Principles of Decorative Design Part 8

1st. A roof is a means whereby the weather is kept out of a dwelling, and tiles afford a means whereby small pieces of material enable us to form a perfect covering to our houses of a weather-proof character. It is very absurd, then, to treat the roof of a cabinet, which is to stand in a room, as if it were an entire house, or an object which were to stand in a garden.

2nd. The windows in the roof, which in the case of a house let light into those rooms which are placed in this part of the building, and are formed in a particular manner so as the more perfectly to exclude rain, become simply stupid when placed in the roof of a cabinet.

These, together with the imitation tiled roof, degrade the work to a mere doll's house in appearance.

3rd. A panelled structure, which is the strongest and best structure, is ignored; hence strong metal bindings are necessary.

The painting of the work is highly interesting, and had it been more flatly treated, would then have been truthful, and would yet have lent the same interest to the cabinet that it now does, even if we consider the matter from a purely pictorial point of view.

Before we pa.s.s from a consideration of furniture and cabinet-work generally, we must notice a few points to which we have as yet merely referred, or which we have left altogether unnoticed. Thus we have to consider upholstery as applied to works of furniture, the materials employed as coverings for seats, and the nature of picture-frames and curtain-poles; we must also notice general errors in furniture, strictly so called.

When examining certain wardrobes and cabinets in the International Exhibition of 1862, I was forcibly impressed with the structural truth of one or two of these works. One especially commended itself to me as a fine structural work of cla.s.sic character. Just as I was expressing my admiration, the exhibitor threw open the doors of this well-formed wardrobe to show me its internal fittings, when, fancy my feelings at beholding the first door bearing with it, as it opened, the two pilasters that I conceived to be the supports of the somewhat heavy cornice above, and the other door bearing away the third support, and thus leaving the superinc.u.mbent ma.s.s resting on the thin sides of the structure only, while they appeared altogether unable to perform the duty imposed upon them. "Horrible! horrible!" was all I could exclaim.

Some of the most costly works of furniture shown by the French in the last Paris International Exhibition were not free from this defect; and this is strange, for to the rightly const.i.tuted mind this one defect is of such a grave character as to neutralise whatever pleasure might otherwise be derived from contemplating the work. We see a man, a genius perhaps--a man having qualities that all must admire; but he has one great vice--one sin which easily besets him. While the man has excellent and estimable qualities, we yet avoid him, for we see not the excellences but the vice. It is so with such works of furniture as those of which we have been speaking, for their defects are such as impress us more powerfully than their excellences.

Respecting these works of furniture, this should be said: they are more or less imitative of works of a debased art-period--of a period in which structural truth was utterly disregarded--yet this is no reason why we should copy the defects of our ancestors.

Infinitely worse than the works just spoken of, is falsely constructed Gothic furniture, where the very truthfulness of structure is openly set before us. Not long since I was staying with a client whose house is of Gothic style. Being about to furnish drawings for the decorations of this mansion, I was carefully noting the character of the architecture and of the furniture, which latter had been designed and manufactured expressly for the house by a large Yorkshire firm of cabinet-makers. The structure of the furniture appeared just, the proportions tolerably good, the wood honest, and the inlays judicious; but, can it be imagined, the whole was a mere series of frauds and shams--the cross-grain ends of what should be supports were attached to the fronts of drawers, pillars came away, and such falsity became apparent as I never before saw. How any person could possibly produce such furniture, be he ever so degraded, I cannot think. I have seen works that are bad, I have seen falsities in art, but I never before saw such falsity of structure and such uncalled-for deception as these works presented. The untrue is always offensive; but when a special effort is made at causing a lie to appear as truth, a double sense of disappointment is experienced when the untruthfulness is discovered.

In his work on "Household Taste," to which I have before alluded, Mr.

Eastlake objects, and I think very justly, to the character of an ordinary telescopic dining-table. He says: "Among the dining-room appointments, the table is an article of furniture which stands greatly in need of reform. It is generally made of planks of polished oak or mahogany laid upon an insecure framework of the same material, and supported by four gouty legs, ornamented by the turner with mouldings which look like inverted cups and saucers piled upon an attic bal.u.s.ter. I call the framework insecure, because I am describing what is commonly called a 'telescope' table, or one which can be pulled out to twice its usual length, and, by the addition of extra leaves in its middle, accommodate twice the usual number of diners.

