The Washington herald. [volume], March 29, 1914, EASTER FASHION EDITION, Page 10, Image 36

About The Washington herald. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1906-1939

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THE WASHmGTONHERAIJ). SXJNDAY,Ml4RCH 29; 1914.
.10
"THE HOUSE
GOOD ORDER"
IT
EDITOBIAL NOTE: The folloirinr
Interesting article oo "The "Home la
Good Order" forma the Introductory
chapter to Mis Eude De WolTi not
able new book en.tte development of
tie modern bouse. It U doubtful If
a more belpfal tod Interesting cbip
u ter on tnls subject has been produced
than the one that follows. Ulsa De
Wolfe bai won an International repo
tatloa In the field of house decora
tlon. 8he will be recalled a; an act
reu of aplendld ability and alnee leaT
lnt the atate In 1903 haa achieved ; not
able success In her new calilne.
Amonr her accompUinmenti are the
decoration of the Colony Club, of
Hew York: the home of J. Olden Ar
'laour. In Chlcaco; California home of
William Crocker and many otter.
The .following article goes to the foun
dation aplrlt of home bullalnr. and
may be read with profit by the build
er of homei from the tambleit to the
mott pretentious. It la reprinted here
throora the courtesy of the Century
Company. New Tork. publishers of
Viu De Wolfe's book.
I know nothing more significant
than the awakening of men and wom
en throughout our country to the de
sire to improve their houses. Call
it what you will awakening, develop
ment, American Renaissance it is a
most startling and promising condi
tion of affairs.
It is no longer possible, even to
gecple of only faintly aesthetic tastes,
to buy chairs merely to sit upon or a
dock merely that jt should tell the
time. Home-makers are determined
to have their houses, outside and in,
correct according to the best stand
ards. What do we mean by the best
standards? Certainly not those of
the useless, overcharged house of the
average American millionaire, who
builds and furnishes his home with a
hopeless disregard of tradition. We
must accept the standards that the
artists and the architects accept, the
standards that have come to us from
those exceedingly rational people, our
ancestors.
Our ancestors built for stability and
use, and so their simple houses were
excellent examples of architecture.
Their spacious, uncrowded interiors
were usually beautiful Houses and
furniture fulfilled their uses, and if
an object fulfills its mission the
chances are that it is beautiful.
It is all very well to plan our ideal
house or apartment, our individual
castle in Spain, but it isn't necessary
to live among intolerable furnishings
just because we cannot realize our
castle. There never was a house so
bad that it couldn't be made over into
something worth while. We shall all
be very much b?ppier when we learn
to transform the things we have into
a semblance of our ideal.
How, then, may we go about ac
complishing our ideal?
By letting it gol
By forgetting this vaguely pleasing
dream, this evidence of our snug van
ity, and making ourselves ready for a
new ideal.
By considering the body of material
from which it is good to choose when
ve have a house to decorate.
By studying the development of the
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modern house, its romantic tradition
and architectural history.
By taking upon ourselves ihe duty
of self-taught lessons of sincerity and
common sense and suitability.
By learning what is meant by color
and form and line, harmony and con
trast and proportion.
When we are on familiar terms
with our tools, and feel our vague
ideas clearing into, definite inspira
tion, then we are ready to talk about
ideals. We are fit to approach the
full art of "home-making.
We take it for granted that every
woman is interested in houses that
she either has a house in courseof
construction, or dreams of having
one, or has had a house long enough
wrong to wish it right. And we take
it for granted that this American
home is always the woman's home;
a man may build and decorate a beau
tiful house, but it remains for a wom
an to make a home of it for him. It
is the personality of the mistress that
the home expresses. Men are for
ever guests in our homes, no matter
how much happiness they may find
there.
You will express yourself in your
house, whether you want to or not,
so you must make up your mind to
a long preparatory discipline. You
may have only one house to furnish
in your lifetime, possibly, so be care
ful and go warily. Therefore, you
must select for your architect a man
who isn't too determined to have his
way. It is a fearful mistake to leave
the entire planning of your home to
a man whose social experience may
be limited, for instance, for he can
impose on you his conception of-your
tastes with a damning permanency
and emphasis. I once heard a cer
tain Boston architect say that he
taught his clients to be ladies and
gentlemen. He couldn't, you know.
All he could do is to set the front
door so that it would reprove them
if they wern'tl
Who does not know, for instance,
those mistaken people whose houses
represent their own or their archi
tect's basty visits to the fine old cha
teaux of the Loire, or the palace of
Versailles, or the fine old houses of
England, or the gracious villas of
Italy? We must avoid such aspiring
architects, and visualize our homes
not as so many specially designated
rooms and convenient closets, but as
individual expressions of ourselves,
of the future we plan, of our dreams
for our children. The ideal house is
the house that has been long planned
or, long awaited.
Trust the Architect.
