[THE HOUSE AND ITS PLENIS House and its Plenishing Being a brief endeavor clearly to set forth the principles which should underlie any well-considered scheme for the proper furnishing of the House New York /if <= ^ i r v ^r ^* " " ' "A" ~ ~ t~ ( ur nit ur e Uompany I N c o K. r o *TK 1 * o * / 34 and 36 West Thirty-Second Street Between Fifth Avenue and Broadway Copyright, 1910, by THE GRAND RAPIDS FURNITURE COMPANY INCORPORATED Arranged and Printed at The CHELTENHAM Press New York LIBRARY UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA SANTA BARBARA By Way of Introduction [HEN we come to analyze the alluring charm inher- ent in the oak-panelled and coffer-ceilinged room of some historic old English Manor house, we feel that it is not entirely due to the picturesqueness of the architectural surroundings. Rather is it to be found in the time-worn furni- ture round which the family associations of gen- erations seem to cling. Here, we feel, are household goods entitled to THE HOUSE AND ITS PLENISHING that worship whose ritual is the tender familiarity of life-long appreciation. So strong is the feeling of personality that attaches to each one of these friendly belongings, that almost can we see the former owners, in starched Elizabethan ruff or trim knee-breeches of Georgian days, as the case may be, sitting in this high-backed chair or reach- ing for some cherished piece of china to the shelf of that diamond-latticed cabinet. Nor is the reason far to seek ; this was furniture chosen not at random or in obedience to the dic- tates of an ephemeral fashion, but after mature thought and deliberation, to serve some definite and well-considered purpose. And so to-day if the house we live in is to be a home and not a mere dwelling-place, it must be furnished with a discriminating care that is the offspring of real affection for the things we know as furniture. It calls for somewhat more than even the most expert intelligence. It demands a degree of inter- est that approaches the enthusiastic. To the increasing number of those who share these views the following pages will, it is hoped, prove of service. THE GRAND RAPIDS FURNITURE COMPANY THE LIVING-ROOM The Living-Room or Drawing- Room WHEN the revelling in the Banqueting- Hall of mediaeval England reached its boisterous height, the Lady with her maidens would discreetly withdraw to her Bedchamber. In time a portion of this room was screened off for her reception, and later a sep- arate room was provided. So by degrees the "Withdrawing-Room" became a permanent fea- ture of the English houses and took the place of the French "Salon de Compagnie" or state apart- ment. We have retained the name in its shortened form, but the province of the modern Drawing- THE HOUSE AND ITS PLENISHING Room has been so enlarged that it must be regarded not simply as the Lady's Withdrawing-Room, and still less as a mere gala, or state, apartment. While partaking to an extent of both these charac- teristics, the Drawing-Room in houses of an average size may be looked upon as a Living-Room or meeting-place for the whole family, when the pleasures and pursuits, the business occupations and cares of the day are over. These varied functions demand a singular care and discretion in its furnishing. Neither must formality and display be carried to the point of chilly discomfort, nor must a de- sirable coziness be attained at the expense of a certain stateliness of appearance. The ornate elaboration, for instance, of the period of Louis XV with its carved gilt and tapestried Bergeres by Gouthiere or Riesener, its Commodes with their mountings of cisele Bronze by the Caffieri, or its Encoigneurs elaborately in- laid by Boule will not serve our purpose. While appropriate enough for the comparatively rare occasions of an entirely formal hospitality, such a scheme would seem garish and out of place under the normal conditions of modern family life. On the other hand, the somewhat sober gravity and sedateness which distinguish much of the THE GRAND RAPIDS FURNITURE COMPANY THE HOUSE AND ITS PLENISHING Mahogany of the earlier Chippendale period befit as little a room which must serve, not seldom, under an artificial illumination, as a setting for the variegated toilettes of an evening assemblage. There is, however, in the furniture of the English School a midway ground, which offers that min- gling of courtliness and simplicity for which the room seems to call. In the works of Sheraton and Heppelwhite, of Thomas Shearer and Robert Manwaring, and of other craftsmen of the last quarter of the eighteenth century, one may find the ideal furnishings for the Drawing-Room or Living-Room, whatever may be its proportions and whether its surround- ings be of the Country or of the Town. In these shield-backed Chairs, slender-appearing but constructionally strong; in these taper-legged Card and Occasional Tables; in these finely proportioned Cabinets, through whose latticed doors may be caught the harmonious coloring of old china and the radiance of antique glass; in these Window-seats with their gracefully attenuated supports ; in these folding Screens with their sug- gestions of the coquetries of an earlier age in each and every one we find the same note of old- world refinement. Their convincing elegance of form and suavity of line are reminiscent of that 34 AND 36 WEST THIRTY-SECOND STREET, NEW YORK THE HOUSE AND ITS PLENISHING neo-classic revival which, following the excavations at Pompeii and Herculaneum, so strongly in- fluenced the minor arts of England and of France. Add to this the effect of buoyant animation im- parted by the delicate lines of inlay which brighten the shadowy richness of the Mahogany and by the painted bands of floral or conventional decoration which harmonize so aptly with the golden surfaces of the Satinwood, and their tale is told of charm and delightsomeness. THE GRAND RAPIDS FURNITURE COMPANY THE DINING-ROOM CHELTENHAM, N.