither rich nor elaborate (see
+Plate XLI). As it usually adjoined the bedroom, it was decorated in
+the same manner, and even when its appointments were expensive all
+appearance of costliness was avoided.[35]
+
+The boudoir is the room in which small objects of art--prints,
+mezzotints and _gouaches_--show to the best advantage. No detail is
+wasted, and all manner of delicate effects in wood-carving, marquetry,
+and other ornamentation, such as would be lost upon the walls and
+furniture of a larger room, here acquire their full value. One or two
+well-chosen prints hung on a background of plain color will give more
+pleasure than a medley of photographs, colored photogravures, and
+other decorations of the cotillon-favor type. Not only do mediocre
+ornaments become tiresome when seen day after day, but the mere
+crowding of furniture and gimcracks into a small room intended for
+work and repose will soon be found fatiguing.
+
+Many English houses, especially in the country, contain a useful room
+called the "morning-room," which is well defined by Robert Kerr, in _The
+English Gentleman's House_, as "the drawing-room in ordinary." It is,
+in fact, a kind of undress drawing-room, where the family may gather
+informally at all hours of the day. The out-of-door life led in England
+makes it specially necessary to provide a sitting-room which people
+are not afraid to enter in muddy boots and wet clothes. Even if the
+drawing-room be not, as Mr. Kerr quaintly puts it, "preserved"--that
+is, used exclusively for company--it is still likely to contain the
+best furniture in the house; and though that "best" is not too fine
+for every-day use, yet in a large family an informal, wet-weather room
+of this kind is almost indispensable.
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE XL._
+
+ PAINTED WALL-PANEL AND DOOR, CHÂTEAU OF
+ CHANTILLY. LOUIS XV.
+ (EXAMPLE OF CHINOISERIE DECORATION.)]
+
+No matter how elaborately the rest of the house is furnished, the
+appointments of the morning-room should be plain, comfortable, and
+capable of resisting hard usage. It is a good plan to cover the floor
+with a straw matting, and common sense at once suggests the furniture
+best suited to such a room: two or three good-sized tables with
+lamps, a comfortable sofa, and chairs covered with chintz, leather, or
+one of the bright-colored horsehairs now manufactured in France.
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE XLI._
+
+ Sa triste amante abandonnee
+ Pleure ses maux et ses plaisirs.
+
+ FRENCH BOUDOIR, LOUIS XVI PERIOD.
+ (FROM A PRINT BY LE BOUTEUX.)]
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[34] Much of the old furniture which appears to us unnecessarily stiff
+and monumental was expressly designed to be placed against the walls
+in rooms used for general entertainments, where smaller and more
+delicately made pieces would have been easily damaged, and would,
+moreover, have produced no effect.
+
+[35] The ornate boudoir seen in many XVIIIth-century prints is that of
+the _femme galante_.
+
+
+
+
+XI
+
+GALA ROOMS: BALL-ROOM, SALOON, MUSIC-ROOM, GALLERY
+
+
+European architects have always considered it essential that those rooms
+which are used exclusively for entertaining--gala rooms, as they are
+called--should be quite separate from the family apartments,--either
+occupying an entire floor (the Italian _piano nobile_) or being so
+situated that it is not necessary to open them except for general
+entertainments.
+
+In many large houses lately built in America, with ball and music
+rooms and a hall simulating the two-storied Italian saloon, this
+distinction has been disregarded, and living and gala rooms have been
+confounded in an agglomeration of apartments where the family, for
+lack of a smaller suite, sit under gilded ceilings and cut-glass
+chandeliers, in about as much comfort and privacy as are afforded by
+the public "parlors" of one of our new twenty-story hotels. This
+confusion of two essentially different types of room, designed for
+essentially different phases of life, has been caused by the fact that
+the architect, when called upon to build a grand house, has simply
+enlarged, instead of altering, the _maison bourgeoise_ that has
+hitherto been the accepted model of the American gentleman's house;
+for it must not be forgotten that the modern American dwelling
+descends from the English middle-class house, not from the
+aristocratic country-seat or town residence. The English nobleman's
+town house was like the French _hôtel_, with gates, porter's lodge,
+and court-yard surrounded by stables and offices; and the planning of
+the country-seat was even more elaborate.
+
+A glance at any collection of old English house-plans, such as
+Campbell's _Vitruvius Britannicus_, will show the purely middle-class
+ancestry of the American house, and the consequent futility of
+attempting, by the mere enlargement of each room, to turn it into a
+gentleman's seat or town residence. The kind of life which makes gala
+rooms necessary exacts a different method of planning; and until this
+is more generally understood the treatment of such rooms in American
+houses will never be altogether satisfactory.
+
+Gala rooms are meant for general entertainments, never for any
+assemblage small or informal enough to be conveniently accommodated in
+the ordinary living-rooms of the house; therefore to fulfil their
+purpose they must be large, very high-studded, and not overcrowded
+with furniture, while the walls and ceiling--the only parts of a
+crowded room that can be seen--must be decorated with greater
+elaboration than would be pleasing or appropriate in other rooms. All
+these conditions unfit the gala room for any use save that for which
+it is designed. Nothing can be more cheerless than the state of a
+handful of people sitting after dinner in an immense ball-room with
+gilded ceiling, bare floors, and a few pieces of monumental furniture
+ranged round the walls; yet in any house which is simply an
+enlargement of the ordinary private dwelling the hostess is often
+compelled to use the ball-room or saloon as a drawing-room.
+
+A gala room is never meant to be seen except when crowded: the crowd
+takes the place of furniture. Occupied by a small number of people,
+such a room looks out of proportion, stiff and empty. The hostess
+feels this, and tries, by setting chairs and tables askew, and
+introducing palms, screens and knick-knacks, to produce an effect of
+informality. As a result the room dwarfs the furniture, loses the air
+of state, and gains little in real comfort; while it becomes
+necessary, when a party is given, to remove the furniture and
+disarrange the house, thus undoing the chief _raison d'être_ of such
+apartments.
+
+The Italians, inheriting the grandiose traditions of the Augustan age,
+have always excelled in the treatment of rooms demanding the "grand
+manner." Their unfailing sense that house-decoration is interior
+architecture, and must clearly proclaim its architectural
+affiliations, has been of special service in this respect. It is rare
+in Italy to see a large room inadequately treated. Sometimes the
+"grand manner"--the mimic _terribilità_--may be carried too far to
+suit Anglo-Saxon taste--it is hard to say for what form of
+entertainment such a room as Giulio Romano's Sala dei Giganti in the
+Palazzo del T would form a pleasing or appropriate background--but
+apart from such occasional aberrations, the Italian decorators showed
+a wonderful sense of fitness in the treatment of state apartments. To
+small dribbles of ornament they preferred bold forcible mouldings,
+coarse but clear-cut free-hand ornamentation in stucco, and either a
+classic severity of treatment or the turbulent bravura style of the
+saloon of the Villa Rotonda and of Tiepolo's Cleopatra frescoes in the
+Palazzo Labia at Venice.
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE XLII._
+
+ SALON À L'ITALIENNE.
+ (FROM A PICTURE BY COYPEL.)]
+
+The saloon and gallery are the two gala rooms borrowed from Italy by
+northern Europe. The saloon has already been described in the chapter
+on Hall and Stairs. It was a two-storied apartment, usually with
+clerestory, domed ceiling, and a gallery to which access was obtained
+by concealed staircases (see Plates XLII and XLIII). This gallery
+was often treated as an arcade or loggia, and in many old Italian
+prints and pictures there are representations of these saloons, with
+groups of gaily dressed people looking down from the gallery upon the
+throngs crowding the floor. The saloon was used in Italy as a
+ball-room or gambling-room--gaming being the chief social amusement of
+the eighteenth century.
+
+In England and France the saloon was rarely two stories high, though
+there are some exceptions, as for example the saloon at
+Vaux-le-Vicomte. The cooler climate rendered a clerestory less
+necessary, and there was never the same passion for grandiose effects
+as in Italy. The saloon in northern Europe was always a stately and
+high-studded room, generally vaulted or domed, and often circular in
+plan; but it seldom reached such imposing dimensions as its Italian
+prototype, and when more than one story high was known by the
+distinctive designation of _un salon à l'italienne_.
+
+The gallery was probably the first feature in domestic house-planning
+to be borrowed from Italy by northern Europe. It is seen in almost all
+the early Renaissance châteaux of France; and as soon as the influence
+of such men as John of Padua and John Shute asserted itself in
+England, the gallery became one of the principal apartments of the
+Elizabethan mansion. There are several reasons for the popularity of
+the gallery. In the cold rainy autumns and winters north of the Alps
+it was invaluable as a sheltered place for exercise and games; it was
+well adapted to display the pictures, statuary and bric-à-brac which,
+in emulation of Italian collectors, the Northern nobles were beginning
+to acquire; and it showed off to advantage the long line of ancestral
+portraits and the tapestries representing a succession of episodes
+from the _Æneid_, the _Orlando Innamorato_, or some of the
+interminable epics that formed the light reading of the sixteenth
+century. Then, too, the gallery served for the processions which were
+a part of the social ceremonial in great houses: the march to the
+chapel or banquet-hall, the escorting of a royal guest to the state
+bedroom, and other like pageants.
+
+In France and England the gallery seems for a long time to have been
+used as a saloon and ball-room, whereas in Italy it was, as a rule,
+reserved for the display of the art-treasures of the house, no Italian
+palace worthy of the name being without its gallery of antiquities or
+of marbles.
+
+In modern houses the ball-room and music-room are the two principal
+gala apartments. A music-room need not be a gala room in the sense of
+being used only for large entertainments; but since it is outside the
+circle of every-day use, and more or less associated with
+entertaining, it seems best to include it in this chapter.
+
+Many houses of average size have a room large enough for informal
+entertainments. Such a room, especially in country houses, should be
+decorated in a gay simple manner in harmony with the rest of the house
+and with the uses to which the room is to be put. Rooms of this kind
+may be treated with a white dado, surmounted by walls painted in a
+pale tint, with boldly modelled garlands and attributes in stucco,
+also painted white (see Plate XIII). If these stucco decorations are
+used to frame a series of pictures, such as fruit and flower-pieces or
+decorative subjects, the effect is especially attractive. Large
+painted panels with eighteenth-century _genre_ subjects or pastoral
+scenes, set in simple white panelling, are also very decorative. A
+coved ceiling is best suited to rooms of this comparatively simple
+character, while in state ball-rooms the dome increases the general
+appearance of splendor.
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE XLIII._
+
+ BALL-ROOM, ROYAL PALACE, GENOA. LATE XVIII CENTURY.
+ (EXAMPLE OF STUCCO DECORATION.)]
+
+A panelling of mirrors forms a brilliant ball-room decoration, and
+charming effects are produced by painting these mirrors with birds,
+butterflies, and garlands of flowers, in the manner of the famous
+Italian mirror-painter, Mario dei Fiori--"Mario of the Flowers"--as he
+was called in recognition of his special gift. There is a beautiful
+room by this artist in the Borghese Palace in Rome, and many Italian
+palaces contain examples of this peculiarly brilliant style of
+decoration, which might be revived to advantage by modern painters.
+
+In ball-rooms of great size and importance, where the walls demand a
+more architectural treatment, the use of an order naturally suggests
+itself. Pilasters of marble, separated by marble niches containing
+statues, form a severe but splendid decoration; and if white and
+colored marbles are combined, and the whole is surmounted by a domed
+ceiling frescoed in bright colors, the effect is extremely brilliant.
+
+In Italy the architectural decoration of large rooms was often
+entirely painted (see Plate XLIV), the plaster walls being covered
+with a fanciful piling-up of statues, porticoes and balustrades, while
+figures in Oriental costume, or in the masks and parti-colored dress
+of the _Comédie Italienne_, leaned from simulated loggias or wandered
+through marble colonnades.
+
+The Italian decorator held any audacity permissible in a room used
+only by a throng of people, whose mood and dress made them ready to
+accept the fairy-tales on the walls as a fitting background to their
+own masquerading. Modern travellers, walking through these old Italian
+saloons in the harsh light of day, while cobwebs hang from the
+audacious architecture, and the cracks in the plaster look like wounds
+in the cheeks of simpering nymphs and shepherdesses, should remember
+that such apartments were meant to be seen by the soft light of wax
+candles in crystal chandeliers, with fantastically dressed dancers
+thronging the marble floor.
+
+Such a ball-room, if reproduced in the present day, would be far more
+effective than the conventional white-and-gold room, which, though
+unobjectionable when well decorated, lacks the imaginative charm, the
+personal note, given by the painter's touch.
+
+Under Louis XIV many French apartments of state were panelled with
+colored marbles, with an application of attributes or trophies, and
+other ornamental motives in fire-gilt bronze: a sumptuous mode of
+treatment according well with a domed and frescoed ceiling. Tapestry
+was also much used, and forms an admirable decoration, provided the
+color-scheme is light and the design animated. Seventeenth and
+eighteenth-century tapestries are the most suitable, as the scale of
+color is brighter and the compositions are gayer than in the earlier
+hangings.
+
+Modern dancers prefer a polished wooden floor, and it is perhaps
+smoother and more elastic than any other surface; but in beauty and
+decorative value it cannot be compared with a floor of inlaid marble,
+and as all the dancing in Italian palaces is still done on such
+floors, the preference for wood is probably the result of habit. In a
+ball-room of any importance, especially where marble is used on the
+walls, the floor should always be of the same substance (see floors in
+Plates XXIX, XXX, and LV).
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE XLIV._
+
+ SALOON IN THE VILLA VERTEMATI. XVI CENTURY.
+ (EXAMPLE OF FRESCOED WALLS AND CARVED WOODEN CEILING.)]
+
+Gala apartments, as distinguished from living-rooms, should be lit
+from the ceiling, never from the walls. No ball-room or saloon is
+complete without its chandeliers: they are one of the characteristic
+features of a gala room (see Plates V, XIX, XXXIV, XLIII, XLV, L). For
+a ball-room, where all should be light and brilliant, rock-crystal
+or cut-glass chandeliers are most suitable: reflected in a long line
+of mirrors, they are an invaluable factor in any scheme of gala
+decoration.
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE XLV._
+
+ SALA DELLO ZODIACO, ROYAL PALACE, MANTUA. XVIII CENTURY.
+ (EXAMPLE OF STUCCO DECORATION.)]
+
+The old French decorators relied upon the reflection of mirrors for
+producing an effect of distance in the treatment of gala rooms. Above
+the mantel, there was always a mirror with another of the same shape
+and size directly opposite; and the glittering perspective thus
+produced gave to the scene an air of fantastic unreality. The gala
+suite being so planned that all the rooms adjoined each other, the
+effect of distance was further enhanced by placing the openings in
+line, so that on entering the suite it was possible to look down its
+whole length. The importance of preserving this long vista, or
+_enfilade_, as the French call it, is dwelt on by all old writers on
+house-decoration. If a ball-room be properly lit and decorated, it is
+never necessary to dress it up with any sort of temporary
+ornamentation: the true mark of the well-decorated ball-room is to
+look always ready for a ball.
