The Art of Interior Decoration | Page 9

what you once found cold. As if
by magic, a white, cream, beige or grey room may be transformed into
a smiling bower, teeming with personality, a room where wit and
wisdom are spontaneously let loose.
If your taste be for chintzes and figured silks, take it as a safe rule, that
given a material with a light background, it should be the same in tone
as your walls; the idea being that by this method you get the full
decorative value of the pattern on chintz or silk.

Figured materials can increase or diminish the size of a room, open up
vistas, push back your walls, or block the vision. For this reason it is
unsafe to buy material before trying the effect of it in its destined
abode.
Remember that the matter of background is of the greatest importance
when arranging your furniture and ornaments. See that your piano is so
placed that the pianist has an unbroken background, of wall, tapestry, a
large piece of rare old sills, or a mirror. Clyde Fitch, past-master at
interior decoration, placed his piano in front of broad windows, across
which at night were drawn crimson damask curtains. Some of us will
never forget Geraldine Farrar, as she sat against that background
wearing a dull, clinging blue-green gown, going over the score,--from
memory,--of "Salomé."
The aim is to make the performer at the piano the object of interest,
therefore place no diverting objects, such as pictures or ornaments, on a
line with the listener's eye, except as a vague background.
There can be no more becoming setting for a group of people dining by
candle or electric light, than walls panelled with dark wood to the
ceiling, or a high wainscoting.
A beautiful sitting-room, not to be forgotten, had light violet walls,
dull-gold frames on the furniture which was covered in deep-cream
brocades, bits of old purple velvets and violet silks on the tables, under
large bowls of Benares bronze filled with violets. The grand piano was
protected by a piece of old brocade in faded yellows, and our hostess, a
well-known singer, usually wore a simple Florentine tea-gown of soft
violet velvet, which together with the lighter violet walls, set off her
fair skin and black hair to beautiful advantage.
Put a figured, many-coloured sofa cushion behind the head of a pretty
woman, and if the dominating colour is becoming to her, she is still
pretty, but change it to a solid black, purple or dull-gold and see how
instantly the degree of her beauty is enhanced by being thrown into
relief.

PLATE VII
Gives attractive corner by a window, the heavy silk brocade curtains of
which are drawn. A standard electric lamp lights the desk, both
modern-painted pieces, and the beautiful old flower picture, black
background with a profusion of colours in lovely soft tones, is framed
by a dull-gold moulding and gives immense distinction. The chair is
Venetian Louis XV, the same period as desk in style.
Not to be ignored in this picture is a tin scrap basket beautifully
proportioned and painted a vivid emerald green; a valuable addition a
note of cheerful colour. The desk and wooden standard of lamp are
painted a deep blue-plum colour, touched with gold, and the silk
curtains are soft mulberry, in two tones.
[Illustration: Corner of Room, Showing Painted Furniture, Antique and
Modern]
Study values--just why and how much any decorative article decorates,
and remember in furnishing a room, decorating a wall or dining-room
table, it is not the intrinsic value or individual beauty of any one article
which counts. Each picture on the wall, each piece of furniture, each bit
of silver, glass, china, linen or lace, each yard of chintz or silk, every
carpet or rug must be beautiful and effective in relation to the others
used, for the art of interior decoration lies in this subtle, or obvious,
relationship of furnishings.
We acknowledge as legitimate all schemes of interior decoration and
insist that what makes any scheme good or bad, successful, or
unsuccessful presuming a knowledge of the fundamentals of the art, is
the fact that it is planned in reference to the type of man or woman who
is to live in it.
A new note has been struck of late in the arranging of bizarre,
delightful rooms which on entering we pronounce "very amusing."
Original they certainly are, in colour combinations, tropical in the
impression they make,--or should we say Oriental?

They have come to us via Russia, Bakst, Munich and Martine of Paris.
Like Rheinhardt's staging of "Sumurun," because these blazing interiors
strike us at an unaccustomed angle, some are merely astonished, others
charmed as well. There are temperaments ideally set in these interiors,
and there are houses where they are in place. We cannot regard them