Such a table cannot be soundly made in the same sense that ordinary furniture is sound; it must depend for its support on some contrivance which is not consistent with the material of which it is made. Few people would like to sit on a chair the legs of which slid in and out, and were fastened at the required height by a pin; there would be a sense of insecurity in the notion eminently unpleasant. You might put up with such an invention in camp, or on a sketching expedition, but to have it and use it under your own roof, instead of a strong and serviceable chair, would be absurd. Yet this is very much what we do in the case of the modern dining-room table. When it is extended it looks weak and untidy at the sides; when it is reduced to its shortest length the legs appear heavy and ill-proportioned. It is always liable to get out of order, and from the very nature of its construction must be an inartistic object. Why should such a table be made at all? A dining-room is a room to dine in. Whether there are few or many people seated for that purpose, the table might well be kept of a uniform length, and if s.p.a.ce is an object it is always possible to use in its stead two small tables, each on four legs. These might be placed end to end when dinner parties are given, and one of them would suffice for family use. A table of this kind might be solidly and stoutly framed, so as to last for ages, and become, as all furniture ought to become, an heirloom in the family. When a man builds himself a house on freehold land, he does not intend that it shall only last his lifetime; he bequeaths it in sound condition to posterity. We ought to be ashamed of furniture which is continually being replaced; at all events, we cannot possibly take any interest in such furniture. In former days, when the principles of good joinery were really understood, the legs of such a large table as that of the dining-room would have been made of a very different form from the lumpy, pear-shaped things of modern use."

In nearly all these remarks I agree with Mr. Eastlake, and especially in his remark that, owing to the very nature of its construction, a modern dining-table must be an inartistic object. No work can be satisfactory in which any portions of the true supporting structure or frame are drawn apart; and this occurs to a marked degree in this table, as is shown in Mr. Eastlake's ill.u.s.tration, which we here copy (Fig. 43).

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 43.]

Falsities of structure, although not so glaring as that of the telescopic dining-table, are everywhere met with in our shops, and, curious as it may appear, the great majority of the works offered to the public are not only false in structure, but are utterly offensive to good taste in every way, and are formed almost exclusively of wood cut across the grain, which secures to the article the maximum amount of weakness. Figs. 44, 45, 46, and 47 are examples of utterly bad furniture.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 44.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 45.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 46.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 47.]

Another falsity in furniture is veneering--a practice which should be wholly abandoned. Simple honesty is preferable to false show in all cases; truthfulness in utterance is always to be desired. It was customary at one time to veneer almost every work of furniture, and even to place the grain of the veneer in a manner totally at variance with the true structure of the framework which it covered. This was a method of making works, which might in their unfinished state be satisfactory, appear when finished as most unsatisfactory objects.

Since this time much progress has been made in a knowledge of truthful structure and of truthful expression, yet this method of giving a false surface by means of veneer is not wholly abandoned as despicable and false.

A few months back I had occasion to visit a cabinet warehouse in Lancashire, and the owner called my attention to the fine grain of some old English oak, and remarked that certain pieces of furniture were of solid wood. Upon investigation, however, I discovered that while the furniture in question was made throughout of oak, the bulk of the structure was of common wainscoting, and the surface was veneered with English oak. I confess that I would much rather have had the furniture without its false exterior, and daily my love for fine grain in wood gets less. I think that this arises from the fact that strong grain in wood takes from the "unity" of the work into which it is formed, and tends to break it up into parts, by rendering every member conspicuous. What is wanted in a work of furniture, before all other considerations, is a fine general form--a harmony of all parts--so that no one member usurps a primary place--and this it is almost impossible to achieve if a wood is employed having a strongly marked grain.