+
+The only chair seen in most modern ball-rooms is the folding camp-seat
+hired by the hundred when entertainments are given; but there is no
+reason why a ball-room should be even temporarily disfigured by these
+makeshifts, which look their worst when an effort is made to conceal
+their cheap construction under a little gilding and satin. In all old
+ball-rooms, benches and _tabourets_ (small seats without backs) were
+ranged in a continuous line along the walls. These seats, handsomely
+designed, and covered with tapestry, velvet, or embroidered silk
+slips, were a part of the permanent decoration of the room. On
+ordinary occasions they would be sufficient for a modern ball-room;
+and when larger entertainments made it needful to provide additional
+seats, these might be copied from the seventeenth-century
+_perroquets_, examples of which may be found in the various French
+works on the history of furniture. These _perroquets_, or folding
+chairs without arms, made of natural walnut or gilded, with seats of
+tapestry, velvet or decorated leather, would form an excellent
+substitute for the modern cotillon seat.
+
+The first rule to be observed in the decoration of the music-room is
+the avoidance of all stuff hangings, draperies, and substances likely
+to deaden sound. The treatment chosen for the room must of course
+depend on its size and its relation to the other rooms in the house.
+While a music-room should be more subdued in color than a ball-room,
+sombre tints and heavy ornament are obviously inappropriate: the
+effect aimed at should be one of lightness and serenity in form and
+color. However small and simple the music-room may be, it should
+always appear as though there were space overhead for the notes to
+escape; and some form of vaulting or doming is therefore more suitable
+than a flat ceiling.
+
+While plain panelling, if well designed, is never out of keeping, the
+walls of a music-room are specially suited to a somewhat fanciful
+style of decoration. In a ball-room, splendor and brilliancy of effect
+are more needful than a studied delicacy; but where people are seated,
+and everything in the room is consequently subjected to close and
+prolonged scrutiny, sprightliness of composition should be combined
+with variety of detail, the decoration being neither so confused and
+intricate as to distract attention, nor so conventional as to be
+dismissed with a glance on entering the room.
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE XLVI._
+
+ FRENCH TABLE.
+ (TRANSITION BETWEEN LOUIS XIV AND LOUIS XV PERIODS.)]
+
+The early Renaissance compositions in which stucco low-reliefs blossom
+into painted arabesques and tendrils, are peculiarly adapted to a
+small music-room; while those who prefer a more architectural
+treatment may find admirable examples in some of the Italian
+eighteenth-century rooms decorated with free-hand stucco ornament, or
+in the sculptured wood-panelling of the same period in France. At
+Remiremont in the Vosges, formerly the residence of a noble order of
+canonesses, the abbess's _hôtel_ contains an octagonal music-room of
+exceptional beauty, the panelled walls being carved with skilfully
+combined musical instruments and flower-garlands.
+
+In larger apartments a fanciful style of fresco-painting might be
+employed, as in the rooms painted by Tiepolo in the Villa Valmarana,
+near Vicenza, or in the staircase of the Palazzo Sina, at Venice,
+decorated by Longhi with the episodes of an eighteenth-century
+carnival. Whatever the design chosen, it should never resemble the
+formal treatment suited to ball-room and saloon: the decoration should
+sound a note distinctly suggestive of the purpose for which the
+music-room is used.
+
+It is difficult to understand why modern music-rooms have so long been
+disfigured by the clumsy lines of grand and upright pianos, since the
+cases of both might be modified without affecting the construction of
+the instrument. Of the two, the grand piano would be the easier to
+remodel: if its elephantine supports were replaced by slender fluted
+legs, and its case and sounding-board were painted, or inlaid with
+marquetry, it would resemble the charming old clavecin which preceded
+the pianoforte.
+
+Fewer changes are possible in the "upright"; but a marked improvement
+could be produced by straightening its legs and substituting right
+angles for the weak curves of the lid. The case itself might be made
+of plainly panelled mahogany, with a few good ormolu ornaments; or of
+inlaid wood, with a design of musical instruments and similar
+"attributes"; or it might be decorated with flower-garlands and
+arabesques painted either on the natural wood or on a gilt or colored
+background.
+
+Designers should also study the lines of those two long-neglected
+pieces of furniture, the music-stool and music-stand. The latter
+should be designed to match the piano, and painted or inlaid like its
+case. The revolving mushroom that now serves as a music-stool is a
+modern invention: the old stools were substantial circular seats
+resting on four fluted legs. The manuals of the eighteenth-century
+cabinet-makers contain countless models of these piano-seats, which
+might well be reproduced by modern designers: there seems no practical
+reason why the accessories of the piano should be less decorative than
+those of the harpsichord.
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE XLVII._
+
+ LIBRARY OF LOUIS XVI, PALACE OF VERSAILLES.
+ (LOUIS XV WRITING-TABLE WITH BUST.)]
+
+
+
+
+XII
+
+THE LIBRARY, SMOKING-ROOM, AND "DEN"
+
+
+In the days when furniture was defined as "that which may be carried
+about," the natural bookcase was a chest with a strong lock. These
+chests, packed with precious manuscripts, followed the prince or noble
+from one castle to another, and were even carried after him into camp.
+Before the invention of printing, when twenty or thirty books formed
+an exceptionally large library, and many great personages were content
+with the possession of one volume, such ambulant bookcases were
+sufficient for the requirements of the most eager bibliophile.
+Occasionally the volumes were kept in a small press or cupboard, and
+placed in a chest only when their owner travelled; but the bookcase,
+as now known, did not take shape until much later, for when books
+multiplied with the introduction of printing, it became customary to
+fit up for their reception little rooms called _cabinets_. In the
+famous _cabinet_ of Catherine de Medici at Blois the walls are lined
+with book-shelves concealed behind sliding panels--a contrivance
+rendered doubly necessary by the general insecurity of property, and
+by the fact that the books of that period, whether in manuscript or
+printed, were made sumptuous as church jewelry by the art of painter
+and goldsmith.
+
+Long after the establishment of the printing-press, books, except in
+the hands of the scholar, continued to be a kind of curiosity, like
+other objects of art: less an intellectual need than a treasure upon
+which rich men prided themselves. It was not until the middle of the
+seventeenth century that the taste for books became a taste for
+reading. France led the way in this new fashion, which was assiduously
+cultivated in those Parisian _salons_ of which Madame de Rambouillet's
+is the recognized type. The possession of a library, hitherto the
+privilege of kings, of wealthy monasteries, or of some distinguished
+patron of letters like Grolier, Maioli, or de Thou, now came to be
+regarded as a necessity of every gentleman's establishment. Beautiful
+bindings were still highly valued, and some of the most wonderful work
+produced in France belongs to the seventeenth and eighteenth
+centuries; but as people began to buy books for the sake of what they
+contained, less exaggerated importance was attached to their exterior,
+so that bindings, though perfect as taste and skill could make them,
+were seldom as extravagantly enriched as in the two preceding
+centuries. Up to a certain point this change was not to be regretted:
+the mediæval book, with its gold or ivory bas-reliefs bordered with
+precious stones, and its massive jewelled clasps, was more like a
+monstrance or reliquary than anything meant for less ceremonious use.
+It remained for the Italian printers and binders of the sixteenth
+century, and for their French imitators, to adapt the form of the book
+to its purpose, changing, as it were, a jewelled idol to a human
+companion.
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE XLVIII._
+
+ SMALL LIBRARY AT AUDLEY END, ENGLAND. XVIII CENTURY.]
+
+The substitution of the octavo for the folio, and certain
+modifications in binding which made it possible to stand books upright
+instead of laying one above the other with edges outward, gradually
+gave to the library a more modern aspect. In France, by the middle of
+the seventeenth century, the library had come to be a recognized
+feature in private houses. The Renaissance _cabinet_ continued to be
+the common receptacle for books; but as the shelves were no longer
+concealed, bindings now contributed to the decoration of the room.
+Movable bookcases were not unknown, but these seem to have been merely
+presses in which wooden door-panels were replaced by glass or by a
+lattice-work of brass wire. The typical French bookcase _à deux
+corps_--that is, made in two separate parts, the lower a cupboard to
+contain prints and folios, the upper with shelves and glazed or
+latticed doors--was introduced later, and is still the best model for
+a movable bookcase. In rooms of any importance, however, the French
+architect always preferred to build his book-shelves into niches
+formed in the thickness of the wall, thus utilizing the books as part
+of his scheme of decoration.
+
+There is no doubt that this is not only the most practical, but the
+most decorative, way of housing any collection of books large enough
+to be so employed. To adorn the walls of a library, and then conceal
+their ornamentation by expensive bookcases, is a waste, or rather a
+misapplication, of effects--always a sin against æsthetic principles.
+
+The importance of bookbindings as an element in house-decoration has
+already been touched upon; but since a taste for good bindings has
+come to be regarded as a collector's fad, like accumulating
+snuff-boxes or _baisers-de-paix_, it seems needful to point out how
+obvious and valuable a means of decoration is lost by disregarding the
+outward appearance of books. To be decorative, a bookcase need not
+contain the productions of the master-binders,--old volumes by Eve and
+Derôme, or the work of Roger Payne and Sanderson,--unsurpassed as they
+are in color-value. Ordinary bindings of half morocco or vellum form
+an expanse of warm lustrous color; such bindings are comparatively
+inexpensive; yet people will often hesitate to pay for a good edition
+bound in plain levant half the amount they are ready to throw away
+upon a piece of modern Saxe or a silver photograph-frame.
+
+The question of binding leads incidentally to that of editions, though
+the latter is hardly within the scope of this book. People who have
+begun to notice the outside of their books naturally come to
+appreciate paper and type; and thus learn that the modern book is too
+often merely the cheapest possible vehicle for putting words into
+print. The last few years have brought about some improvement; and it
+is now not unusual for a publisher, in bringing out a book at the
+ordinary rates, to produce also a small edition in large-paper copies.
+These large-paper books, though as yet far from perfect in type and
+make-up, are superior to the average "commercial article"; and, apart
+from their artistic merit, are in themselves a good investment, since
+the value of such editions increases steadily year by year. Those who
+cannot afford both edition and binding will do better to buy
+large-paper books or current first editions in boards, than
+"handsomely bound" volumes unworthy in type and paper. The plain paper
+or buckram covers of a good publisher are, in fact, more decorative,
+because more artistic, than showy tree-calf or "antique morocco."
+
+The same principle applies to the library itself: plain shelves filled
+with good editions in good bindings are more truly decorative than
+ornate bookcases lined with tawdry books.
+
+It has already been pointed out that the plan of building book-shelves
+into the walls is the most decorative and the most practical (see
+Plate XLVIII). The best examples of this treatment are found in
+France. The walls of the rooms thus decorated were usually of panelled
+wood, either in natural oak or walnut, as in the beautiful library of
+the old university at Nancy, or else painted in two contrasting
+colors, such as gray and white. When not set in recesses, the shelves
+formed a sort of continuous lining around the walls, as in the library
+of Louis XVI in the palace at Versailles (see Plate XLVII), or in that
+of the Duc de Choiseul at Chanteloup, now set up in one of the rooms
+of the public library at Tours.
+
+In either case, instead of being detached pieces of furniture, the
+bookcases formed an organic part of the wall-decoration. Any study of
+old French works on house-decoration and furniture will show how
+seldom the detached bookcase was used in French libraries: but few
+models are to be found, and these were probably designed for use in
+the boudoir or study, rather than in the library proper (see bookcase
+in Plate V).
+
+In England, where private libraries were fewer and less extensive, the
+movable bookcase was much used, and examples of built-in shelves are
+proportionately rarer. The hand-books of the old English
+cabinet-makers contain innumerable models of handsome bookcases, with
+glazed doors set with diamond-shaped panes in wooden mouldings, and
+the familiar broken pediment surmounted by a bust or an urn. It was
+natural that where books were few, small bookcases should be preferred
+to a room lined with shelves; and in the seventeenth century,
+according to John Evelyn, the "three nations of Great Britain"
+contained fewer books than Paris.
+
+Almost all the old bookcases had one feature in common: that is, the
+lower cupboard with solid doors. The bookcase proper rested upon this
+projecting cupboard, thus raising the books above the level of the
+furniture. The prevalent fashion of low book-shelves, starting from
+the floor, and not extending much higher than the dado-moulding, has
+probably been brought about by the other recent fashion of
+low-studded rooms. Architects are beginning to rediscover the
+forgotten fact that the stud of a room should be regulated by the
+dimensions of its floor-space; so that in the newer houses the dwarf
+bookcase is no longer a necessity. It is certainly less convenient
+than the tall old-fashioned press; for not only must one kneel to
+reach the lower shelves, but the books are hidden, and access to them
+is obstructed, by their being on a level with the furniture.
+
+The general decoration of the library should be of such character as
+to form a background or setting to the books, rather than to distract
+attention from them. The richly adorned room in which books are but a
+minor incident is, in fact, no library at all. There is no reason why
+the decorations of a library should not be splendid; but in that case
+the books must be splendid too, and sufficient in number to dominate
+all the accessory decorations of the room.
+
+When there are books enough, it is best to use them as part of the
+decorative treatment of the walls, panelling any intervening spaces in
+a severe and dignified style; otherwise movable bookcases may be
+placed against the more important wall-spaces, the walls being
+decorated with wooden panelling or with mouldings and stucco
+ornaments; but in this case composition and color-scheme must be so
+subdued as to throw the bookcases and their contents into marked
+relief. It does not follow that because books are the chief feature of
+the library, other ornaments should be excluded; but they should be
+used with discrimination, and so chosen as to harmonize with the
+spirit of the room. Nowhere is the modern litter of knick-knacks and
+photographs more inappropriate than in the library. The tables should
+be large, substantial, and clear of everything but lamps, books and
+papers--one table at least being given over to the filing of books
+and newspapers. The library writing-table is seldom large enough, or
+sufficiently free from odds and ends in the shape of photograph-frames,
+silver boxes, and flower-vases, to give free play to the elbows. A
+large solid table of the kind called _bureau-ministre_ (see the table
+in Plate XLVII) is well adapted to the library; and in front of it
+should stand a comfortable writing-chair such as that represented in
+Plate XLIX.
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE XLIX._
+
+ WRITING-CHAIR, LOUIS XV PERIOD.]
+
+The housing of a great private library is one of the most interesting
+problems of interior architecture. Such a room, combining monumental
+dimensions with the rich color-values and impressive effect produced
+by tiers of fine bindings, affords unequalled opportunity for the
+exercise of the architect's skill. The two-storied room with gallery
+and stairs and domed or vaulted ceiling is the finest setting for a
+great collection. Space may of course be gained by means of a series
+of bookcases projecting into the room and forming deep bays along each
+of the walls; but this arrangement is seldom necessary save in a
+public library, and however skilfully handled must necessarily
+diminish the architectural effect of the room. In America the great
+private library is still so much a thing of the future that its
+treatment need not be discussed in detail. Few of the large houses
+lately built in the United States contain a library in the serious
+meaning of the term; but it is to be hoped that the next generation of
+architects will have wider opportunities in this direction.