> Y~ The Dining-Room NEITHER gloomy nor frivolous, but of a dignified cheeriness, the Dining- Room should be instinct with the spirit of hospitality, and accord its welcome, not only to the stranger-guest, but to the members of the household and their intimates as well. To this the furniture must contribute, at least as much as the interior decorations and architectural treat- ment, and in order to arrive at the Style and Period which lend themselves most fittingly to the desired purpose the bygone associations of the itself may well receive some consideration. room As we know it as a room set apart for the purposes of the table it was, in all but English THE HOUSE AND ITS PLENISHING houses, practically unknown until the close of the eighteenth century. In France as in Italy it was the practice for the family to dine in any one of the Dining-Rooms temporarily available and con- venient. But in England the case was very different. As early as the seventeenth century the " Dining- Parlor," as it was termed, was a very marked feature in English house-planning. Oftentimes, indeed, there were several of these, so arranged that they could be advantageously used in turn and in accordance with the varying seasons of the year. Not until the middle of the succeeding century, however, did the Dining-Room assume its place of present importance, for not until then did the formal dinner become the conventional manifesta- tion of hospitality. Of the resulting predilection for some little stateliness and display in the furnishing of this room with its increasing significance, the English furniture-makers were not slow to avail themselves. Thomas Chippendale, for instance, devotes no little of his "Gentleman's and Cabinet-Maker's Director" to "Chairs, Side-Tables, Wine-Coolers, Knife-boxes, and other pieces suitable for Dining- Room adornment." THE GRAND RAPIDS FURNITURE COMPANY THE HOUSE AND ITS PLENISHING The thought and consideration bestowed by him on his Dining-Room chairs resulted in the pro- duction of a type preeminently fitted for table use the seats wide and deep so that the often- times tediously protracted sitting might be en- dured, the backs not too high to interfere with the convenient service of the table. It follows then that the choice of appropriate furniture for the Dining-Room may well be de- termined in favor of the later Chippendale period, with only one exception. Chippendale never made a Sideboard, and therefore, for this characteristic fitment of the modern Dining-Room, the assis- tance of Chippendale's contemporaries and suc- cessors, Shearer or Sheraton, must be invoked. 34 AND 36 WEST THIRTY-SECOND STREET, NEW YORK THE LIBRARY CHELTENHAM, N.V. The Library AL natural consequence of the part it so often plays, of the general Living- Room of the masculine side of the household, it seems fitting that the dominant note of the Library's furnishing should be one of viril- ity, vigor, and sobriety. Not until long after the invention of printing, and the consequent reduplication of books, was the Library, as we know it, to differentiate itself from the Scriptorium of monkish days. But be- fore the mid-seventeenth century mark had been crossed, the Library in many an English country mansion had come to be a room of considerable consequence. THE HOUSE AND ITS PLENISHING And so, to-day, when we evoke a memory-pic- ture of the typical book-worm, though he himself may be habited in the sober black small-clothes of the eighteenth century, we see him seated in a high-backed Stuart chair of carved walnut, and resting his black-letter folio on a sturdy oaken table of Queen Elizabeth's days. There are sentimental reasons, then, for relying, as regards at least one of the main features of the Library's furnishing, on reproductions the most faithful procurable of English Oak and Walnut furniture of the seventeenth century. Yet, though the craftsmen of the first three quarters of that century produced work that has rarely been excelled for its harmonious propor- tion, refined detail and general nobility of design, the varied functions of the modern library demand a certain catholicity of treatment. Not out of place, therefore, is the more massive mahogany of the English Georgian or our own Colonial era. So important a plenishment, for in- stance, as the writing-table might well borrow its proportions and its severity of style as well as its common-sensible capacity and convenience