With us a room is considered as almost unfurnished if the windows are not hung with some kind of drapery. The original object of this drapery was that of keeping out a draught of air, which found its way through the imperfectly fitting windows; and the ant.i.type of our window-hangings was a simple curtain, formed of a material suitable to achieve the purpose sought. Such a curtain was legitimate and desirable, and would contrast strangely with the elaborate festooning and quadrupled curtains of our present windows. We daily see yards of valuable material, arranged in ma.s.sive and absurd folds, shutting out that light which is necessary to our health and well-being; a pair of heavy stuff curtains and a pair of lace curtains being hung at each window, each curtain consisting of a sufficient amount of material to more than cover the window of itself. An excess of drapery is always vulgar, while a little drapery usefully and judiciously employed is pleasant.

Many windows that are well made, and thus keep out all currents of air, need no curtains. If the window mouldings are of an architectural character, and are coloured much darker than the wall, so as to become an obvious frame to the window, and thus do for the window what a picture-frame does for a picture, no curtains will be required. I have recently had a wonderfully striking ill.u.s.tration of this. Two adjoining rooms are alike in their architecture; one is decorated, and has the window cas.e.m.e.nt of such colours as strongly contrast, while they are yet harmonious, with the wall. Before the room was decorated, and the windows were thus treated, a general light colour prevailed, both on the wood-work and on the walls of the room, and curtains were hung at the windows in the usual way. With the altered decorations, the windows became so effective that I at once saw the undesirability of re-hanging the curtains, and yet not one of all my friends has observed that there are no curtains to the windows; while if the curtains are removed from the adjoining room, where the window-frames are as light as the walls, the first question asked is, "Where are your curtains?"

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 48.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 49.]

Curtains should be hung on a simple and obvious pole (Fig. 48). All means of hiding this pole are foolish and useless. This pole need not be very thick, and is better formed of wood than of metal, for then the rings to which the curtains are attached pa.s.s along almost noiselessly. The ends of the pole may be of metal, but I prefer simple b.a.l.l.s of wood. The pole may be grooved, and any little enrichments may be introduced into these grooves, providing the carving does not come to the surface, and thus touch the rings, which by their motion would injure it. Whatever is used in the way of enrichment should be of simple character, for the height at which the curtain pole is placed would render fine work altogether ineffective.

As to upholstery, I would say, never indulge in an excess. A wood frame should appear in every work of furniture, as in the examples we have given. Sofas are now made as though they were feather beds; they are so soft that you sink into them, and become uncomfortably warm by merely resting upon them, and their gouty forms are relieved only by a few inches of wood, which appear as legs. Stuffing should be employed only as a means of rendering a properly constructed seat comfortably soft. If it goes beyond this it is vulgar and objectionable. Spring stuffing is not to be altogether commended; a good old-fashioned hair-stuffed seat is more desirable, as it will endure when springs have perished. As to the materials with which seats may be covered I can say little, for they are many. Hair cloth, although very durable, is altogether inartistic in its effect. Nothing is better than leather for dining-room chairs; Utrecht velvet, either plain or embossed, looks well on library chairs; silk and satin damasks, rep, plain cloth, and many other fabrics are appropriate to drawing-room furniture. Chintz I am not fond of as a chair covering, and in a bed-room I would rather have chairs with plain wooden seats than with cushions covered with this glazed material.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 50.]

With a mere remark upon picture-frames I will finish this chapter.

Picture-frames are generally elaborately carved mouldings, or are simple mouldings covered with ornaments, which, whether carved or formed of putty, are overlaid with gold leaf; they are, indeed, highly ornamented gilt mouldings. I much prefer a well-formed, yet somewhat simple, black polished moulding, on the interior of which runs a gold bead (Fig. 49). A fanciful yet good picture-frame was figured in the _Building News_ of September 7th, 1866, which we now repeat (Fig.

50).

CHAPTER IV.

DECORATION OF BUILDINGS.

DIVISION I.--GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS--CEILINGS.

Having considered furniture, the formation of which requires a knowledge of construction, or of what we may term structural art, we pa.s.s on to notice principles involved in the decoration of surfaces, or in "surface decoration," as it is usually called. We commence by considering how rooms should be decorated; yet, in so doing, we are met at the very outset with a great difficulty, as the nature of the decoration of a room should be determined by the character of its architecture. My difficulty rests here. How am I to tell you what is the just decoration for a room, when the suitability of the decoration is often dependent upon even structural and ornamental details; and when, in all cases, the character of the decoration should be in harmony with the character of the architecture? Broadly, if a building is in the Gothic style, all that it contains in the way of decoration, and of furniture also, should be Gothic. If the building is Greek, the decorations and furniture should be Greek. If the building is Italian, all its decorations and furniture should be Italian, and so on.