+
+The smoking-room proper, with its _mise en scène_ of Turkish divans,
+narghilehs, brass coffee-trays, and other Oriental properties, is no
+longer considered a necessity in the modern house; and the room which
+would formerly have been used for this special purpose now comes
+rather under the head of the master's lounging-room, or "den"--since
+the latter word seems to have attained the dignity of a technical
+term.
+
+Whatever extravagances the upholsterer may have committed in other
+parts of the house, it is usually conceded that common sense should
+regulate the furnishing of the den. Fragile chairs, lace-petticoat
+lamp-shades and irrelevant bric-à-brac are consequently excluded; and
+the master's sense of comfort often expresses itself in a set of
+"office" furniture--a roller-top desk, a revolving chair, and others
+of the puffy type already described as the accepted model of a
+luxurious seat. Thus freed from the superfluous, the den is likely to
+be the most comfortable room in the house; and the natural inference
+is that a room, in order to be comfortable, must be ugly. One can
+picture the derision of the man who is told that he might, without the
+smallest sacrifice of comfort or convenience, transact his business at
+a Louis XVI writing-table, seated in a Louis XVI chair!--yet the
+handsomest desks of the last century--the fine old _bureaux à la
+Kaunitz_ or _à cylindre_--were the prototypes of the modern
+"roller-top"; and the cane or leather-seated writing-chair, with
+rounded back and five slim strong legs, was far more comfortable than
+the amorphous revolving seat. Convenience was not sacrificed to beauty
+in either desk or chair; but both the old pieces, being designed by
+skilled cabinet-makers, were as decorative as they were useful. There
+seems, in fact, no reason why the modern den should not resemble the
+financiers' _bureaux_ seen in so many old prints: rooms of dignified
+plainness, but where each line of wall-panelling and furniture was as
+carefully studied and intelligently adapted to its ends as though
+intended for a drawing-room or boudoir.
+
+Reference has been made to the way in which, even in small houses, a
+room may be sacrificed to a supposed "effect," or to some inherited
+tradition as to its former use. Thus the family drawing-room is too
+often made uninhabitable from some vague feeling that a "drawing-room"
+is not worthy of its name unless too fine to sit in; while the small
+front room on the ground floor--in the average American house the only
+corner given over to the master--is thrown into the hall, either that
+the house may appear larger and handsomer, or from sheer inability to
+make so small a room habitable.
+
+There is no reason why even a ten-by-twelve or an eight-by-fourteen
+foot room should not be made comfortable; and the following
+suggestions are intended to indicate the lines on which an appropriate
+scheme of decoration might be carried out.
+
+In most town houses the small room down-stairs is built with an
+opening in the longitudinal wall, close to the front door, while there
+is usually another entrance at the back of the room, facing the
+window; one at least of these openings being, as a rule, of
+exaggerated width. In such cases the door in the side of the room
+should be walled up: this gives privacy and provides enough additional
+wall-space for a good-sized piece of furniture.
+
+The best way of obtaining an effect of size is to panel the walls by
+means of clear-cut architectural mouldings: a few strong vertical
+lines will give dignity to the room and height to the ceiling. The
+walls should be free from pattern and light in color, since dark walls
+necessitate much artificial light, and have the disadvantage of making
+a room look small.
+
+The ceiling, if not plain, must be ornamented with the lightest
+tracery, and supported by a cornice correspondingly simple in design.
+Heavy ceiling-mouldings are obviously out of place in a small room,
+and a plain expanse of plaster is always preferable to misapplied
+ornament.
+
+A single curtain made of some flexible material, such as corduroy or
+thin unlined damask, and so hung that it may be readily drawn back
+during the day, is sufficient for the window; while in a corner near
+this window may be placed an easy-chair and a small solidly made
+table, large enough to hold a lamp and a book or two.
+
+These rooms, in some recently built town houses, contain chimneys set
+in an angle of the wall: a misplaced attempt at quaintness, making it
+inconvenient to sit near the hearth, and seriously interfering with
+the general arrangement of the room. When the chimney occupies the
+centre of the longitudinal wall there is space, even in a very narrow
+room, for a group of chairs about the fireplace--provided, as we are
+now supposing, the opening in the parallel wall has been closed. A
+bookcase or some other high piece of furniture may be placed on each
+side of the mantel, and there will be space opposite for a sofa and a
+good-sized writing-table. If the pieces of furniture chosen are in
+scale with the dimensions of the room, and are placed against the
+wall, instead of being set sideways, with the usual easel or palm-tree
+behind them, it is surprising to see how much a small room may contain
+without appearing to be overcrowded.
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE L._
+
+ DINING-ROOM, PALACE OF COMPIÈGNE. LOUIS XVI PERIOD.
+ (OVER-DOORS AND OVER-MANTEL PAINTED IN GRISAILLE, BY SAUVAGE.)]
+
+
+
+
+XIII
+
+THE DINING-ROOM
+
+
+The dining-room, as we know it, is a comparatively recent innovation
+in house-planning. In the early middle ages the noble and his
+retainers ate in the hall; then the _grand'salle_, built for
+ceremonial uses, began to serve as a banqueting-room, while the meals
+eaten in private were served in the lord's chamber. As house-planning
+adapted itself to the growing complexity of life, the mediæval bedroom
+developed into a private suite of living-rooms, preceded by an
+antechamber; and this antechamber, or one of the small adjoining
+cabinets, was used as the family dining-room, the banqueting-hall
+being still reserved for state entertainments.
+
+The plan of dining at haphazard in any of the family living-rooms
+persisted on the Continent until the beginning of the eighteenth
+century: even then it was comparatively rare, in France, to see a room
+set apart for the purpose of dining. In small _hôtels_ and apartments,
+people continued to dine in the antechamber; where there were two
+antechambers, the inner was used for that purpose; and it was only in
+grand houses, or in the luxurious establishments of the _femmes
+galantes_, that dining-rooms were to be found. Even in such cases the
+room described as a _salle à manger_ was often only a central
+antechamber or saloon into which the living-rooms opened; indeed,
+Madame du Barry's sumptuous dining-room at Luciennes was a vestibule
+giving directly upon the peristyle of the villa.
+
+In England the act of dining seems to have been taken more seriously,
+while the rambling outgrowths of the Elizabethan residence included a
+greater variety of rooms than could be contained in any but the
+largest houses built on more symmetrical lines. Accordingly, in old
+English house-plans we find rooms designated as "dining-parlors"; many
+houses, in fact, contained two or three, each with a different
+exposure, so that they might be used at different seasons. These rooms
+can hardly be said to represent our modern dining-room, since they
+were not planned in connection with kitchen and offices, and were
+probably used as living-rooms when not needed for dining. Still, it
+was from the Elizabethan dining-parlor that the modern dining-room
+really developed; and so recently has it been specialized into a room
+used only for eating, that a generation ago old-fashioned people in
+England and America habitually used their dining-rooms to sit in. On
+the Continent the incongruous uses of the rooms in which people dined
+made it necessary that the furniture should be easily removed. In the
+middle ages, people dined at long tables composed of boards resting on
+trestles, while the seats were narrow wooden benches or stools, so
+constructed that they could easily be carried away when the meal was
+over. With the sixteenth century, the _table-à-tréteaux_ gave way to
+various folding tables with legs, and the wooden stools were later
+replaced by folding seats without arms called _perroquets_. In the
+middle ages, when banquets were given in the _grand'salle_, the plate
+was displayed on movable shelves covered with a velvet slip, or on
+elaborately carved dressers; but on ordinary occasions little silver
+was set out in French dining-rooms, and the great English
+sideboard, with its array of urns, trays and wine-coolers, was
+unknown in France. In the common antechamber dining-room, whatever was
+needed for the table was kept in a press or cupboard with solid wooden
+doors; changes of service being carried on by means of serving-tables,
+or _servantes_--narrow marble-topped consoles ranged against the walls
+of the room.
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE LI._
+
+ DINING-ROOM FOUNTAIN, PALACE OF FONTAINEBLEAU.
+ LOUIS XV PERIOD.]
+
+For examples of dining-rooms, as we understand the term, one must look
+to the grand French houses of the eighteenth century (see Plate L) and
+to the same class of dwellings in England. In France such dining-rooms
+were usually intended for gala entertainments, the family being still
+served in antechamber or cabinet; but English houses of the same
+period generally contain a family dining-room and another intended for
+state.
+
+The dining-room of Madame du Barry at Luciennes, already referred to,
+was a magnificent example of the great dining-saloon. The ceiling was
+a painted Olympus; the white marble walls were subdivided by
+Corinthian pilasters with plinths and capitals of gilt bronze,
+surmounted by a frieze of bas-reliefs framed in gold; four marble
+niches contained statues by Pajou, Lecomte, and Moineau; and the
+general brilliancy of effect was increased by crystal chandeliers,
+hung in the intercolumniations against a background of looking-glass.
+
+Such a room, the banqueting-hall of the official mistress, represents
+the _courtisane's_ ideal of magnificence: decorations as splendid, but
+more sober and less theatrical, marked the dining-rooms of the
+aristocracy, as at Choisy, Gaillon and Rambouillet.
+
+The state dining-rooms of the eighteenth century were often treated
+with an order, niches with statues being placed between the pilasters.
+Sometimes one of these niches contained a fountain serving as a
+wine-cooler--a survival of the stone or metal wall-fountains in which
+dishes were washed in the mediæval dining-room. Many of these earlier
+fountains had been merely fixed to the wall; but those of the
+eighteenth century, though varying greatly in design, were almost
+always an organic part of the wall-decoration (see Plate LI).
+Sometimes, in apartments of importance, they formed the pedestal of a
+life-size group or statue, as in the dining-room of Madame de
+Pompadour; while in smaller rooms they consisted of a semicircular
+basin of marble projecting from the wall and surmounted by groups of
+cupids, dolphins or classic attributes. The banqueting-gallery of
+Trianon-sous-Bois contains in one of its longitudinal walls two wide
+niches with long marble basins; and Mariette's edition of d'Aviler's
+_Cours d'Architecture_ gives the elevation of a recessed buffet
+flanked by small niches containing fountains. The following
+description, accompanying d'Aviler's plate, is quoted here as an
+instance of the manner in which elaborate compositions were worked out
+by the old decorators: "The second antechamber, being sometimes used
+as a dining-room, is a suitable place for the buffet represented. This
+buffet, which may be incrusted with marble or stone, or panelled with
+wood-work, consists in a recess occupying one of the side walls of the
+room. The recess contains a shelf of marble or stone, supported on
+brackets and surmounting a small stone basin which serves as a
+wine-cooler. Above the shelf is an attic flanked by volutes, and over
+this attic may be placed a picture, generally a flower or fruit-piece,
+or the representation of a concert, or some such agreeable scene;
+while in the accompanying plate the attic is crowned by a bust of
+Comus, wreathed with vines by two little satyrs--the group detaching
+itself against a trellised background enlivened with birds. The
+composition is completed by two lateral niches for fountains,
+adorned with masks, tritons and dolphins of gilded lead."
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE LII._
+
+ DINING-CHAIR, LOUIS XIV PERIOD.]
+
+These built-in sideboards and fountains were practically the only
+feature distinguishing the old dining-rooms from other gala
+apartments. At a period when all rooms were painted, panelled, or hung
+with tapestry, no special style of decoration was thought needful for
+the dining-room; though tapestry was seldom used, for the practical
+reason that stuff hangings are always objectionable in a room intended
+for eating.
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE LIII._
+
+ DINING-CHAIR, LOUIS XVI PERIOD.]
+
+Towards the end of the seventeenth century, when comfortable seats
+began to be made, an admirably designed dining-room chair replaced the
+earlier benches and _perroquets_. The eighteenth century dining-chair
+is now often confounded with the light _chaise volante_ used in
+drawing-rooms, and cabinet-makers frequently sell the latter as copies
+of old dining-chairs. These were in fact much heavier and more
+comfortable, and whether cane-seated or upholstered, were invariably
+made with wide deep seats, so that the long banquets of the day might
+be endured without constraint or fatigue; while the backs were low and
+narrow, in order not to interfere with the service of the table. (See
+Plates LII and LIII. Plates XLVI and L also contain good examples of
+dining-chairs.) In England the state dining-room was decorated much as
+it was in France: the family dining-room was simply a plain parlor,
+with wide mahogany sideboards or tall glazed cupboards for the display
+of plate and china. The solid English dining-chairs of mahogany, if
+less graceful than those used on the Continent, are equally well
+adapted to their purpose.
+
+The foregoing indications may serve to suggest the lines upon which
+dining-room decoration might be carried out in the present day. The
+avoidance of all stuff hangings and heavy curtains is of great
+importance: it will be observed that even window-curtains were seldom
+used in old dining-rooms, such care being given to the decorative
+detail of window and embrasure that they needed no additional ornament
+in the way of drapery. A bare floor of stone or marble is best suited
+to the dining-room; but where the floor is covered, it should be with
+a rug, not with a nailed-down carpet.
+
+The dining-room should be lit by wax candles in side _appliques_ or in
+a chandelier; and since anything tending to produce heat and to
+exhaust air is especially objectionable in a room used for eating, the
+walls should be sufficiently light in color to make little artificial
+light necessary. In the dining-rooms of the last century, in England
+as well as on the Continent, the color-scheme was usually regulated by
+this principle: the dark dining-room panelled with mahogany or hung
+with sombre leather is an invention of our own times. It has already
+been said that the old family dining-room was merely a panelled
+parlor. Sometimes the panels were of light unvarnished oak, but
+oftener they were painted in white or in some pale tint easily lit by
+wax candles. The walls were often hung with fruit or flower-pieces, or
+with pictures of fish and game: a somewhat obvious form of adornment
+which it has long been the fashion to ridicule, but which was not
+without decorative value and appropriateness. Pictures representing
+life and action often grow tiresome when looked at over and over
+again, day after day: a fact which the old decorators probably had in
+mind when they hung what the French call _natures mortes_ in the
+dining-room.
+
+Concerning the state dining-room that forms a part of many modern houses
+little remains to be said beyond the descriptions already given of the
+various gala apartments. It is obvious that the banqueting-hall
+should be less brilliant than a ball-room and less fanciful in
+decoration than a music-room: a severer and more restful treatment
+naturally suggests itself, but beyond this no special indications are
+required.
+
+The old dining-rooms were usually heated by porcelain stoves. Such a
+stove, of fine architectural design, set in a niche corresponding with
+that which contains the fountain, is of great decorative value in the
+composition of the room; and as it has the advantage of giving out
+less concentrated heat than an open fire, it is specially well suited
+to a small or narrow dining-room, where some of the guests must
+necessarily sit close to the hearth.
