John W. Stephenson

“ Thus we have a sleeping-room, a dining-room, a reception-room, an entertaining-room, a cooking-room, and so on, each designed and furnished to create the atmosphere and stimulate the spirits of the occupant to the mood which the environment best serves. ”

“ All that has been said in regard to appropriateness in general furnishings is true in a concentrated sense of the cosey corner. Applicable and suitable in almost every room of the house, it should be all that the name implies. The simple desire for its possession should be no excuse for its introduction in a location where coziness or even comfort would be an impossibility. A cosey seat should never be placed in a position where its presence would constitute a nuisance, as before a window or in a doorway. ”

“ Drapery work that is not worth doing well is not worth doing at all, and it is far better to turn out a perfect job at cost, or even at an occasional loss, than to turn out poor work that pays a big profit. ”

“ It is natural that the ground floor windows should be more densely dressed than those of the upper floors, not only to impart a sense of privacy, but as following the general construction of ordinary buildings, the ground floor windows usually being larger and more heavily trimmed, and as the treatment ascends from floor to floor permit the curtains to be less weighty in character and expose a larger area of uncovered glass. By lace curtains we mean that class of furnishing familiarly known to the trade by that name and comprising all of the various styles of net and patterns. ”

“ When the decoration is of a transient character, however, such as show-window decoration, festival decoration, or the temporary adornment of a door or window, very good effects can be obtained by practice and the exercise of a little ingenuity without cutting the material, and it is not a rare occurrence to meet men of long experience in the drapery business who employ this method altogether. ”

“ Electricity is an important decorative feature in nearly all present-day treatments of any size, and serves the two-fold purpose of decoration and illumination. Its unquestioned supremacy after dark is a temptation to place the entire decoration in the hands of the electrician. The result of that is a building pleasing by night, but by daylight exhibiting nothing more attractive than a temporary wiring and stripping.
To produce a satisfactory result the electrical and fabric decorations should be planned together, so that one will aid the other. ”

“ It is sometimes necessary to square the bottom edge if the goods are very heavy, but the bottom can usually be kept square with the pleating. To straighten the bottom tack the curtain in place temporarily and allowing it to hang naturally, insert pins all along the goods as it hangs at the floor line; trim off the surplus thus marked, and finish the bottom with a hem, cord or fringe, and trim the top with a gimp or large cord. This method is only suitable where the fabric will not be disturbed, but is very effective as a background. ”

“ The quantity of steam should be regulated so that it will just soften the fabric without making it wet. The hair of the brush should be short, even, and fairly stiff. The brushes used in carpet sweepers when joined end to end make good steamer brushes, or the roller can be covered with mohair plush, so that the nap forms a brush.
While it may not be always convenient to construct a steamer large enough to take the width of the goods with one operation, and as complete as the one herein described, the quality of the work performed by one of this kind will repay the effort of building it. ”

“ No matter how much the rest of the house may suffer, these places must be lavishly, even extravagantly, replete with everything that custom ordains as necessary to a stylish house. Against extravagance as to value we have no quarrel, provided all things are in keeping, but we do oppose the garish assembling of costly goods which do not make for comfort or beauty or utility. ”

“ The prevailing styles of dining-room furniture—particularly of the chairs—seem to have been purposely planned utterly devoid of comfort, that the occupant might not even for a moment be lulled into forgetfulness of the business at hand, but be urged to prosecute it with dispatch and seek comfort elsewhere. ”

“ The equipment of the workroom should at all times be fully adequate to the demands upon it, and the very smallest of workrooms should have at least: A good sewing machine, capable of performing fine or coarse work; a cutting table approximately 5—0 by 12—0; a work table 5—0 by 9—0; a pressing table 3—0 by 6—0; a draping board, a test pole, a steamer and a cupboard for finished work.
As to the sewing machine, almost any reliable make of machine will do the necessary sewing for ordinary drapery work. ”

“ PIANO AND MANTEL DRAPERIES
The fabric decoration of pianos presents difficulties peculiar to itself, and the effort to combine beauty with common-sense utility has resulted in many pretty treatments, a few of which we illustrate. One of the first problems in the treatment of an upright piano is to securely and neatly attach the drapery to the instrument without in anywise interfering with its use or marring its finish. ”

“ This may seem a small thing, but to those accustomed to neatness the sloppy droop of the top edge of a curtain from pin to pin is extremely distasteful and would spoil an otherwise neat arrangement.
In hanging lace curtains having a prominent pattern it does not always follow that the same distance turned down at the top of each one will bring the patterns in line, and it is well to spread them in pairs side by side and match the pattern, so that when hung the pattern will be perfectly true and not zig-zag all the way up the two middle edges. ”

“ While it is not absolutely necessary that the pattern in grill work should be exactly duplicated on each side of the centre, the balance or symmetry must be retained by having the same body or expanse of woodwork on each side of the centre, or when a drapery is used, as in this case, it should be so disposed as to equalize the appearance of the grille by having the heaviest part of the drapery opposite to the heaviest side of the grille work. ”

“ When using a striped goods that would admit of any number of seams, a seventeen-foot bay window has been effectively dressed with twelve yards of goods, including in the treatment two double tails, and presented such an elaborate appearance that a disgruntled representative of a rival house offered to alter it and save enough from it to drape an eight-foot window at the back of a room. ”

“ To make the right hand panel, alternate colors of material are bunched and tacked in the centre of the space and stretched to the outer edge, keeping the dividing lines square and true.
The designs and instructions that we have given are sufficient when variously combined and assembled for almost any decorative requirement. The main things to bear in mind are balance or symmetry, neatness, and color harmony; a proper consideration of these points will result in a satisfactory trim.
For interior work the decorator is limited only by his price in his selection of material ”