Fortunately for us, our best archi
tects are so very srood thatTwe are
better than safe if we take our prob
lems to them. These men associate
wi(h themselves the hundred young
architects who are eager to prove
themselves on small houses. The
idea-that it is economical to be your
own architect and trust your houses
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View of a Bedroom in the
of
to a building contractor is a mis
taken, and most expensive, one. The
surer you are of your architect's
common sense and professional abil
ity the surer you may be that your
house will be economically efficient.
He will not only plan a house that
will meet the needs of your family,
but he will give you the inspiration
for its interior. He will concern him
self with the moldings, the light-openings,
the door-handles and hinges,
the unconsidered things that make or
mar your bouse. Select for your
architect a man you'd like for a
friend. Perhaps he will be, before the
house comes true. If you are both
sincere, if vou both purpose to have
the best thing you can afford, the
house will express the genius and
character of your architect and the
personality and character of yourself,
as a great painting suggests both
painter and sitter. The hard won
triumph of a well-built house means
many compromises, but the ultimate
satisfaction is worth everything.
Development of the Modern Houm.
Ido not purpose to go -into the his
toric traditions of architecture and
decoration, but I do wish to trace
briefly the development of the mod
ern house, the woman's house, to
show vou that all that is intimate and
charming in the home as we know
it, has come through the unmeasured
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influence of women. Man conceived
the great house with its parade room,
its grand apartments, but woman
found eternal parade tiresome, and
planned for herself little retreats,
rooms small enough for comfort and
intimacy. In short, man made the
house; woman went him one better
and made of it a home.
First Signs of Development.
The virtues of simplicity and reti
cence in form first came into being,
as nearly as we can tell, in the Grotta,
the Rule studio-like apartment of
Isabella d'Este. the Marchioness of
Mantua, away back in 1406. The
Marchioness made of this little studio
her personal retreat Here she
brought many of the treasures of the
Italian Renaissance. Really, simplici
ty and reticence were the last things
she considered, but the point is that
they were considered at all in such a
restless, passionate age. Later, in
1522, she established the Paradiso, a
suite of apartments which she occu
pied after her husband's death. So
you see the idea of a woman planning
her own apartment is pretty old, al
ter alL
The next woman who took a stand
that revealed genuine social con
sciousness was that half-French, half
Italian woman. Catherine de Vivonne,
Marquise de Rambouillet. She se
ceded from court because the court
was swaggering and hurly-burly, with
florid Marie-de-Medicis at its head.
And with this recession she began to
express in her conduct, her feeling,
her conversation, and, finally, in her
house, her awakened consciousness of
beauty and reserve, of simplicity and
suitability.
This was the early seventeenth cen
tury, mind you. when the main salons
of the French houses were filled with
such institutions as rows of red chairs
and boxed state beds. She undertook,
first of all, to have a light and grace
fully curving stairway leading to her
salon instead of supplanting it. She
grouped her rooms with a lovely di
versity of size and purpose, whereas
before they had been vast, stately
halls with cubbies hardby for sleeping.
She gave the bedroom its alcove,
boudoir, antechamber, and even its
bath, and then as decorator she sup
planted the old feudal yellow and red
with her famous silver-blue She
covered blue chairs with silver bul
lion. She fashioned long, tenderly
colored curtains of novel shades.
Reticence was always in evidence, but
it was the reticence of elegance. It
was through Madam de Racbouillet
that the armchair received its final
distribution of yielding parts, and be
gan to express the comfort of soft
padded backward slope, of width and
warmth and color.
WHAT NOTED STARS
SAY OF THE FASHIONS
Miss Kffle Shannon Keeping up with
the fashions means holding old ge at
lay. All women keep nunc when they
keep abreast of the times, and no matter
how bizarre a fashion seems ot first, a
woman can alas suit it to her per
sonality and rejoice to Had it enhancing
her good looks.
Mis Mary fcer-os Most women are
afraid of oricinalit) . thev want to look
like paper dolls all cut from the same
sheet of white paper, hut it Is a mistake;
there is alas enough latitude in jny
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It was all very heavy, very grave,
very angular, this Hotel Ramboullet,
but it was devised for and consecrated
to conversation, considered a new
form of privilege. The precieuses in
their later jargon called chairs "the
indispensables of conversation."
I have been at some length to give
a picture of. Madame de Rambouillet' s
hotel because it really is the earliest
modern house. There, where the so
ciety that frequented it was analyzing
its soul in dialogue and long platonie
discussion that would seem stark
enough to us. the word which it in
vented for itself was urbanite the
coinage of one of its own foremost
figures.
It is unprofitable to follow on into
the grandeurs, of Louis XIV, if one
hopes to find an advance there in
truth-telling architecture. At the end
of that splendid official success the
squalor of Versailles was unspeak
able, its stenches unbearable. In
spite of its size the Palace was known
as the most comfortless house in Eu
rope. After the death of its owner
society, in a fit of madness, plunged
into the recaille. When the restless
ness of Louis XV could no longer
find moorings in this brilliancy there
came into being little houses called
folies, garden hermitages for the privi
leged. Here we find Madam de Pom
padour in calicoes, in a wild garden,
bare-foot, playing as a milkmaid, or
seated in a little gray-white interior
with painted wooden furniture, having
her supper on earthenware service
that has replaced old silver and gold.