+
+Most houses which have banquet-halls contain also a smaller apartment
+called a breakfast-room; but as this generally corresponds in size and
+usage with the ordinary family dining-room, the same style of
+decoration is applicable to both. However ornate the banquet-hall may
+be, the breakfast-room must of course be simple and free from gilding:
+the more elaborate the decorations of the larger room, the more
+restful such a contrast will be found.
+
+Of the dinner-table, as we now know it, little need be said. The
+ingenious but ugly extension-table with a central support, now used
+all over the world, is an English invention. There seems no reason why
+the general design should not be improved without interfering with the
+mechanism of this table; but of course it can never be so satisfactory
+to the eye as one of the old round or square tables, with four or six
+tapering legs, such as were used in eighteenth-century dining-rooms
+before the introduction of the "extension."
+
+
+
+
+XIV
+
+BEDROOMS
+
+
+The history of the bedroom has been incidentally touched upon in
+tracing the development of the drawing-room from the mediæval hall. It
+was shown that early in the middle ages the sleeping-chamber, which
+had been one of the first outgrowths of the hall, was divided into the
+_chambre de parade_, or incipient drawing-room, and the _chambre au
+giste_, or actual sleeping-room.
+
+The increasing development of social life in the sixteenth century
+brought about a further change; the state bedroom being set aside for
+entertainments of ceremony, while the sleeping-chamber was used as the
+family living-room and as the scene of suppers, card-parties, and
+informal receptions--or sometimes actually as the kitchen. Indeed, so
+varied were the uses to which the _chambre au giste_ was put, that in
+France especially it can hardly be said to have offered a refuge from
+the promiscuity of the hall.
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE LIV._
+
+ BEDROOM. PALACE OF FONTAINEBLEAU. LOUIS XIV PERIOD.
+ (LOUIS XVI BED AND CHAIR, MODERN SOFA.)]
+
+As a rule, the bedrooms of the Renaissance and of the seventeenth
+century were very richly furnished. The fashion of raising the bed on
+a dais separated from the rest of the room by columns and a balustrade
+was introduced in France in the time of Louis XIV. This innovation
+gave rise to the habit of dividing the decoration of the room into two
+parts; the walls being usually panelled or painted, while the
+"alcove," as it was called, was hung in tapestry, velvet, or some
+rich stuff in keeping with the heavy curtains that completely
+enveloped the bedstead. This use of stuff hangings about the bed, so
+contrary to our ideas of bedroom hygiene, was due to the difficulty of
+heating the large high-studded rooms of the period, and also, it must
+be owned, to the prevalent dread of fresh air as of something
+essentially unwholesome and pernicious.
+
+In the early middle ages people usually slept on the floor; though it
+would seem that occasionally, to avoid cold or dampness, the mattress
+was laid on cords stretched upon a low wooden framework. In the
+fourteenth century the use of such frameworks became more general, and
+the bed was often enclosed in curtains hung from a tester resting on
+four posts. Bed-hangings and coverlet were often magnificently
+embroidered; but in order that it might not be necessary to transport
+from place to place the unwieldy bedstead and tester, these were made
+in the rudest manner, without attempt at carving or adornment. In
+course of time this primitive framework developed into the sumptuous
+four-post bedstead of the Renaissance, with elaborately carved cornice
+and _colonnes torses_ enriched with gilding. Thenceforward more wealth
+and skill were expended upon the bedstead than upon any other article
+of furniture. Gilding, carving, and inlaying of silver, ivory or
+mother-of-pearl, combined to adorn the framework, and embroidery made
+the coverlet and hangings resplendent as church vestments. This
+magnificence is explained by the fact that it was customary for the
+lady of the house to lie in bed while receiving company. In many old
+prints representing suppers, card-parties, or afternoon visits, the
+hostess is thus seen, with elaborately dressed head and stiff brocade
+gown, while her friends are grouped about the bedside in equally rich
+attire. This curious custom persisted until late in the eighteenth
+century; and under such conditions it was natural that the old
+cabinet-makers should vie with each other in producing a variety of
+ornate and fanciful bedsteads. It would be useless to enumerate here
+the modifications in design marking the different periods of
+decoration: those who are interested in the subject will find it
+treated in detail in the various French works on furniture.
+
+It was natural that while the bedroom was used as a _salon_ it should
+be decorated with more elaboration than would otherwise have been
+fitting; but two causes combined to simplify its treatment in the
+eighteenth century. One of these was the new fashion of _petits
+appartements_. With artists so keenly alive to proportion as the old
+French designers, it was inevitable that such a change in dimensions
+should bring about a corresponding change in decoration. The bedrooms
+of the eighteenth century, though sometimes elaborate in detail, had
+none of the pompous richness of the great Renaissance or Louis XIV
+room (see Plate LIV). The pretentious dais with its screen of columns
+was replaced by a niche containing the bed; plain wood-panelling
+succeeded to tapestry and embroidered hangings; and the heavy carved
+ceiling with its mythological centre-picture made way for light
+traceries on plaster.
+
+The other change in the decoration of French bedrooms was due to the
+substitution of linen or cotton bed and window-hangings for the
+sumptuous velvets and brocades of the seventeenth century. This change
+has usually been ascribed to the importation of linens and cottons
+from the East; and no doubt the novelty of these gay _indiennes_
+stimulated the taste for simple hangings. The old inventories,
+however, show that, in addition to the imported India hangings, plain
+white linen curtains with a colored border were much used; and it is
+probably the change in the size of rooms that first led to the
+adoption of thin washable hangings. The curtains and bed-draperies of
+damask or brocatelle, so well suited to the high-studded rooms of the
+seventeenth century, would have been out of place in the small
+apartments of the Regency. In studying the history of decoration, it
+will generally be found that the supposed vagaries of house-furnishing
+were actually based on some practical requirement; and in this
+instance the old decorators were doubtless guided rather by common
+sense than by caprice. The adoption of these washable materials
+certainly introduced a style of bedroom-furnishing answering to all
+the requirements of recent hygiene; for not only were windows and
+bedsteads hung with unlined cotton or linen, but chairs and sofas were
+covered with removable _housses_, or slip-covers; while the painted
+wall-panelling and bare brick or parquet floors came far nearer to the
+modern sanitary ideal than do the papered walls and nailed-down
+carpets still seen in many bedrooms. This simple form of decoration
+had the additional charm of variety; for it was not unusual to have
+several complete sets of curtains and slip-covers, embroidered to
+match, and changed with the seasons. The hangings and covers of the
+queen's bedroom at Versailles were changed four times a year.
+
+Although bedrooms are still "done" in chintz, and though of late
+especially there has been a reaction from the satin-damask bedroom
+with its dust-collecting upholstery and knick-knacks, the modern habit
+of lining chintz curtains and of tufting chairs has done away with the
+chief advantages of the simpler style of treatment. There is something
+illogical in using washable stuffs in such a way that they cannot be
+washed, especially in view of the fact that the heavily lined
+curtains, which might be useful to exclude light and cold, are in nine
+cases out of ten so hung by the upholsterer that they cannot possibly
+be drawn at night. Besides, the patterns of modern chintzes have so
+little in common with the _toiles imprimées_ of the seventeenth and
+eighteenth centuries that they scarcely serve the same decorative
+purpose; and it is therefore needful to give some account of the old
+French bedroom hangings, as well as of the manner in which they were
+employed.
+
+The liking for _cotonnades_ showed itself in France early in the
+seventeenth century. Before this, cotton materials had been imported
+from the East; but in the seventeenth century a manufactory was
+established in France, and until about 1800 cotton and linen curtains
+and furniture-coverings remained in fashion. This taste was encouraged
+by the importation of the _toiles des Indes_, printed cottons of gay
+color and fanciful design, much sought after in France, especially
+after the government, in order to protect native industry, had
+restricted the privilege of importing them to the _Compagnie des
+Indes_. It was not until Oberkampf established his manufactory at Jouy
+in 1760 that the French _toiles_ began to replace those of foreign
+manufacture. Hitherto the cottons made in France had been stamped
+merely in outline, the colors being filled in by hand; but Oberkampf
+invented a method of printing in colors, thereby making France the
+leading market for such stuffs.
+
+The earliest printed cottons having been imported from India and
+China, it was natural that the style of the Oriental designers should
+influence their European imitators. Europe had, in fact, been prompt
+to recognize the singular beauty of Chinese art, and in France the
+passion for _chinoiseries_, first aroused by Mazarin's collection of
+Oriental objects of art, continued unabated until the general decline
+of taste at the end of the eighteenth century. Nowhere, perhaps, was
+the influence of Chinese art more beneficial to European designers
+than in the composition of stuff-patterns. The fantastic gaiety and
+variety of Chinese designs, in which the human figure so largely
+predominates, gave fresh animation to European compositions, while the
+absence of perspective and modelling preserved that conventionalism so
+essential in pattern-designing. The voluminous acanthus-leaves, the
+fleur-de-lys, arabesques and massive scroll-work so suitable to the
+Genoese velvets and Lyons silks of the sixteenth and seventeenth
+centuries, would have been far too magnificent for the cotton stuffs
+that were beginning to replace those splendid tissues. On a thin
+material a heavy architectural pattern was obviously inappropriate;
+besides, it would have been out of scale with the smaller rooms and
+lighter style of decoration then coming into fashion.
+
+The French designer, while influenced by Chinese compositions, was too
+artistic to be satisfied with literal reproductions of his Oriental
+models. Absorbing the spirit of the Chinese designs, he either blent
+mandarins and pagodas with Italian grottoes, French landscapes, and
+classical masks and trophies, in one of those delightful inventions
+which are the fairy-tales of decorative art, or applied the principles
+of Oriental design to purely European subjects. In comparing the
+printed cottons of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries with
+modern chintzes, it will be seen that the latter are either covered
+with monotonous repetitions of a geometrical figure, or with realistic
+reproductions of some natural object. Many wall-papers and chintzes of
+the present day represent loose branches of flowers scattered on a
+plain surface, with no more relation to each other or to their
+background than so many real flowers fixed at random against the wall.
+This literal rendering of natural objects with deceptive accuracy,
+always condemned by the best artists, is especially inappropriate when
+brought in close contact with the highly conventionalized forms of
+architectural composition. In this respect, the endlessly repeated
+geometrical figure is obviously less objectionable; yet the
+geometrical design, as produced to-day, has one defect in common with
+the other--that is, lack of imagination. Modern draughtsmen, in
+eliminating from their work that fanciful element (always strictly
+subordinated to some general scheme of composition) which marked the
+designs of the last two centuries, have deprived themselves of the
+individuality and freshness that might have saved their patterns from
+monotony.
+
+This rejection of the fanciful in composition is probably due to the
+excessive use of pattern in modern decoration. Where much pattern is
+used, it must be as monotonous as possible, or it will become
+unbearable. The old decorators used few lines, and permitted
+themselves more freedom in design; or rather they remembered, what is
+now too often forgotten, that in the decoration of a room furniture
+and objects of art help to make design, and in consequence they were
+chiefly concerned with providing plain spaces of background to throw
+into relief the contents of the room. Of late there has been so marked
+a return to plain panelled or painted walls that the pattern-designer
+will soon be encouraged to give freer rein to his fancy. In a room
+where walls and floor are of uniform tint, there is no reason why the
+design of curtains and chair-coverings should consist of long straight
+rows of buttercups or crocuses, endlessly repeated.
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE LV._
+
+ BATH-ROOM, PITTI PALACE, FLORENCE.
+ LATE XVIII CENTURY. DECORATED BY CACIALLI.]
+
+It must not be thought that the old designs were unconventional.
+Nature, in passing through the medium of the imagination, is
+necessarily transposed and in a manner conventionalized; and it is
+this transposition, this deliberate selection of certain
+characteristics to the exclusion of others, that distinguishes the
+work of art from a cast or a photograph. But the reduction of natural
+objects to geometrical forms is only one of the results of artistic
+selection. The Italian fresco-painters--the recognized masters of
+wall-decoration in the flat--always used the naturalistic method, but
+subject to certain restrictions in composition or color. This applies
+also to the Chinese designers, and to the humbler European
+pattern-makers who on more modest lines followed the same sound
+artistic traditions. In studying the _toiles peintes_ manufactured in
+Europe previous to the present century, it will be seen that where the
+design included the human figure or landscape naturalistically treated
+(as in the fables of Æsop and La Fontaine, or the history of Don
+Quixote), the pattern was either printed entirely in one color, or so
+fantastically colored that by no possibility could it pass for an
+attempt at a literal rendering of nature. Besides, in all such
+compositions (and here the Chinese influence is seen) perspective was
+studiously avoided, and the little superimposed groups or scenes were
+either connected by some decorative arabesque, or so designed that by
+their outline they formed a recurring pattern. On the other hand, when
+the design was obviously conventional a variety of colors was freely
+used. The introduction of the human figure, animals, architecture and
+landscape into stuff-patterns undoubtedly gave to the old designs an
+animation lacking in those of the present day; and a return to the
+_pays bleu_ of the Chinese artist would be a gain to modern
+decoration.
+
+Of the various ways in which a bedroom may be planned, none is so
+luxurious and practical as the French method of subdividing it into a
+suite composed of two or more small rooms. Where space is not
+restricted there should in fact be four rooms, preceded by an
+antechamber separating the suite from the main corridor of the house.
+The small sitting-room or boudoir opens into this antechamber; and
+next comes the bedroom, beyond which are the dressing and bath rooms.
+In French suites of this kind there are usually but two means of
+entrance from the main corridor: one for the use of the occupant,
+leading into the antechamber, the other opening into the bath-room, to
+give access to the servants. This arrangement, besides giving greater
+privacy, preserves much valuable wall-space, which would be sacrificed
+in America to the supposed necessity of making every room in a house
+open upon one of the main passageways.
+
+The plan of the bedroom suite can of course be carried out only in
+large houses; but even where there is no lack of space, such an
+arrangement is seldom adopted by American architects, and most of the
+more important houses recently built contain immense bedrooms, instead
+of a series of suites. To enumerate the practical advantages of the
+suite over the single large room hardly comes within the scope of this
+book; but as the uses to which a bedroom is put fall into certain
+natural subdivisions, it will be more convenient to consider it as a
+suite.
+
+Since bedrooms are no longer used as _salons_, there is no reason for
+decorating them in an elaborate manner; and, however magnificent the
+other apartments, it is evident that in this part of the house
+simplicity is most fitting. Now that people have been taught the
+unhealthiness of sleeping in a room with stuff hangings, heavy
+window-draperies and tufted furniture, the old fashion of painted
+walls and bare floors naturally commends itself; and as the bedroom
+suite is but the subdivision of one large room, it is obviously better
+that the same style of decoration should be used throughout.