But there are further requirements. Each term that I have now employed, as expressive of a style of architecture, is more or less generic in character, and is therefore too broad for general use. What is usually termed Gothic architecture, is a group of styles having common origin and resemblances, known to the architect as the Semi-Norman or Transition style, which occurred in the twelfth century under Henry II. (it was at this time that the pointed arch was first employed). The Early English, which was developed in the end of the twelfth and early part of the thirteenth century, under Richard I., John, and Henry III.; the Decorated, which occurred at the end of the thirteenth, and early portion of the fourteenth century, under Edward I., Edward II., and Edward III.; the Perpendicular, which occurred at the latter part of the fourteenth, and through the greater portion of the fifteenth century, under Richard II., Henry IV., V., and VI., Edward IV. and V., and Richard III.; and, lastly, the Tudor, which occurred at the end of the fifteenth, and the beginning of the sixteenth century, under Henry VII. and Henry VIII. All these styles are popularly spoken of as one, and are expressed by the one term--Gothic. It is so also, to an extent, with the Greek, Roman, and Italian styles, for each of these appears in various modifications of character, but into such details we will not enter: it must suffice to notice that the character of the decoration must be not only broadly in the style of the architecture of the building which it is intended to beautify, but it must be similar in nature to the ornament produced at precisely the same date as the architecture which has been employed for the building.

It must not be supposed that I am an advocate of reproducing works, or even styles of architecture, such as were created in times gone by, for I am not. The peoples of past ages carefully sought to ascertain their wants--the wants resulting from climate--the wants resulting from the nature of their religion--the wants resulting from social arrangements--the wants imposed by the building material at command.

We, on the contrary, look at a hundred old buildings, and without considering our wants, as differing from those of our forefathers, take a bit from one and a bit from another, or we reproduce one almost as it stands, and thus we bungle on, instead of seeking to raise such buildings as are in all respects suited to our modern requirements.

Things are, however, much better in this respect than they were. Bold men are dealing with the Gothic style in its various forms. Scott, Burgess, Street, and many others are venturing to alter it; and thus, while it is losing old characteristics, and is acquiring new elements, it is already a.s.suming a character which has n.o.bility of expression, truthfulness of structure, and suitability to our special requirements. In time to come, further changes will doubtless be made; and thus the style which arose as an imitation of the past will have become new, through constantly departing from the original type, and as constantly adopting new elements.

I have said that the decoration of a building should be brought about by the employment of such ornament as was, in time past, a.s.sociated with the particular form of architecture employed in the building to be decorated, if a precisely similar form of architecture previously existed. Let not the ornament, however, be a mere servile imitation of what has gone before, but let the designer study the ornament of bygone ages till he understands and _feels_ its spirit, and then let him strive to produce new forms and new combinations in the spirit of the ornament of the past.

This must also be carefully noted--that the ornament of a particular period does not consist merely of the forms employed in the architecture, drawn in colour on the wall, or the ceiling, as the case may be. The particular form of ornament used in a.s.sociation with some forms of Gothic architecture was very different in character from what we might expect from the nature of the architecture itself, and did not to any extent consist of flatly-treated crockets, gable ends, trefoils, cinque-foils, etc. The ornament of the past must be studied in its purity, and not from those wretched attempts at the production of Gothic decoration which we often see.

In what we may call the typical English house of the present day there is really no architecture, and if such a building is to be decorated it is almost legitimate to employ any style of ornamentation. In such a case I should choose a style which has no very marked features--which is not strongly Greek, or strongly Gothic, or strongly Italian; and if there is the necessary ability, I should say try and produce ornaments having novelty of character, and yet showing your knowledge of the good qualities of all styles that are past. If this is attempted, care must be exercised in order to avoid getting a mere combination of elements from various styles as one ornament. Nothing can be worse than to see a bit of Greek, a fragment of Egyptian, an Alhambraic scroll, a Gothic flower, and an Italian husk a.s.sociated together as one ornament; unless this were done advisedly and in order to meet a very special want, such an ornamental composition would be detestable. What I recommend is the production of new forms; but the new composition may have the vigour of the best Gothic ornament, the severity of Egyptian, the intricacy of the Persian, the gorgeousness of the Alhambra, and so on, only it must not imitate in detail the various styles of the past.