Amorous alcoves lost their painted
loves and took on gray and white
decorations. The casinos of little
comediennes did not glitter any more.
English sentiment began to bedim
Gallic eyes, and so what we know as
the Louis XVI style was born.
And so, at that moment, the idea
of the modern house came into its
own, and it could advance as an idea
hardly any further. For with all
the interpidity and passion of the
later eighteenth century in its search
for beauty, for all the magic-making
of convenience and ingenuity of the
nineteenth century, the fundamentals
have changed but little. And now we
of the twentieth century can only add
material comforts and expression of
our personality. We raise the house
beyond the reach of squalor, we give
it measured heat, we give it water in
abundance and perfect sanitation and
light everywhere, we give it ventila
tion less successfully than we might,
and finally we give it the human
quality that is so modern. There are
no dungeons in the good modem
house, no disgraceful lairs for ser
vants, no horrors of humidity.
The Haute Achieved.
And so we women have achieved
a house, luminous with kind purpose
throughout. It is finished that is
our difficulty! We inherit it, all round
ed in its perfection, consummate in
style to make it possible to change It
to suit one's self. To many women the
bustle and the wired tunic are becoming. I
to others the closely wraped origintl
effect Is most charming, for some the
narrow, straight line of the square tut
coat. Fashion has given u all a chance
this spring, but to be original as well.
Miss Patricia Collinge Modern fash
ions are a lot more sensible than people
give them credit for Girls nowadays
have frocks that fasten in front, ttut
are straight and comfortable and far
more girlish and simple than were the
frocks ot a generation back
Miss Emily Ann Wcllman' Fashions as
they come to us should be like clay in
the hands of a potter. Pari takes the
WANTED
IN EXCHANGE FOR
its charm, but it is finished, and what
can we do about a thing that is fin
ished? Doesn't it seem that we are
back in the old position oPIs'abella
d'Este eager, predatory and
"thingy?" And isn't it time for us
to pull up short lest we sidestep the
goal? We are so sure of a thousand
appetites we are in danger of passing
by the amiable commonplaces. We
find ourselves dismayed in old houses
that look too simple. We must stop
and ask ourselves questions, and, if
necessary, plan for ourselves little re
treats until we can find ourselves
again.
What is the goal? A house that
is like the life that goes on within it,
a house that gives us beauty as we
understand it and beauty of a nobler
kind that we may grow to understand,
a house that looks amenity.
Suppose you have obtained this
sort of wisdom a sane viewpoint. I
think it will give you as great a satis
faction to rearrange your house with
what you have as to rebuild, redeco
rate. The results may not be so
charming, but you can learn by them.
You can take your indiscriminate in
heritance of Victorian rosewood, of
Eastlake walnut and cocobolo, your
pickle-and-plum colored Morris fur
niture, and make a civilized interior
by placing it right, and putting detail
at the right points. Your sense of
the pleasure and meaning of human
intercourse will be clear in your dis
position of your best things, in your
elimination of your worst ones.
When you have emptied the tables
of rubbish so that you can put things
down on them at need, placed them
in a light where you can write on
them in repose, or isolated real works
of art in the middle of them; when
you have set your dropsical sofas
where you want them for talk, or
warmth and reading; when you can
see the fire from the bed in your
sleeping-room, and dress near your
bath; if this sort of sense of your
rights is acknowledged in your rear
rangement, your rooms will always
have meaning in the end If you like
only the things in a chair that have
meaning and grow to hate the
rest, you will, without any other in
struction, prefer the next fme you
are buying a good Louis XVI fau
teuil to a stuffed velvet chair. You
will never again be guilty of the er
rors of meaningless magnificence.
To most of us in America who
must perforce lead workaday lives
the absence of beauty is a very dis
tinct lack. I think, indeed, that the
present awakening has come to stay,
and that before very long, we shall
have simple houses with fireplaces
that draw, electric lights in the prop
er places, comfortable and sensible
furniture, and not a gilt-legged, spindle-shanked
table or chair anywhere.
This may be a decorator's optimistic
dream, but let us all hope that it may
come true.
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clay and makes a beautiful model whici
we. in our clumsy wa. try to copy bu!
sometimes we would succeed better r
we made these models of ours more sim
pie. more "suited to the unsubtle Ameri
can atmosphere. That i" what I lik.
about the fashions this spring their sim
plicity THE STOCKING PURSE.
Kvolved from the stocking purs'. 1
stocking has arrUed with a pocket It
is a real patch rxkft made of silk, knit
in with the wool of the "tocking proper
with an envelope flap, fastening flown
with a snap button. It Is claimed for
this pocket that it u a safe receptacle
for monej and jewels-
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