+
+For this reason, plain panelled walls and chintz or cotton hangings
+are more appropriate to the boudoir than silk and gilding. If the
+walls are without pattern, a figured chintz may be chosen for curtains
+and furniture; while those who prefer plain tints should use
+unbleached cotton, trimmed with bands of color, or some colored linen
+with applications of gimp or embroidery. It is a good plan to cover
+all the chairs and sofas in the bedroom suite with slips matching the
+window-curtains; but where this is done, the furniture should, if
+possible, be designed for the purpose, since the lines of modern
+upholstered chairs are not suited to slips. The habit of designing
+furniture for slip-covers originated in the middle ages. At a time
+when the necessity of transporting furniture was added to the other
+difficulties of travel, it was usual to have common carpenter-built
+benches and tables, that might be left behind without risk, and to
+cover these with richly embroidered slips. The custom persisted long
+after furniture had ceased to be a part of luggage, and the benches
+and _tabourets_ now seen in many European palaces are covered merely
+with embroidered slips. Even when a set of furniture was upholstered
+with silk, it was usual, in the eighteenth century, to provide
+embroidered cotton covers for use in summer, while curtains of the
+same stuff were substituted for the heavier hangings used in winter.
+Old inventories frequently mention these _tentures d'été_, which are
+well adapted to our hot summer climate.
+
+The boudoir should contain a writing-table, a lounge or _lit de
+repos_, and one or two comfortable arm-chairs, while in a bedroom
+forming part of a suite only the bedstead and its accessories should
+be placed.
+
+The pieces of furniture needed in a well-appointed dressing-room are
+the toilet-table, wash-stand, clothes-press and cheval-glass, with the
+addition, if space permits, of one or two commodes or chiffonniers.
+The designing of modern furniture of this kind is seldom satisfactory;
+yet many who are careful to choose simple, substantial pieces for the
+other rooms of the house, submit to the pretentious "bedroom suit" of
+bird's-eye maple or mahogany, with its wearisome irrelevance of line
+and its excess of cheap ornament. Any study of old bedroom furniture
+will make clear the inferiority of the modern manufacturer's designs.
+Nowhere is the old sense of proportion and fitness seen to better
+advantage than in the simple, admirably composed commodes and
+clothes-presses of the eighteenth-century bedroom.
+
+The bath-room walls and floor should, of course, be water-proof. In
+the average bath-room, a tiled floor and a high wainscoting of tiles
+are now usually seen; and the detached enamel or porcelain bath has in
+most cases replaced the built-in metal tub. The bath-rooms in the
+larger houses recently built are, in general, lined with marble; but
+though the use of this substance gives opportunity for fine
+architectural effects, few modern bath-rooms can in this respect be
+compared with those seen in the great houses of Europe. The chief
+fault of the American bath-room is that, however splendid the
+materials used, the treatment is seldom architectural. A glance at the
+beautiful bath-room in the Pitti Palace at Florence (see Plate LV)
+will show how much effect may be produced in a small space by
+carefully studied composition. A mere closet is here transformed into
+a stately room, by that regard for harmony of parts which
+distinguishes interior architecture from mere decoration. A bath-room
+lined with precious marbles, with bath and wash-stand ranged along the
+wall, regardless of their relation to the composition of the whole, is
+no better architecturally than the tiled bath-room seen in ordinary
+houses: design, not substance, is needed to make the one superior to
+the other.
+
+
+
+
+XV
+
+THE SCHOOL-ROOM AND NURSERIES
+
+
+One of the most important and interesting problems in the planning and
+decoration of a house is that which has to do with the arrangement of
+the children's rooms.
+
+There is, of course, little opportunity for actual decoration in
+school-room or nursery; and it is only by stretching a point that a
+book dealing merely with the practical application of æsthetics may be
+made to include a chapter bordering on pedagogy. It must be
+remembered, however, that any application of principles presupposes
+some acquaintance with the principles themselves; and from this
+standpoint there is a certain relevance in studying the means by which
+the child's surroundings may be made to develop his sense of beauty.
+
+The room where the child's lessons are studied is, in more senses than
+one, that in which he receives his education. His whole view of what
+he is set to learn, and of the necessity and advantage of learning
+anything at all, is tinged, more often than people think, by the
+appearance of the room in which his studying is done. The æsthetic
+sensibilities wake early in some children, and these, if able to
+analyze their emotions, could testify to what suffering they have been
+subjected by the habit of sending to school-room and nurseries
+whatever furniture is too ugly or threadbare to be used in any other
+part of the house.
+
+In the minds of such children, curious and lasting associations are
+early established between the appearance of certain rooms and the
+daily occupations connected with them; and the aspect of the
+school-room too often aggravates instead of mitigating the weariness
+of lesson-learning.
+
+There are, of course, many children not naturally sensitive to
+artistic influences, and the parents of such children often think that
+no special care need be spent on their surroundings--a curious
+misconception of the purpose of all æsthetic training. To teach a
+child to appreciate any form of beauty is to develop his intelligence,
+and thereby to enlarge his capacity for wholesome enjoyment. It is,
+therefore, never idle to cultivate a child's taste; and those who have
+no pronounced natural bent toward the beautiful in any form need more
+guidance and encouragement than the child born with a sense of beauty.
+The latter will at most be momentarily offended by the sight of ugly
+objects; while they may forever blunt the taste and narrow the views
+of the child whose sluggish imagination needs the constant stimulus of
+beautiful surroundings.
+
+If art is really a factor in civilization, it seems obvious that the
+feeling for beauty needs as careful cultivation as the other civic
+virtues. To teach a child to distinguish between a good and a bad
+painting, a well or an ill-modelled statue, need not hinder his growth
+in other directions, and will at least develop those habits of
+observation and comparison that are the base of all sound judgments.
+It is in this sense that the study of art is of service to those who
+have no special aptitude for any of its forms: its indirect action in
+shaping æsthetic criteria constitutes its chief value as an element of
+culture.
+
+The habit of regarding "art" as a thing apart from life is fatal to
+the development of taste. Parents may conscientiously send their
+children to galleries and museums, but unless the child can find some
+point of contact between its own surroundings and the contents of the
+galleries, the interest excited by the pictures and statues will be
+short-lived and ineffectual. Children are not reached by abstract
+ideas, and a picture hanging on a museum wall is little better than an
+abstraction to the child's vivid but restricted imagination. Besides,
+if the home surroundings are tasteless, the unawakened sense of form
+will not be roused by a hurried walk through a museum. The child's
+mind must be prepared by daily lessons in beauty to understand the
+masterpieces of art. A child brought up on foolish story-books could
+hardly be expected to enjoy _The Knight's Tale_ or the _Morte
+d'Arthur_ without some slight initiation into the nature and meaning
+of good literature; and to pass from a house full of ugly furniture,
+badly designed wall-papers and worthless knick-knacks to a hurried
+contemplation of the Venus of Milo or of a model of the Parthenon is
+not likely to produce the desired results.
+
+The daily intercourse with poor pictures, trashy "ornaments," and
+badly designed furniture may, indeed, be fittingly compared with a
+mental diet of silly and ungrammatical story-books. Most parents
+nowadays recognize the harmfulness of such a _régime_, and are careful
+to feed their children on more stimulating fare. Skilful compilers
+have placed Mallory and Chaucer, Cervantes and Froissart, within reach
+of the childish understanding, thus laying the foundations for a
+lasting appreciation of good literature. No greater service can be
+rendered to children than in teaching them to know the best and to
+want it; but while this is now generally conceded with regard to
+books, the child's eager eyes are left to fare as best they may on
+chromos from the illustrated papers and on carefully hoarded rubbish
+from the Christmas tree.
+
+The mention of the Christmas tree suggests another obstacle to the
+early development of taste. Many children, besides being surrounded by
+ugly furniture and bad pictures, are overwhelmed at Christmas, and on
+every other anniversary, by presents not always selected with a view
+to the formation of taste. The question of presents is one of the most
+embarrassing problems in the artistic education of children. As long
+as they are in the toy age no great harm is done: it is when they are
+considered old enough to appreciate "something pretty for their rooms"
+that the season of danger begins. Parents themselves are often the
+worst offenders in this respect, and the sooner they begin to give
+their children presents which, if not beautiful, are at least useful,
+the sooner will the example be followed by relatives and friends. The
+selection of such presents, while it might necessitate a little more
+trouble, need not lead to greater expense. Good things do not always
+cost more than bad. A good print may often be bought for the same
+price as a poor one, and the money spent on a china "ornament," in the
+shape of a yellow Leghorn hat with a kitten climbing out of it, would
+probably purchase a good reproduction of one of the Tanagra
+statuettes, a plaster cast of some French or Italian bust, or one of
+Cantagalli's copies of the Robbia bas-reliefs--any of which would
+reveal a world of unsuspected beauty to many a child imprisoned in a
+circle of _articles de Paris_.
+
+The children of the rich are usually the worst sufferers in such
+cases, since the presents received by those whose parents and
+relations are not "well off" have the saving merit of usefulness. It
+is the superfluous gimcrack--the "ornament"--which is most
+objectionable, and the more expensive such articles are the more
+likely are they to do harm. Rich children suffer from the quantity as
+well as the quality of the presents they receive. Appetite is
+surfeited, curiosity blunted, by the mass of offerings poured in with
+every anniversary. It would be better if, in such cases, friends and
+family could unite in giving to each child one thing worth having--a
+good edition, a first-state etching or engraving, or some like object
+fitted to give pleasure at the time and lasting enjoyment through
+life. Parents often make the mistake of thinking that such presents
+are too "serious"--that children do not care for good bindings, fine
+engravings, or reproductions of sculpture. As a matter of fact,
+children are quick to appreciate beauty when pointed out and explained
+to them, and an intelligent child feels peculiar pride in being the
+owner of some object which grown-up people would be glad to possess.
+If the selection of such presents is made with a reasonable regard for
+the child's tastes and understanding--if the book chosen is a good
+edition, well bound, of the _Morte d'Arthur_ or of _Chaucer_--if the
+print represents some Tuscan Nativity, with a joyous dance of angels
+on the thatched roof, or a group of splendid horsemen and strange
+animals from the wondrous fairy-tale of the Riccardi chapel--the
+present will give as much immediate pleasure as a "juvenile" book or
+picture, while its intrinsic beauty and significance may become
+important factors in the child's æsthetic development. The possession
+of something valuable, that may not be knocked about, but must be
+handled with care and restored to its place after being looked at,
+will also cultivate in the child that habit of carefulness and order
+which may be defined as good manners toward inanimate objects.
+
+Children suffer not only from the number of presents they receive, but
+from that over-crowding of modern rooms that so often makes it
+necessary to use the school-room and nurseries as an outlet for the
+overflow of the house. To the children's quarters come one by one the
+countless objects "too good to throw away" but too ugly to be
+tolerated by grown-up eyes--the bead-work cushions that have
+"associations," the mildewed Landseer prints of foaming, dying
+animals, the sheep-faced Madonna and Apostles in bituminous draperies,
+commemorating a paternal visit to Rome in the days when people bought
+copies of the "Old Masters."
+
+Those who wish to train their children's taste must resolutely clear
+the school-room of all such stumbling-blocks. Ugly furniture cannot
+always be replaced; but it is at least possible to remove unsuitable
+pictures and knick-knacks.
+
+It is essential that the school-room should be cheerful. Dark colors,
+besides necessitating the use of much artificial light, are depressing
+to children and consequently out of place in the school-room: white
+woodwork, and walls tinted in some bright color, form the best
+background for both work and play.
+
+Perhaps the most interesting way of decorating the school-room is that
+which might be described as the rotation system. To carry out this
+plan--which requires the coöperation of the children's teacher--the
+walls must be tinted in some light color, such as turquoise-blue or
+pale green, and cleared of all miscellaneous adornments. These should
+then be replaced by a few carefully-chosen prints, photographs and
+plaster casts, representing objects connected with the children's
+studies. Let it, for instance, be supposed that the studies in hand
+include natural history, botany, and the history of France and England
+during the sixteenth century. These subjects might be respectively
+illustrated by some of the clever Japanese outline drawings of plants
+and animals, by Holbein's portrait of Henry VIII, Clouet's of Charles
+IX and of Elizabeth of Austria, Dürer's etchings of Luther and
+Erasmus, and views of some of the principal buildings erected in
+France and England during the sixteenth century.
+
+The prints and casts shown at one time should be sufficiently
+inexpensive and few in number to be changed as the child's lessons
+proceed, thus forming a kind of continuous commentary upon the various
+branches of study.
+
+This plan of course necessitates more trouble and expense than the
+ordinary one of giving to the walls of the school-room a permanent
+decoration: an arrangement which may also be made interesting and
+suggestive, if the child's requirements are considered. When casts and
+pictures are intended to remain in place, it is a good idea to choose
+them at the outset with a view to the course of studies likely to be
+followed. In this way, each object may serve in turn to illustrate
+some phase of history or art: even this plan will be found to have a
+vivifying effect upon the dry bones of "lessons."
+
+In a room decorated in this fashion, the prints or photographs
+selected might represent the foremost examples of Greek, Gothic,
+Renaissance and eighteenth-century architecture, together with several
+famous paintings of different periods and schools; sculpture being
+illustrated by casts of the Disk-thrower, of one of Robbia's friezes
+of child-musicians, of Donatello's Saint George, and Pigalle's "Child
+with the Bird."
+
+Parents who do not care to plan the adornment of the school-room on
+such definite lines should at least be careful to choose appropriate
+casts and pictures. It is generally conceded that nothing painful
+should be put before a child's eyes; but the deleterious effects of
+namby-pamby prettiness are too often disregarded. Anything "sweet" is
+considered appropriate for the school-room or nursery; whereas it is
+essential to the child's artistic training that only the sweetness
+which proceeds _de forte_ should be held up for admiration. It is easy
+to find among the world's masterpieces many pictures interesting to
+children. Vandyck's "Children of Charles I"; Bronzino's solemn
+portraits of Medici babies; Drouais' picture of the Comte d'Artois
+holding his little sister on the back of a goat; the wan little
+princes of Velasquez; the ruddy beggar-boys of Murillo--these are but
+a few of the subjects that at once suggest themselves. Then, again,
+there are the wonder-books of those greatest of all story-tellers, the
+Italian fresco-painters--Benozzo Gozzoli, Pinturicchio,
+Carpaccio--incorrigible gossips every one, lingering over the minor
+episodes and trivial details of their stories with the desultory
+slowness dear to childish listeners. In sculpture, the range of choice
+is no less extended. The choristers of Robbia, the lean little St.
+Johns of Donatello and his school--Verrocchio's fierce young David,
+and the Capitol "Boy with the Goose"--these may alternate with
+fragments of the Parthenon frieze, busts of great men, and studies of
+animals, from the Assyrian lions to those of Canova and Barye.
+
+Above all, the walls should not be overcrowded. The importance of
+preserving in the school-room bare wall-spaces of uniform tint has
+hitherto been little considered; but teachers are beginning to
+understand the value of these spaces in communicating to the child's
+brain a sense of repose which diminishes mental and physical
+restlessness.