“ The conformation of the draperies has much to do in determining the artistic atmosphere of a room, and may suggest vivacity, dignity, restfulness, solemnity or depression, according to the design and the style of material. ”

“ Frequently the best that can be done is to employ an unassuming neutral color that will not offer a very decided contrast to either floor or side-wall, and then introduce the colors of these other furnishings in a modified form in the trimmings.
Where walls and floor are in harmony, or where the furnishings are chosen together, it is a safe plan to build from the ground up, allowing the portières to be slightly lighter in tone than the carpet, and the over-draperies and side-wall in lighter tones still. ”

“ The roller is made long enough to contain a large spool at each end, and works equally well at the bottom of the curtain, where it rolls up with it, or at the top, where it revolves in brackets and winds the curtain up. The rope which causes the roller to revolve is first wound around the spool a couple of times when the curtain is altogether rolled up, and as the curtain is unrolled, the spools take up a sufficient quantity of rope, so that pulling the rope causes the spool to revolve and the curtain to roll up. ”

“ A board or shelf is made to fit the top of the radiator and so constructed as to fit squarely and securely with a boxing or keeper beneath, to prevent sliding or slipping. This is covered with a fabric to harmonize with the other furnishings and trimmed with a deep fringe, a Japanese reed and bead curtain, a moulding, or a very shallow valance.
The depth of any, governed by the style of the radiator and the taste of the decorator, best results are obtained by using a board that has saw cuts about an inch apart, and running within a few inches of from end to end, lengthwise. ”

“ The roller is cut to be one and a-half inches longer over all than the width of the cloth, and is mounted to allow the same play at each side, though in special cases this rule may be departed from, and a smaller allowance for play will sometimes work quite freely if hung perfectly true. It is customary to allow only one inch difference between cloth and roller for inside brackets, as they are usually made narrower than those for outside brackets, and, the bracket being much smaller, they work freely with the smaller allowance. ”

“ We have been continuously advocating uniformity or conformity as the foundation of decorative thought, and in no branch of the trade is this more necessary than in the application of grille work. Few people would have the courage to advocate the use of quartered-oak polished doors in a room with white enameled wood trims, and yet grille work made and finished in natural oak is confidently shown by some salesmen as equally suitable for weathered oak dining-rooms, Oriental dens or Louis XVI drawing-rooms. ”

“ One of the oldest methods, still recommended and manufactured for this purpose, is the rolling shade, made of thin slats of wood, laced together with twine to form a flat flexible curtain or shade, rolled from the bottom by means of a cord passed over a pulley.
For public institutions, offices or verandas, where usefulness and efficiency may be desired more than decorative value, they serve the purpose very well; but it can never be claimed that they tend to beautify the room in which they are used. ”

“ Over-curtains are always better on a separate pole, [38] but may be attached to the same pole as the lace curtains by using extra rings for them. In the elevation detail, Figure 78, Rod B is for lace curtains and Pole A for the over-curtains, a plan that permits either curtain to be drawn without interfering with the other. Over-curtains may be used at the discretion of the decorator in almost any room, and are particularly effective in large rooms. They may hang straight or loop back, having the same effect on the apparent size of the window as already explained. ”

“ Everything in nature is formed and placed for purpose, and here is the keynote of harmonious interior arrangement. For instance, here is a drawing-room with appropriate and well-chosen pieces of furniture. ”

“ Sash curtains to loop back, as A, Figure 60, are made about six inches longer than the length of the window from top to sill, with shrinking allowance added, and produce the opposite effect to straight curtains, seeming to increase the width and reduce the height. They may be made of bordered goods or of plain or dotted material edged with lace or ruffle of itself. Looped curtains give a jaunty, cheerful appearance to the exterior of a house, but do not look well on wide, short windows, unless left widely separated at the top. ”

“ In cutting the sides, as dotted lines Figure 2, allow about three inches extra at top and bottom and hollow at centre to one and one-half inches from straight lines E—— D and E—— C, round the bottom as curved dotted line, with greatest swell at about one-third of the distance from X. This gives us our perfect festoon pattern, with three inches allowance at each side for trimming off after pleating.
To lay out the plan for the tail it is more economical to use a paper pattern; take a large piece of paper and lay on the table with the longest edge parallel with the edge of the table nearest you. ”

“ If a window is low and a drapery carried out in proportion would be so low as to exclude the light or interfere with the vision, the usual rule must be departed from and the drapery raised to a greater height. The proper elevation our third measurement will enable us to easily determine.
Again, if we are planning a door, we must allow sufficient distance from the floor to the lowest point of the festoons for an ordinary person to pass or stand beneath without stooping. In practice it is seldom well to leave less than six feet six ”

“ Succeeding the period of disguised homeliness we have a period of more elaborate designs, and with the return of the overmantel architectural art has lavished upon this piece of furniture carvings and mouldings until it is usually a thing of beauty, and the decorator has sometimes to advise against what would be a superfluity of decoration in the employment of fabric. ”

“ To apply the trimming, the curtain is first tacked out flat on the table face upward, true and even with the square table edge, and a guide line ruled where the lace is desired to be.
Open-work appliqué trimmings are usually started from the corner, and the trimming so planned that where the mitre is made a perfect pattern is made and the surplus cut away. When all laid on in place the trimming may be either basted, pinned or cemented, after which it is taken up and sewn permanently. ”