from the century which elevated familiar correspond- ence into the sphere of literary art. THE GRAND RAPIDS FURNITURE COMPANY THE BEDROOMS The Bedrooms I ideal Bedroom demands not only a nice sense of selection, but a faculty for composition which shall arrange into a restfully pleasing picture its various plenishings. Although encompassed with historical traditions which reach farther back than those of any other, in its present manifestation, it is, of all the house rooms, the most essentially modern. For this rea- son, perhaps, in the search for appropriate styles in its furnishings, we instinctively approach, as nearly as may be, to our own time and era. The mediaeval or Renaissance Bedroom with its heavily draped and canopied State Bed, with THE HOUSE AND ITS PLENISHING its tapestried hangings and with the carved and painted coffers which were its chief furnishing, may be left almost completely out of our present reckoning. Not until the close of the eighteenth century do we find, in our own country as well as in England and France, Bedrooms which, con- forming in a certain degree to our modern princi- ples of hygiene, may offer us some suggestions derived from their furnishing, of which advantage may be opportunely taken. The associative, as well as the active, atmosphere ot the Bedroom should be a commingling ot fresh air and sunlight, and its ideal outlook there- fore is a garden. Even in the city, however, the desired sentiment may be suggested by the deftness of arrangement, and the sagacious selection of its furnishings. There is more than one Bedroom still to be seen in some Colonial Manor-House of Virginia or the Carolinas which, with its Mahogany tall- boys, its tent bedstead, and its bow-fronted chest of drawers, might well, even for a closely hemmed-in city house, be reproduced with an almost textual accuracy. There is, however, one Bedroom in the house which calls for something approaching finesse in its treatment. The custom, in France of the late THE GRAND RAPIDS FURNITURE COMPANY THE HOUSE AND ITS PLENISHING eighteenth century, based on the growing fond- ness for petits appartements, of dividing the Cham- ber into a suite of two or more small rooms including a Boudoir, as well as a Bedroom, can- not always with convenience be followed in this country. Nevertheless the Bedroom of the mistress of the household must often, of necessity, partake of the characteristics of boudoir as well as of sleep- ing-chamber. For it then, nothing could be more applicably appropriate than the choice of that French neo- classicism, reticent in its lines and daintily delicate in its details, with which is associated the name of Louis Seize, though it is rather, perhaps, to Marie Antoinette that the credit of this appealing style should be given. The touch of feminine grace which pervades it, the very purposes which led to the creation of some of its more characteristic forms, such as the Lit de Repos^ or the 'fable de ^oilette, suggest that the Queen rather than the King should have been its sponsor. In any case, however, there is, about the best examples of the style, the courtly grace, as well as the studied sim- plicity, that are demanded by a room which must at times serve for the informal reception of fem- inine visitors. 34 AND 36 WEST THIRTY-SECOND STREET, NEW YORK In Conclusion IN the foregoing suggestions as to the princi- ples which should underlie the furnishing of the modern house, an endeavor has been made to so broaden them as to admit of their widest and most general application. So, while only the four main rooms have been considered in detail, the remaining rooms of the house may be treated on precisely similar lines. It needs only to determine the precise purposes for which the room, whether Hall or Lounging- Room, Nursery or Music-Room, is destined, and the general character of the furniture most appro- priate to those purposes will surely suggest itself. The satisfactory selection of the style which seems to embody those characteristics will surely follow, "as the night the day." It remains only to point out the helpful part which the Grand Rapids Furniture Company is prepared to play in regard to this. It has always been a source of satisfaction to the Company that it is enabled to offer a wider and more diversified opportunity for the selection of THE GRAND RAPIDS FURNITURE COMPANY THE HOUSE AND ITS PLENISHING carefully considered furniture than can elsewhere be found. No matter what the architectural character ot the surroundings, no matter what the general scheme of decoration may be, furniture of a style which will be appropriately harmonious is always to be found among the Company's productions. Further than this, it matters not what may be desired whether some trifle of relative insignifi- cance or some piece of the utmost importance it will be found in either case to be distinguished by the same integrity of material, the same care- fulness of construction, and the same whole-hearted attention to the nicety of its finish and its details. THE GRAND RAPIDS FURNITURE COMPANY THIS BOOK IS DUE ON THE LAST DATE STAMPED BELOW. Series 9482 UC SOUTHERN REGIONAL LIBRARY FACILITY A 000 976 901 9