+
+The furniture of the school-room should of course be plain and
+substantial. Well-designed furniture of this kind is seldom made by
+modern manufacturers, and those who can afford the slight extra
+expense should commission a good cabinet-maker to reproduce some of
+the simple models which may be found in the manuals of old French and
+English designers. It is of special importance to provide a large,
+solid writing-table: children are too often subjected to the needless
+constraint and fatigue of writing at narrow unsteady desks, too small
+to hold even the books in use during the lesson.
+
+A well-designed bookcase with glass doors is a valuable factor in the
+training of children. It teaches a respect for books by showing that
+they are thought worthy of care; and a child is less likely to knock
+about and damage a book which must be taken from and restored to such
+a bookcase, than one which, after being used, is thrust back on an
+open shelf. Children's books, if they have any literary value, should
+be bound in some bright-colored morocco: dingy backs of calf or black
+cloth are not likely to attract the youthful eye, and the better a
+book is bound the more carefully it will be handled. Even
+lesson-books, when they become shabby, should have a covering of some
+bright-colored cloth stitched over the boards.
+
+The general rules laid down for the decoration of the school-room may,
+with some obvious modifications, be applied to the treatment of
+nursery and of children's rooms. These, like the school-room, should
+have painted walls and a floor of hard wood with a removable rug or a
+square of matting. In a house containing both school-room and nursery,
+the decoration of the latter room will of course be adapted to the
+tastes of the younger children. Mothers often say, in answer to
+suggestions as to the decoration of the nursery, that little children
+"like something bright"--as though this precluded every form of art
+above the newspaper chromo and the Christmas card! It is easy to
+produce an effect of brightness by means of white wood-work and walls
+hung with good colored prints, with large photographs of old Flemish
+or Italian pictures,--say, for example, Bellini's baby-angels playing
+on musical instruments,--and with a few of the Japanese plant and
+animal drawings already referred to. All these subjects would interest
+and amuse even very young children; and there is no reason why a gay
+Japanese screen, with boldly drawn birds and flowers, should not
+afford as much entertainment as one composed of a heterogeneous
+collection of Christmas cards, chromos, and story-book pictures, put
+together without any attempt at color-harmony or composition.
+
+Children's rooms should be as free as possible from all superfluous
+draperies. The windows may be hung with either shades or curtains: it
+is needless to have both. If curtains are preferred, they should be of
+chintz, or of some washable cotton or linen. The reproductions of the
+old _toiles de Jouy_, with pictures from Æsop and La Fontaine, or from
+some familiar myth or story, are specially suited to children's rooms;
+while another source of interest and amusement may be provided by
+facing the fireplace with blue and white Dutch tiles representing the
+finding of Moses, the story of David and Goliath, or some such
+familiar episode.
+
+As children grow older, and are allotted separate bedrooms, these
+should be furnished and decorated on the same principles and with the
+same care as the school-room. Pieces of furniture for these bedrooms
+would make far more suitable and interesting presents than the costly
+odds and ends so often given without definite intention. In the
+arrangement of the child's own room the expression of individual taste
+should be encouraged and the child allowed to choose the pictures and
+casts with which the walls are hung. The responsibility of such
+selection will do much to develop the incipient faculties of
+observation and comparison.
+
+To sum up, then: the child's visible surroundings form the basis of
+the best, because of the most unconscious, cultivation: and not of
+æsthetic cultivation only, since, as has been pointed out, the
+development of any artistic taste, if the child's general training is
+of the right sort, indirectly broadens the whole view of life.
+
+
+
+
+XVI
+
+BRIC-À-BRAC
+
+
+It is perhaps not uninstructive to note that we have no English word
+to describe the class of household ornaments which French speech has
+provided with at least three designations, each indicating a delicate
+and almost imperceptible gradation of quality. In place of bric-à-brac,
+bibelots, _objets d'art_, we have only knick-knacks--defined by
+Stormonth as "articles of small value."
+
+This definition of the knick-knack fairly indicates the general level
+of our artistic competence. It has already been said that cheapness is
+not necessarily synonymous with trashiness; but hitherto this
+assertion has been made with regard to furniture and to the other
+necessary appointments of the house. With knick-knacks the case is
+different. An artistic age will of course produce any number of
+inexpensive trifles fit to become, like the Tanagra figurines, the
+museum treasures of later centuries; but it is hardly necessary to
+point out that modern shop-windows are not overflowing with such
+immortal toys. The few objects of art produced in the present day are
+the work of distinguished artists. Even allowing for what Symonds
+calls the "vicissitudes of taste," it seems improbable that our
+commercial knick-knack will ever be classed as a work of art.
+
+ [Illustration: _PLATE LVI._
+
+ BRONZE ANDIRON. VENETIAN SCHOOL.
+ XVI CENTURY.]
+
+It is clear that the weary man must have a chair to sit on, the
+hungry man a table to dine at; nor would the most sensitive judgment
+condemn him for buying ugly ones, were no others to be had; but
+objects of art are a counsel of perfection. It is quite possible to go
+without them; and the proof is that many do go without them who
+honestly think to possess them in abundance. This is said, not with
+any intention of turning to ridicule the natural desire to "make a
+room look pretty," but merely with the purpose of inquiring whether
+such an object is ever furthered by the indiscriminate amassing of
+"ornaments." Decorators know how much the simplicity and dignity of a
+good room are diminished by crowding it with useless trifles. Their
+absence improves even bad rooms, or makes them at least less
+multitudinously bad. It is surprising to note how the removal of an
+accumulation of knick-knacks will free the architectural lines and
+restore the furniture to its rightful relation with the walls.
+
+Though a room must depend for its main beauty on design and furniture,
+it is obvious that there are many details of luxurious living not
+included in these essentials. In what, then, shall the ornamentation
+of rooms consist? Supposing walls and furniture to be satisfactory,
+how put the minor touches that give to a room the charm of
+completeness? To arrive at an answer, one must first consider the
+different kinds of minor embellishment. These may be divided into two
+classes: the object of art _per se_, such as the bust, the picture, or
+the vase; and, on the other hand, those articles, useful in
+themselves,--lamps, clocks, fire-screens, bookbindings,
+candelabra,--which art has only to touch to make them the best
+ornaments any room can contain. In past times such articles took the
+place of bibelots. Few purely ornamental objects were to be seen, save
+in the cabinets of collectors; but when Botticelli decorated the
+panels of linen chests, and Cellini chiselled book-clasps and
+drinking-cups, there could be no thought of the vicious distinction
+between the useful and the beautiful. One of the first obligations of
+art is to make all useful things beautiful: were this neglected
+principle applied to the manufacture of household accessories, the
+modern room would have no need of knick-knacks.
+
+Before proceeding further, it is necessary to know what constitutes an
+object of art. It was said at the outset that, though cheapness and
+trashiness are not always synonymous, they are apt to be so in the
+case of the modern knick-knack. To buy, and even to make, it may cost
+a great deal of money; but artistically it is cheap, if not worthless;
+and too often its artistic value is in inverse ratio to its price. The
+one-dollar china pug is less harmful than an expensive onyx lamp-stand
+with moulded bronze mountings dipped in liquid gilding. It is one of
+the misfortunes of the present time that the most preposterously bad
+things often possess the powerful allurement of being expensive. One
+might think it an advantage that they are not within every one's
+reach; but, as a matter of fact, it is their very unattainableness
+which, by making them more desirable, leads to the production of that
+worst curse of modern civilization--cheap copies of costly horrors.
+
+An ornament is of course not an object of art because it is
+expensive--though it must be owned that objects of art are seldom
+cheap. Good workmanship, as distinct from designing, almost always
+commands a higher price than bad; and good artistic workmanship having
+become so rare that there is practically no increase in the existing
+quantity of objects of art, it is evident that these are more likely
+to grow than to diminish in value. Still, as has been said, costliness
+is no test of merit in an age when large prices are paid for bad
+things. Perhaps the most convenient way of defining the real object of
+art is to describe it as _any ornamental object which adequately
+expresses an artistic conception_. This definition at least clears the
+ground of the mass of showy rubbish forming the stock-in-trade of the
+average "antiquity" dealer.
+
+Good objects of art give to a room its crowning touch of distinction.
+Their intrinsic beauty is hardly more valuable than their suggestion
+of a mellower civilization--of days when rich men were patrons of "the
+arts of elegance," and when collecting beautiful objects was one of
+the obligations of a noble leisure. The qualities implied in the
+ownership of such bibelots are the mark of their unattainableness. The
+man who wishes to possess objects of art must have not only the means
+to acquire them, but the skill to choose them--a skill made up of
+cultivation and judgment, combined with that feeling for beauty that
+no amount of study can give, but that study alone can quicken and
+render profitable.
+
+Only time and experience can acquaint one with those minor
+peculiarities marking the successive "manners" of a master, or even
+with the technical _nuances_ which at once enable the collector to
+affix a date to his Sèvres or to his maiolica. Such knowledge is
+acquired at the cost of great pains and of frequent mistakes; but no
+one should venture to buy works of art who cannot at least draw such
+obvious distinctions as those between old and new Saxe, between an old
+Italian and a modern French bronze, or between Chinese peach-bloom
+porcelain of the Khang-hi period and the Japanese imitations to be
+found in every "Oriental emporium."
+
+Supposing the amateur to have acquired this proficiency, he is still
+apt to buy too many things, or things out of proportion with the rooms
+for which they are intended. The scoffers at style--those who assume
+that to conform to any known laws of decoration is to sink one's
+individuality--often justify their view by the assertion that it is
+ridiculous to be tied down, in the choice of bibelots, to any given
+period or manner--as though Mazarin's great collection had comprised
+only seventeenth-century works of art, or the Colonnas, the Gonzagas,
+and the Malatestas had drawn all their treasures from contemporary
+sources! As a matter of fact, the great amateurs of the past were
+never fettered by such absurd restrictions. All famous patrons of art
+have encouraged the talent of their day; but the passion for
+collecting antiquities is at least as old as the Roman Empire, and
+Græco-Roman sculptors had to make archaistic statues to please the
+popular fancy, just as our artists paint pre-Raphaelite pictures to
+attract the disciples of Ruskin and William Morris. Since the Roman
+Empire, there has probably been no period when a taste for the best of
+all ages did not exist.[36] Julius II, while Michel Angelo and Raphael
+worked under his orders, was gathering antiques for the Belvedere
+_cortile_; under Louis XIV, Greek marbles, Roman bronzes, cabinets of
+Chinese lacquer and tables of Florentine mosaic were mingled without
+thought of discord against Lebrun's tapestries or Bérain's arabesques;
+and Marie-Antoinette's collection united Oriental porcelains with
+goldsmiths' work of the Italian Renaissance.
+
+Taste attaches but two conditions to the use of objects of art: that
+they shall be in scale with the room, and that the room shall not be
+overcrowded with them. There are two ways of being in scale: there is
+the scale of proportion, and what might be called the scale of
+appropriateness. The former is a matter of actual measurement, while
+the latter is regulated solely by the nicer standard of good taste.
+Even in the matter of actual measurement, the niceties of proportion
+are not always clear to an unpractised eye. It is easy to see that the
+Ludovisi Juno would be out of scale in a boudoir, but the discrepancy,
+in diminishing, naturally becomes less obvious. Again, a vase or a
+bust may not be out of scale with the wall-space behind it, but may
+appear to crush the furniture upon which it stands; and since
+everything a room contains should be regarded as a factor in its
+general composition, the relation of bric-à-brac to furniture is no
+less to be studied than the relation of bric-à-brac to wall-spaces.
+Much of course depends upon the effect intended; and this can be
+greatly modified by careful adjustment of the contents of the room. A
+ceiling may be made to look less high by the use of wide, low pieces
+of furniture, with massive busts and vases; while a low-studded room
+may be heightened by tall, narrow commodes and cabinets, with objects
+of art upon the same general lines.
+
+It is of no less importance to observe the scale of appropriateness. A
+bronze Pallas Athene or a cowled mediæval _pleureur_ would be
+obviously out of harmony with the spirit of a boudoir; while the
+delicate graces of old Saxe or Chelsea would become futile in library
+or study.
+
+Another kind of appropriateness must be considered in the relation of
+objects of art to each other: not only must they be in scale as
+regards character and dimensions, but also--and this, though more
+important, is perhaps less often considered--as regards quality. The
+habit of mixing good, bad, and indifferent in furniture is often
+excused by necessity: people must use what they have. But there is no
+necessity for having bad bric-à-brac. Trashy "ornaments" do not make a
+room more comfortable; as a general rule, they distinctly diminish its
+comfort; and they have the further disadvantage of destroying the
+effect of any good piece of work. Vulgarity is always noisier than
+good breeding, and it is instructive to note how a modern commercial
+bronze will "talk down" a delicate Renaissance statuette or bust, and
+a piece of Deck or Minton china efface the color-values of
+blue-and-white or the soft tints of old Sèvres. Even those who set
+down a preference for old furniture as an affectation will hardly
+maintain that new knick-knacks are as good as old bibelots; but only
+those who have some slight acquaintance with the subject know how wide
+is the distance, in conception and execution, between the old object
+of art and its unworthy successor. Yet the explanation is simple. In
+former times, as the greatest painters occupied themselves with
+wall-decoration, so the greatest sculptors and modellers produced the
+delicate statuettes and the incomparable bronze mountings for vases
+and furniture adorning the apartments of their day. A glance into the
+window of the average furniture-shop probably convinces the most
+unobservant that modern bronze mountings are not usually designed by
+great artists; and there is the same change in the methods of
+execution. The bronze formerly chiselled is now moulded; the iron once
+wrought is cast; the patina given to bronze by a chemical process
+making it a part of the texture of the metal is now simply applied as
+a surface wash; and this deterioration in processes has done more than
+anything else to vulgarize modern ornament.
+
+It may be argued that even in the golden age of art few could have
+walls decorated by great painters, or furniture-mountings modelled by
+great sculptors; but it is here that the superiority of the old method
+is shown. Below the great painter and sculptor came the trained
+designer who, formed in the same school as his superiors, did not
+attempt a poor copy of their masterpieces, but did the same kind of
+work on simpler lines; just as below the skilled artificer stood the
+plain artisan whose work was executed more rudely, but by the same
+genuine processes. This explains the supposed affectation of those who
+"like things just because they are old." Old bric-à-brac and furniture
+are, indeed, almost always worthy of liking, since they are made on
+good lines by a good process.
+
+Two causes connected with the change in processes have contributed to
+the debasement of bibelots: the substitution of machine for hand-work
+has made possible the unlimited reproduction of works of art; and the
+resulting demand for cheap knick-knacks has given employment to a
+multitude of untrained designers having nothing in common with the
+_virtuoso_ of former times.
