Furnishing the Home of Good Taste | Page 2

old highboy 249

Preface
To try to write a history of furniture in a fairly short space is almost as
hard as the square peg and round hole problem. No matter how one
tries, it will not fit. One has to leave out so much of importance, so
much of historic and artistic interest, so much of the life of the people
that helps to make the subject vivid, and has to take so much for
granted, that the task seems almost impossible. In spite of this I shall
try to give in the following pages a general but necessarily short review
of the field, hoping that it may help those wishing to furnish their
homes in some special period style. The average person cannot study
all the subject thoroughly, but it certainly adds interest to the problems
of one's own home to know something of how the great periods of
decoration grew one from another, how the influence of art in one
country made itself felt in the next, molding and changing taste and
educating the people to a higher sense of beauty.
It is the lack of general knowledge which makes it possible for
furniture built on amazingly bad lines to be sold masquerading under
the name of some great period. The customer soon becomes bewildered,
and, unless he has a decided taste of his own, is apt to get something
which will prove a white elephant on his hands. One must have some
standard of comparison, and the best and simplest way is to study the

great work of the past. To study its rise and climax rather than the
decline; to know the laws of its perfection so that one can recognize the
exaggeration which leads to degeneracy. This ebb and flow is most
interesting: the feeling the way at the beginning, ever growing surer
and surer until the high level of perfection is reached; and then the
desire to "gild the lily" leading to over-ornamentation, and so to decline.
However, the germ of good taste and the sense of truth and beauty is
never dead, and asserts itself slowly in a transition period, and then
once more one of the great periods of decoration is born.
There are several ways to study the subject, one of the pleasantest
naturally being travel, as the great museums, palaces, and private
collections of Europe offer the widest field. In this country, also, the
museums and many private collections are rich in treasures, and there
are many proud possessors of beautiful isolated pieces of furniture. If
one cannot see originals the libraries will come to the rescue with many
books showing research and a thorough knowledge and appreciation of
the beauty and importance of the subject in all its branches.
I have tried to give an outline, (which I hope the reader will care to
enlarge for himself), not from a collector's standpoint, but from the
standpoint of the modern home-maker, to help him furnish his house
consistently,--to try to spread the good word that period furnishing does
not necessitate great wealth, and that it is as easy and far more
interesting to furnish a house after good models, as to have it banal and
commonplace.
The first part of this little book is devoted to a short review of the great
periods, and the second part is an effort to help adapt them to modern
needs, with a few chapters added of general interest to the home-maker.
A short bibliography is also added, both to express my thanks and
indebtedness to many learned and delightful writers on this subject of
house furnishing in all its branches, and also as a help to others who
may wish to go more deeply into its different divisions than is possible
within the covers of a book.
I wish to thank the Editors of House and Garden and _The Woman's

Home Companion_ for kindly allowing me to reprint articles and
portions of articles which have appeared in their magazines.
I wish also to thank the owners of the different houses illustrated, and
Messrs. Trowbridge and Livingston, architects, for their kindness in
allowing me to use photographs.
Thanks are also due Messrs. Bergen & Orsenigo, Nahon & Company,
Tiffany Studios, Joseph Wild & Co. and the John Somma Co. for the
use of photographs to illustrate the reproduction of period furniture and
rugs of different types.

Egypt and Greece
The early history of art in all countries is naturally connected more
closely with architecture than with decoration, for architecture had to
be developed before the demand for decoration could come. But the
two have much in common. Noble architecture calls for noble
decoration. Decoration is one of the natural instincts of man, and from
the earliest records of his existence we find him