Now as to the decoration of a room. If one part only can be decorated, let that one part be the ceiling. Nothing appears to me more strange than that our ceilings, which can be properly seen, are usually white in middle-cla.s.s houses, while the walls, which are always in part hidden, and even the floor, on which we tread, should have colour and pattern applied to them; and of this I am certain, that, considered from a decorative point of view, our ordinary treatment is wrong.

We glory in a clear blue sky overhead, and we speak of the sky as increasing in beauty as it becomes deeper and deeper in tint. Thus the depth of the tint of the Italian sky is familiar to us all. Why, then, make our ceilings white? I often ask this question, and am told that the whiteness renders the ceiling almost invisible; hence it is preferred. This idea is very absurd; first, because blue is the most ethereal and most distant of all colours (see Chap. II., page 33); and, second, do we not build a house with the view of procuring shelter? hence why do we seek to realise the feeling that we are without a covering over our heads? We only like a white ceiling because we have been accustomed to such from infancy, and because we have been taught to regard a clean white ceiling as all that is to be desired. I knew a Yorkshire lady who, upon being asked by her husband whether she would like the drawing-room ceiling decorated, replied that she thought not, as she could not then have it re-whitewashed every year. The idea was clean certainly. Blue, I have said, is ethereal in character; it is so, and may become exceedingly so if of medium depth and of a grey hue; hence, if a mere atmospheric effect was sought, it would be desirable that this colour be used on the ceiling rather than white. But, as we have just said, invisibility of the ceiling is absurd, as it is our protection from the weather.

Further, the ceiling may become an object of great beauty, and it can be seen as a whole. Why then neglect the opportunity of arranging a beautiful object when there is no reason to the contrary? We like a beautiful coloured vase, or, if we do not, we can have it whitewashed, or even dispense with it altogether. We like beautiful walls, or we would have them whitewashed also; indeed, we like our surroundings generally beautiful. Why not, then, have beautiful ceilings, especially as they can be seen complete, while the wall is in part hidden by furniture and pictures?

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 51.]

I will suppose that we have an ordinary room to deal with. First, take away the wretched plaster ornament in the centre of the ceiling, for it is sure to be bad. There is not one such ornament out of a thousand that can be so treated as to make the ceiling look as well as it would do without it. Now place all over the ceiling a flat painted or stencilled pattern, a pattern which repeats equally in all directions (as Fig. 51), and let this pattern be in blue (of any depth) and white, or in blue (of any depth) and cream-colour, and it is sure to look well (the blue being the ground, and the cream-colour or white the ornament).

Simple patterns in cream-colour on blue ground, but having a black outline, also look well (Fig. 52); and these might be prepared in paper, and hung on the ceiling as common paper-hangings, if cheapness is essential. Gold ornaments on a deep blue ground, with black outline, also look rich and effective. These are all, however, simple treatments, for any amount of colour may be used on a ceiling, provided the colours are employed in very small ma.s.ses, and perfectly mingled, so that the effect produced is that of a rich coloured bloom (see Chap. II., page 46). A ceiling should be beautiful, and should also be manifest; but if it must be somewhat indistinct, in order that the caprices of the ignorant be humoured, let the pattern be in middle-tint or pale blue and white only.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 52.]

I like to see the ceiling of a room covered all over with a suitable pattern, but I do not at all object to a large central ornament only, or to a centre ornament and corners; especially if the cornice is heavy, so as to give compensating weight to the margin. I have recently designed and seen carried out one or two centre ornaments for drawing-rooms, which ornaments were twenty-one feet in diameter. A centre ornament, if properly treated, may be very large without looking heavy; it may, indeed, extend at least two-thirds of the way from the centre to the margin of the ceiling. I do not speak of plaster ornaments, but of flat decorations.