+
+It is an open question how much the mere possibility of unlimited
+reproduction detracts from the intrinsic value of an object of art. To
+the art-lover, as distinguished from the collector, uniqueness _per
+se_ can give no value to an inartistic object; but the distinction,
+the personal quality, of a beautiful object is certainly enhanced when
+it is known to be alone of its kind--as in the case of the old bronzes
+made _à cire perdue_. It must, however, be noted that in some
+cases--as in that of bronze-casting--the method which permits
+reproduction is distinctly inferior to that used when but one object
+is to be produced.
+
+In writing on objects of art, it is difficult to escape the charge of
+saying on one page that reproductions are objectionable, and on the
+next that they are better than poor "originals." The United States
+customs laws have drawn a rough distinction between an original work
+and its reproductions, defining the former as a work of art and the
+latter as articles of commerce; but it does not follow that an article
+of commerce may not be an adequate representation of a work of art.
+The technical differences incidental to the various forms of
+reproduction make any general conclusion impossible. In the case of
+bronzes, for instance, it has been pointed out that the _cire perdue_
+process is superior to that by means of which reproductions may be
+made; nor is this the only cause of inferiority in bronze
+reproductions. The nature of bronze-casting makes it needful that the
+final touches should be given to bust or statue after it emerges from
+the mould. Upon these touches, given by the master's chisel, the
+expressiveness and significance of the work chiefly depend; and
+multiplied reproductions, in lacking this individual stamp, must lack
+precisely that which distinguishes the work of art from the commercial
+article.
+
+Perhaps the safest general rule is to say that the less the
+reproduction suggests an attempt at artistic interpretation,--the more
+literal and mechanical is its rendering of the original,--the better
+it fulfils its purpose. Thus, plaster-casts of sculpture are more
+satisfactory than bronze or marble copies; and a good photograph of a
+painting is superior to the average reproduction in oils or
+water-color.
+
+The deterioration in gilding is one of the most striking examples of
+the modern disregard of quality and execution. In former times gilding
+was regarded as one of the crowning touches of magnificence in
+decoration, was little used except where great splendor of effect was
+desired, and was then applied by means of a difficult and costly
+process. To-day, after a period of reaction during which all gilding
+was avoided, it is again unsparingly used, under the mistaken
+impression that it is one of the chief characteristics of the French
+styles now once more in demand. The result is a plague of liquid
+gilding. Even in France, where good gilding is still done, the great
+demand for cheap gilt furniture and ornaments has led to the general
+use of the inferior process. The prevalence of liquid gilding, and the
+application of gold to furniture and decoration not adapted to such
+treatment, doubtless explain the aversion of many persons to any use
+of gilding in decoration.
+
+In former times the expense of good gilding was no obstacle to its
+use, since it was employed only in gala rooms, where the whole
+treatment was on the same scale of costliness: it would never have
+occurred to the owner of an average-sized house to drench his walls
+and furniture in gilding, since the excessive use of gold in
+decoration was held to be quite unsuited to such a purpose. Nothing
+more surely preserves any form of ornament from vulgarization than a
+general sense of fitness.
+
+Much of the beauty and propriety of old decoration was due to the fact
+that the merit of a work of art was held to consist, not in substance,
+but in design and execution. It was never thought that a badly
+designed bust or vase could be saved from mediocrity by being made of
+an expensive material. Suitability of substance always enhances a work
+of art; mere costliness never. The chryselephantine Zeus of Olympia
+was doubtless admirably suited to the splendor of its surroundings;
+but in a different setting it would have been as beautiful in marble.
+In plastic art everything depends on form and execution, and the
+skilful handling of a substance deliberately chosen for its
+resistance (where another might have been used with equal fitness) is
+rather a _tour de force_ than an artistic achievement.
+
+These last generalizations are intended to show, not only that there
+is an intrinsic value in almost all old bibelots, but also that the
+general excellence of design and execution in past times has handed
+down to us many unimportant trifles in the way of furniture and
+household appliances worthy of being regarded as minor objects of art.
+In Italy especially, where every artisan seems to have had the gift of
+the _plasticatore_ in his finger-tips, and no substance was thought
+too poor to express a good design, there are still to be found many
+bits of old workmanship--clocks, _appliques_, terra-cottas, and carved
+picture-frames with touches of gilding--that may be characterized in
+the terms applied by the builder of Buckingham House to his collection
+of pictures:--"Some good, _none disagreeable_." Still, no accumulation
+of such trifles, even where none is disagreeable, will give to a room
+the same distinction as the presence of a few really fine works of
+art. Any one who has the patience to put up with that look of bareness
+so displeasing to some will do better to buy each year one superior
+piece rather than a dozen of middling quality.
+
+Even the buyer who need consult only his own pleasure must remember
+that his very freedom from the ordinary restrictions lays him open to
+temptation. It is no longer likely that any collector will be
+embarrassed by a superfluity of treasures; but he may put too many
+things into one room, and no amount of individual merit in the objects
+themselves will, from the decorator's standpoint, quite warrant this
+mistake. Any work of art, regardless of its intrinsic merit, must
+justify its presence in a room by being _more valuable than the space
+it occupies_--more valuable, that is, to the general scheme of
+decoration.
+
+Those who call this view arbitrary or pedantic should consider, first,
+the importance of plain surfaces in decoration, and secondly the
+tendency of overcrowding to minimize the effect of each separate
+object, however striking in itself. Eye and mind are limited in their
+receptivity to a certain number of simultaneous impressions, and the
+Oriental habit of displaying only one or two objects of art at a time
+shows a more delicate sense of these limitations than the Western
+passion for multiplying effects.
+
+To sum up, then, a room should depend for its adornment on general
+harmony of parts, and on the artistic quality of such necessities as
+lamps, screens, bindings, and furniture. Whoever goes beyond these
+essentials should limit himself in the choice of ornaments to the
+"labors of the master-artist's hand."
+
+FOOTNOTE:
+
+[36] "A little study would probably show that the Ptolemaic era in
+Egypt was a renaissance of the Theban age, in architecture as in other
+respects, while the golden period of Augustus in Rome was largely a
+Greek revival. Perhaps it would even be discovered that all ages of
+healthy human prosperity are more or less revivals, and have been
+marked by a retrospective tendency." _The Architecture of the
+Renaissance in Italy_, by W. J. Anderson. London, Batsford, 1896.
+
+
+
+
+CONCLUSION
+
+
+In the preceding pages an attempt has been made to show that in the
+treatment of rooms we have passed from the golden age of architecture
+to the gilded age of decoration.
+
+Any argument in support of a special claim necessitates certain
+apparent injustices, sets up certain provisional limitations, and can
+therefore be judged with fairness only by those who make due allowance
+for these conditions. In the discussion of æsthetics such impartiality
+can seldom be expected. Not unnaturally, people resent any attempt to
+dogmatize on matters so generally thought to lie within the domain of
+individual judgment. Many hold that in questions of taste _Gefühl ist
+alles_; while those who believe that beyond the oscillations of
+fashion certain fixed laws may be discerned have as yet agreed upon no
+formula defining their belief. In short, our civilization has not yet
+developed any artistic creed so generally recognized that it may be
+invoked on both sides of an argument without risk of misunderstanding.
+
+This is true at least of those forms of art that minister only to the
+æsthetic sense. With architecture and its allied branches the case is
+different. Here beauty depends on fitness, and the practical
+requirements of life are the ultimate test of fitness.
+
+If, therefore, it can be proved that the old practice was based upon a
+clearer perception of these requirements than is shown by modern
+decorators, it may be claimed not unreasonably that the old methods
+are better than the new. It seems, however, that the distinction
+between the various offices of art is no longer clearly recognized.
+The merit of house-decoration is now seldom measured by the standard
+of practical fitness; and those who would set up such a standard are
+suspected of proclaiming individual preferences under the guise of
+general principles.
+
+In this book, an endeavor has been made to draw no conclusion
+unwarranted by the premises; but whatever may be thought of the
+soundness of some of the deductions, they must be regarded, not as a
+criticism of individual work, but simply of certain tendencies in
+modern architecture. It must be remembered, too, that the book is
+merely a sketch, intended to indicate the lines along which further
+study may profitably advance.
+
+It may seem inconsequent that an elementary work should include much
+apparently unimportant detail. To pass in a single chapter from a
+discussion of abstract architectural laws to the combination of colors
+in a bedroom carpet seems to show lack of plan; yet the transition is
+logically justified. In the composition of a whole there is no
+negligible quantity: if the decoration of a room is planned on certain
+definite principles, whatever contributes line or color becomes a
+factor in the composition. The relation of proportion to decoration is
+like that of anatomy to sculpture: underneath are the everlasting
+laws. It was the recognition of this principle that kept the work of
+the old architect-decorators (for the two were one) free from the
+superfluous, free from the intemperate accumulation that marks so many
+modern rooms. Where each detail had its determinate part, no
+superficial accessories were needed to make up a whole: a great
+draughtsman represents with a few strokes what lesser artists can
+express only by a multiplicity of lines.
+
+The supreme excellence is simplicity. Moderation, fitness,
+relevance--these are the qualities that give permanence to the work of
+the great architects. _Tout ce qui n'est pas nécessaire est nuisible._
+There is a sense in which works of art may be said to endure by virtue
+of that which is left out of them, and it is this "tact of omission"
+that characterizes the master-hand.
+
+Modern civilization has been called a varnished barbarism: a
+definition that might well be applied to the superficial graces of
+much modern decoration. Only a return to architectural principles can
+raise the decoration of houses to the level of the past. Vasari said
+of the Farnesina palace that it was not built, but really born--_non
+murato ma veramente nato_; and this phrase is but the expression of an
+ever-present sense--the sense of interrelation of parts, of unity of
+the whole.
+
+There is no absolute perfection, there is no communicable ideal; but
+much that is empiric, much that is confused and extravagant, will give
+way before the application of principles based on common sense and
+regulated by the laws of harmony and proportion.
+
+
+
+
+INDEX
+
+
+ Adam, ceiling ornaments of, 93
+
+ Andirons, 84
+
+ _Appliques_, in hall and staircase, 119
+
+ Araldi's ceiling in the convent of St. Paul, Parma, 97
+
+ Architrave of door, see Doorway;
+ of mantel-piece, 82
+
+ Arm-chair, modern, 128
+
+ _Armoires_, old French and Italian, 117
+
+ Ashby, Castle, Inigo Jones's stairs in, 111
+
+ Aviler, d', his description of dining-room fountain, 158
+
+
+ Ball-room, 137;
+ in Italy, 138;
+ Louis XIV, 139;
+ lighting of, 140;
+ chairs, 140
+
+ Barry, Madame du, dining-room of, 156
+
+ Bath-room, 172;
+ in Pitti Palace, 172
+
+ Bedroom, development of, 162;
+ Renaissance, 162;
+ Louis XIV, 162;
+ XVIII-century, 163;
+ cotton hangings in, 164;
+ suite, plan of, 169;
+ children's, 182
+
+ Bedstead, history of, 163
+
+ Belvédère, at Versailles, frescoes in, 42
+
+ Bérain, ceiling arabesques of, 98
+
+ _Bergère_, origin of, 7;
+ design of, 128
+
+ Bernini, his staircase in the Vatican, 108
+
+ Bindings, decorative value of, 146
+
+ Blinds, 73
+
+ Blois, spiral stairs in court-yard of château, 109;
+ _cabinet_ of Catherine de' Medici, 123
+
+ Blondel, on doors, 58;
+ on fireplaces, 74
+
+ Book-cases, medieval, 145;
+ in Catherine de' Medici's _cabinet_, 145;
+ in France in the XVII century, 146;
+ built into the wall, 147;
+ in England, 149;
+ modern, 148
+
+ Books in the middle ages, 145;
+ in the Renaissance, 146
+
+ Bosse, Abraham, engravings of Louis XIII interiors, 69;
+ examples of state bedrooms, 123
+
+ Boudoir, 130;
+ modern decoration of, 170
+
+ Bramante, his use of the mezzanin floor, 5
+
+ Breakfast-room, 160
+
+ Bric-à-brac, definition of, 184;
+ knowledge of, 187;
+ superiority of old over new, 190
+
+ Burckhardt, on medieval house-planning, 107, note
+
+ Byfield, G., his stairs at Hurlingham, 111
+
+
+ _Cabinet_, Italian origin of, 123;
+ used in French Renaissance houses, 123;
+ of Catherine de' Medici, book-cases in, 145
+
+ Campbell's _Vitruvius Britannicus_, example of Palladian manner, 4;
+ of English house-planning, 135
+
+ Carpets, in general color-scheme, 29;
+ choice of, 100;
+ _Savonnerie_, 100;
+ designs of, 101;
+ stair-carpets, 102, 118;
+ hall-carpets, 118
+
+ Caserta, staircase in royal palace, 108
+
+ Casino del Grotto, near Mantua, frescoes in, 42;
+ ceilings in, 98
+
+ Casts in vestibule, 105;
+ in hall, 118;
+ in school-room, 178
+
+ Ceilings, 89;
+ timbered, 90;
+ in France and England, 91;
+ Elizabethan, 92;
+ Louis XIII, 92;
+ Louis XV, 92;
+ Louis XVI, 93;
+ Adam, 93, 96;
+ objections to wooden, 94;
+ modern treatment of, 95;
+ frescoed, 97
+
+ Chambord, staircase at, 109
+
+ _Chambre de parade_, 123
+
+ Chandeliers, 140, 159
+
+ Chanteloup, library of, 149
+
+ Chantilly, stair-rail at, 113
+
+ Chevening, Inigo Jones's stairs at, 111
+
+ Cheverny, fireplace at, 74
+
+ Chinese art, influence of, on stuff patterns, 166
+
+ Chippendale's designs for grates, 81
+
+ "Colonial" style, the, 81
+
+ Color, use of, in decoration, 28;
+ predominance of one color in each room, 28;
+ color-schemes, 29
+
+ Cornices, interior, Durand on, 94
+
+ Cortile, Italian, modern adaptation of, 117
+
+ Coutant d'Ivry's stair-rail in the Palais Royal, 113
+
+ Curtains, mediæval and Renaissance, 69;
+ in XVII and XVIII centuries, 70;
+ muslin, 72
+
+
+ Dado, the, 37;
+ sometimes omitted in lobbies and corridors, 38
+
+ Decoration and furniture, harmony between, 13;
+ individuality in decoration, 17;
+ graduated scheme of, 24
+
+ "Den," furniture of, 152;
+ decoration of, 153
+
+ Dining-chairs, mediæval, 156;
+ XVII century, 159;
+ XVIII century, 159
+
+ Dining-room, origin of, 155;
+ in France, 154;
+ in England, 155;
+ furniture of, 156;
+ French, XVIII century, 157;
+ fountains in, 158;
+ decoration of modern, 160;
+ lighting of, 160;
+ state, 160;
+ heating of, 161
+
+ Dining-table, mediæval, 156;
+ modern, 161
+
+ Donowell, J., his stairs at West Wycombe, 111
+
+ Doors, 48;
+ sliding, origin of, 49;
+ double, 49;
+ mediæval, 51;
+ in palace of Urbino, 52;
+ in Italy, 52-54;
+ locks and hinges, 55;
+ in the Hôtels de Rohan, de Soubise, and de Toulouse, 56;
+ glass doors, 57;
+ treatment in England, 57;
+ mahogany, 58;
+ panelling, principles of, 59;
+ veneering, 61;
+ concealed doors, 61;
+ entrance-door, 103
+
+ Doorway, proper dimensions of, 51, 60;
+ treatment of, in Italy, 52;
+ in France, 55;
+ in England, 57
+
+ Drawing-room, in modern town houses, 20;
+ evolution of, in England, 122;
+ in France, 122;
+ origin of modern, 124;
+ treatment of, in England and America, 124;
+ furniture of, 127
+
+ Dressing-room, 171
+
+ _Duchesse_, 130
+
+ Durand, J. L. N., on originality in architecture, 10;
+ on interior cornices, 94
+
+
+ Easton Neston, use of panel-pictures at, 46
+
+ Entrance, treatment of, 103;
+ entrance-door, 103
+
+
+ Fenders, 85
+
+ Fire-backs, 80
+
+ Fire-boards, 86
+
+ Fireplaces, 74;
+ mediæval, construction of, 75;
+ in Italy, 75;
+ in France, 76;
+ lining of, 80;
+ American, 81;
+ accessories of, 84
+
+ Fire-screens, 86
+
+ Floors, 89;
+ of brick or stone, 99;
+ marble and mosaic, in Italy, 99;
+ parquet, 99;
+ of vestibule, 104;
+ of ball-room, 140
+
+ Fontana, his staircase in the royal palace, Naples, 108
+
+ Fountains in dining-rooms, 158
+
+ Fresco-painting, in wall-decoration, 41;
+ examples of, in Italy and France, 42;
+ in ceiling-decoration, 97;
+ in Italy, 97;
+ in France, 98;
+ in Italian gala rooms, 139
+
+ Furniture, in the middle ages, 7;
+ furniture and decoration, harmony between, 25;
+ modern English and American, 26;
+
+ XVIII century, in France and England, 27;
+ in vestibule, 105;
+ in hall, 117;
+ in _salon de compagnie_, 125;
+ in drawing-room, 127, 128;
+ English, XVIII century, 129;
+ in dining-room, 156;
+ in bedroom, 171;
+ in school-room, 180
+
+
+ Gabriel, influence of, on ornamental detail, 56;
+ on ceilings, 93;
+ on stair-rails, 114
+
+ Gala rooms, 134;
+ uses of, 135;
+ in Italy, 136
+
+ Gallery, 137
+
+ Genoa, royal palace, doors in, 54
+
+ Gibbons, Grinling, carvings for panel-pictures, 46
+
+ Gilding, deterioration of, 192
+
+ Giulio Romano's frescoes in the Palazzo del T, 136
+
+ _Grand'salle_, mediæval, 110
+
+ Grates, 81
+
+ Gwilt, his definition of _staircase_, 106
+
+
+ Hall, 106;
+ old English, 110;
+ uses of, 115;
+ modern treatment of, 115;
+ decoration of, 117;
+ furniture, 117;
+ floor of, 118;
+ lighting of, 119;
+ prints and pictures in, 119
+
+ Holkham, over-mantels at, 81
+
+ Hôtel de Rohan, doors in, 56
+
+ de Soubise, doors in, 56
+
+ de Toulouse, doors in, 56
+
+ Houghton Hall, doors in, 57, note
+
+ House, Carlton, stair-rail in, 114
+
+ Devonshire, stair-rail in, 114
+
+ Norfolk, stair-rail in, 114
+
+
+ Individuality in decoration, 17
+
+ Isabella of Este's apartment at Mantua, doorways in, 52
+
+
+ Jones, Inigo, his introduction of Palladian manner in England, 4,
+ note;
+ influence on ceiling-decoration, 92;
+ on plan of English hall, 110;
+ his stairs at Castle Ashby, 111;
+ at Chevening, 111
+
+ Juvara, his staircase in the Palazzo Madama, Turin, 108
+
+
+ Lambrequin, origin of, 71
+
+ Lamour, Jean, his wrought-iron work at Nancy, 112
+
+ Lantern in vestibule, 105
+
+ Laurano, Luciano da, palace of Urbino built by, 6
+
+ Lebrun, door-locks in _Galerie d'Apollon_ designed by, 55
+
+ Le Riche, frescoes of, in Belvédère, Versailles, 42
+
+ Library, 145;
+ in the university at Nancy, 149;
+ of Louis XVI, at Versailles, 149;
+ of Chanteloup, 149;
+ modern, decoration of, 150
+
+ _Lit de parade_, 122
+
+ _Lit de repos_, 130
+
+ Longhi, frescoes of, in Palazzo Sina, Venice, 143
+
+ Louis XIII, windows, 69;
+ ceilings, 92
+
+ Louis XIV, modern house-furnishing dates from his reign, 8;
+ style, characteristics of, 14;
+ window-shutters, 69;
+ influence on French, 77;
+ mantels, 78;
+ ceilings, 98;
+ stair-rails, 112;
+ ball-rooms, 140
+
+ Louis XV style, characteristics of, 13;
+ doors, 56;
+ ceilings, 92;
+ wrought-iron work, 112;
+ stair-rails, 113
+
+ Louis XVI style, characteristics of, 12;
+ Gabriel's influence on, 56, 93;
+ doors, 57;
+ ceilings, 93;
+ stair-rails, 114
+
+ Luciennes, Madame du Barry's dining-room at, 157
+
+
+ Mantegna's ceiling, palace of Mantua, 97
+
+ Mantel-pieces, Italian Renaissance, 77;
+ French Renaissance, 77;
+ Louis XIV, 78;
+ XVIII century, 79;
+ American, 82;
+ facing of, 83
+
+ Mantua, doorways in palace, 52, 54;
+ Mantegna's ceiling in, 97;
+ _cabinet_ of Isabella of Este, 123
+
+ Mario dei Fiori, 139
+
+ Massimi alle Colonne, palace of, in Rome, 6
+
+ Mezzanin, origin of, 5; treatment of, 6
+
+ Ministère de la Marine, Paris, door in, 61
+
+ Mirrors, use of, in over-mantel, 79;
+ painted, in Borghese Palace, Rome, 139;
+ in ball-rooms, 141
+
+ Morelli's staircase in Palazzo Braschi, Rome, 108
+
+ Morning-room, 132
+
+ Mullions, use of, 66
+
+ Music-room, 142;
+ at Remiremont, 143
+
+ Music-stand, 144
+
+ Music-stool, 144
+
+
+ Nancy, wrought-iron work at, 112;
+ library in the university, 149
+
+ Naples, staircase in royal palace, 108
+
+ Niches, in hall and staircase, 117
+
+ Nursery, 181
+
+
+ Oberkampf, inventor of color-printing on cotton, 166
+
+ Object of art, definition of, 187;
+ reproductions of, 191
+
+ Openings, placing and proportion of, 23;
+ lines of, carried up to ceiling, 37, 52, 65, 74;
+ treatment of, in rocaille style, 56
+
+ Orders, use of, in wall-decoration, 36;
+ application to doorways in Italy, 53;
+ in France, 54;
+ in England, 57;
+ in ball-rooms, 139
+
+ Originality in art, 9;
+ J. L. N. Durand on, 10
+
+ Over-doors, mediæval treatment of, 52;
+ in Italy, 53;
+ in France, 55;
+ Louis XVI, 57
+
+ Over-mantels, Renaissance, 76;
+ use of mirror in, 79;
+ XVIII-century treatment, 79;
+ in England, 81
+
+
+ Palais Royal, stair-rail in, 113
+
+ Palazzo Borghese, Rome, painted mirrors in, 139
+
+ Braschi, Rome, staircase in, 108
+
+ Gondi, Florence, stairs in, 108
+
+ Labia, Venice, frescoes in, 136
+
+ Madama, Turin, staircase in, 108
+
+ Massimi alle Colonne, Rome, date of, 6
+
+ Piccolomini, at Pienza, staircase in, 108, note
+
+ Pitti, Florence, bath-room in, 172
+
+ Reale, Caserta, staircase in, 108
+
+ Reale, Naples, staircase in, 108
+
+ Riccardi, staircase in, 108, note
+
+ Sina, Venice, frescoes in, 143
+
+ del T, Mantua, frescoes in, 136
+
+ Palladian window, 67
+
+ Panelling, in Italy and north of the Alps, 40;
+ wood, stone and stucco, 40, 42;
+ subdivisions of, 43
+
+ Parma, Araldi's ceiling in convent of St. Paul, 97;
+ rocaille stoves in museum, 121
+
+ Pavia, Certosa of, doorways in, 52
+
+ _Perroquets_, 141
+
+ Perugia, ceiling in the Sala del Cambio, 97
+
+ Perugino's ceiling in the Sala del Cambio, Perugia, 97
+
+ Peruzzi, Baldassare, his use of the mezzanin, 5
+
+ Piano, design of, 143
+
+ Pictures, proper background for, 45;
+ mode of hanging, 46;
+ in hall, 119;
+ in dining-room, 160;
+ in school-room, 180
+
+ Picture-frames, selection of, 45
+
+ Plan of house in relation to decoration, 23
+
+ Plate-glass in windows, 67
+
+ Pompadour, Madame de, dining-room fountain of, 158
+
+ Pompeii, wall-frescoes of, 41
+
+ Portière, use of, 59
+
+ Presses, old English, 117
+
+ Prints in hall, 120;
+ in school-room, 180
+
+ Privacy, modern indifference to, 22
+
+ Proportion, definition of, 31;
+ Isaac Ware on, 32
+
+ Pyne's _Royal Residences_, examples of pictures set in panels, 46
+
+
+ Rambouillet, Madame de, her influence on house-planning, 8
+
+ Raphael, ceilings of, 97
+
+ Remiremont, music-room at, 143
+
+ Renaissance, characteristics of domestic architecture, 4;
+ doors, 52;
+ window-curtains, 69;
+ mantels, 76, 77;
+ ceilings, 90-92;
+ French architects of, 109
+
+ Rennes, Palais de Justice, carved wooden ceilings, 89
+
+ Rugs, Oriental, 29, 100;
+ modern European, 101
+
+
+ _Salon à l'Italienne_, see Saloon
+
+ _Salon de compagnie_, origin and use of, 123, 125;
+ decoration and furniture of, 125;
+ lighting of, 126
+
+ _Salon de famille_, origin and use of, 123
+
+ Saloon, adaptation of, in England by Inigo Jones, 111;
+ introduction in France, 123;
+ uses in Italy, 136;
+ at Vaux-le-Vicomte, 137
+
+ School-room, 172;
+ decoration of, 178
+
+ Screen in Tudor halls, 110
+
+ Shobden Court, stairs in, 111
+
+ Shutters, interior decoration of, 69;
+ at Vaux-le-Vicomte, 69;
+ in rooms of Mesdames de France, Versailles, 69;
+ purpose of, 72
+
+ Sideboard, mediæval, 156;
+ in France, 157
+
+ Smoking-room, 151
+
+ Stairs, 106;
+ development of, in Italy, 107;
+ in the Palladian period, 108;
+ in the XVII and XVIII centuries, 108;
+ spiral, 109;
+ in hall, in England, 111;
+ construction of, in Italy, 112;
+ in France, 112
+
+ Stair-carpets, 118
+
+ Staircase, meaning of term, 106;
+ walls of, 117;
+ in simple houses, 119;
+ lighting of, 119
+
+ Stair-rails, in Italy and France, 112;
+ Louis XIV and XV, 113;
+ Louis XVI and Empire, 113;
+ Tudor and Elizabethan, 114;
+ Palladian, in England, 114
+
+ Stoves, use of, in hall, 120;
+ examples of old stoves, 121;
+ in dining-room, 161
+
+ Stucco, use of, in decoration, 40;
+ panelling, in Italy, 40;
+ in ceilings, 90;
+ in Elizabethan ceilings, 92;
+ combined with painting, 97
+
+ Stuff hangings, 44
+
+ Stupinigi, frescoes at, 42;
+ over-mantels at, 80
+
+ Styles, essence of, 11;
+ conformity to, 13
+
+ Symmetry, definition of, 33;
+ advantages of, 34
+
+
+ Tapestry, use of, in northern Europe, 39;
+ its subordination to architectural lines of room, 39
+
+ Tiepolo, frescoes of, in the Villa Valmarana, 42;
+ in the Palazzo Labia, 136
+
+ Titian's "Presentation of the Virgin," doorway in, 53
+
+ _Toiles de Jouy_, 166
+
+ Trianon-sous-Bois, fountains in banqueting-gallery, 158
+
+
+ Udine, Giovanni da, ceilings of, in collaboration with Raphael, 97
+
+ Urbino, ducal palace of, 6;
+ doors in, 52;
+ fireplace in, 74;
+ _cabinet_ of Isabella of Este, 123
+
+
+ Vanvitelli's staircase at Caserta, 108
+
+ Vatican, Bernini's staircase in, 108
+
+ Vault, the Roman, influence of, on ceilings, 191
+
+ Vaux-le-Vicomte, interior shutters at, 69;
+ saloon at, 137
+
+ Versailles, frescoes in Belvédère, 42;
+ windows in rooms of Mesdames de France, 68;
+ shutters in same, 69;
+ library of Louis XVI, 148
+
+ Vestibule, 104;
+ furniture of, 105;
+ lighting of, 105;
+ absence of, in English house-planning, 110
+
+ Villa, Italian, chief features of, 4, note
+
+ Villa Giacomelli, at Maser, over-mantel in, 76
+ Madama, in Rome, ceiling of loggia, 97
+ Rotonda, near Vicenza, saloon in, 136
+ Valmarana, near Vicenza, frescoes in, 42
+ Vertemati, near Chiavenna, over-mantel in, 76;
+ carved wooden ceiling in, 89
+
+ Viollet-le-Duc, on doorways, 52, note;
+ on mediæval house-planning, 109
+
+ Voguë, Hôtel, at Dijon, 7
+
+
+ Wall-decoration, 38
+
+ Wall-papers, 44
+
+ Walls, 31
+
+ Ware, Isaac, on proportion, 32;
+ on sliding doors, 49;
+ his definition of staircase, 106
+
+ West Wycombe, Donowell's stairs at, 111
+
+ Windows, decorative value of, 64;
+ dimensions of, 65;
+ plate-glass in, 67;
+ French or casement, 68;
+ sash, 68;
+ curtains, 69, 70;
+ shutters, 69, 72;
+ lambrequin, 71;
+ muslin curtains, 72;
+ blinds, 73
+
+ Wood-box, 86
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Decoration of Houses, by
+Edith Wharton and Ogden Codman Jr.
+
+*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 40367 ***
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