# Mrs. Beeton's Book of Household Management/Chapter LXV

TABLE DECORATION
CHAPTER LXV
The Decoration of Tables at the present time is almost universal, and so does the taste for it grow and develop, that what was formerly left in the hands of the head servants in large establishments, who had no difficulty in packing the heavy epergnes with fruit or flowers, now forms a wide field of labour for artistic taste and skill. Hostesses in the season vie with each other as to whose table shall be the most elegant, and often spend almost as much upon the flowers as upon the dinner itself, employing for the floral arrangement people who make a profession of this pleasant occupation. Home decoration is practised by those who have the time, and we can imagine no household duty more attractive to the ladies of the house than that of making their tables beautiful with the exquisite floral produce of the different seasons, exercising their taste in devising new ways for employing the materials at their command. Young people should have the task of arranging flowers encouraged, and be allowed to assist in decorating the table. Care should be taken not to overload the table with flowers and ornaments.
Plant Decoration.—Where the means of the housekeeper or the supply of flowers is limited, delicate-looking ferns, Japanese dwarf trees, and other plants suitable for table use may be employed, for they look in many cases as pretty as flowers, unless the latter be most tastefully arranged. Maidenhair looks perhaps prettier than ordinary ferns, but will not stand the heat of a dinner-room so well. The plants should be placed in vases, which may be of any material, preferably china, and, if possible, of a pattern that will match the dinner service. Although rather old-fashioned, the rustic glass stands, lined with plate glass, are extremely pretty. Other pretty small plant or fern vases may be had of terra-cotta and coloured china.
Flowers for Decoration should be those which are not very strongly scented. To some the perfume of such flowers as gardenias, stephanotis, hyacinths and others is not offensive, but to others the strong scent in a heated room, especially during dinner, is considered very unpleasant. Otherwise, there is no dictating what the flowers should be. It is well to avoid many colours in one decoration, for, even if well grouped, they are seldom as effective as one or two mixed with white and green. It is a fashion to have a single colour for a dinner-table decoration, this being often chosen of the same tint as the ​hostess's dress or the hangings of the room, though these are sometimes varied to suit the flowers. Again, all white flowers are very often employed, relieved by plenty of foliage. Smilax is a very popular table decoration, and long strips of it are often laid on the table between each person and left hanging down the side of the cloth.
Vases and Wires.—If there are vases of all kinds to select from, then almost any kind of flower can be used, but few people have many sets for dinner-table decorations. Some prefer low decorations, others high ones, but there is one rule that should always be in force, and that is, that the flowers and their receptacles should never interfere with the line of vision, but be above or below it. The great objection to the epergnes of olden days was that they hid the guests from one another. If the vases be coloured ones, of glass or china, let the flowers, if they cannot be had of a corresponding tone, be white only, mixed with foliage. If the vases be of white china, use coloured flowers. Roses look always best in low stands or bowls, or in specimen tubes where only a single flower is placed. Wire that can be easily bent is obtainable from any florist, and is particularly useful in arranging high arches, etc., indeed there is no limit to the ingenuity that can be displayed in obtaining pretty and novel effects with it. Our coloured illustrations of dinner tables show several very effective styles of floral decoration.
Small Flower Stands and Specimen Tubes.—These are preferred by many people to large ones, as it is so easy to arrange a few blooms, the vase itself lending beauty, while some care and much more taste is needed to make the larger ones look pretty. The small specimen tubes are particularly useful for breakfast or tea tables, and for small households.
Arrangement of Flowers.—We have said that effect is marred in the arrangement of beautiful flowers by too many colours being introduced. It is equally so by too many flowers being used. Each flower should have room to stand out, although it may be partially veiled by delicate wavy grasses or fern fronds, and each flower should be put in in the way it grows. If hanging ones be used, let them hang; if they naturally stand upright, let them be so placed to look natural. The only flowers that look less pretty growing than when cut are, perhaps, orchids, but these must be most carefully handled and put into the vases or wired up and placed as they would be if upon the plant. They are costly, it is true, but no flowers are better for dinner-table decorations, as they are generally scentless and they live for a long while when cut.
Inexpensive Decorations. Times were when people, living in town, could not afford flowers, and the dwellers in country places, if they did not grow them, could not obtain them, but now things have changed. The demand has brought the supply; we must have plenty of flowers, and at the London markets they can be bought very cheaply, while out of town florists and nurserymen flourish everywhere.
​But if economy is an object, it is easy enough to have flowers for nothing in the country. What prettier ornaments can we find for our table in spring than the wild flowers of that season, specially primroses and cowslips. In summer, what more cool and refreshing than water-lilies and grasses. In autumn, what grand effects can be produced with the richly-tinted foliage and berries of that season. While, even in winter, really beautiful effects can be produced with fresh dark evergreen leaves, mingled with golden bracken dried and pressed.
Foliage Decoration is, if well and artistically done, one of the most lovely. It commends itself for vases of coloured glass or for white china stands set upon crimson plush centres. As many white leaves as can be found should be chosen, and light feathery grasses (real, not dyed ones) should be introduced. Hot-house foliage varies from white to almost black, and has so many tints of green that a pretty effect is easily gained when tasteful hands carry out the decorating. Palms can be also used, and made to form very pretty centres on dinner-tables, if the pot is hidden by moss and covered with flowers and foliage.
Dessert Centres, as they are usually called, are particularly effective on large tables. They may be made of any material and in any colour, but for one which has to do duty often, red is perhaps the most useful colour, while plush is the most effective material. We have seen an old gold brocaded silk one look extremely well, with its fringe of myrtle and brown ivy leaves, and its tall, slender vases of yellowy-tinted glass filled with crimson flowers and foliage, also a pale pink one, upon which the flowers are of two tones of the same colour, with a good deal of white and green intermixed, the shades of the lamps being rose colour. Dessert centres are more suitable for winter than summer decoration. Choose the flowers according to the season and centre, if one is used. In summer, a cool effect is needed, and plenty of white and green should be found upon the table, while in winter it is pleasant to see brilliantly coloured flowers, that seem to give warmth as well as brightness to the table. Glasses through which the stems of the flowers can be seen should be filled with water, but bowls or opaque stands can be filled with moss or sand, in which it is far easier to arrange the flowers than in water.
Strewing.— This is an exceedingly pretty way of decorating the table, but it unfortunately happens sometimes that the flowers wither or become disarranged. It is necessary to choose such flowers and foliage as will bear heat and lie without water for a time for this purpose. Ivy leaves and smilax come in here well, as does also myrtle and French inn. and foliage generally looks better alone than with flowers, particularly for a border for a dessert centre.
Decorations for a wedding breakfast are prettiest and most appropriate when arranged entirely with white flowers and foliage. Often the cake is decorated with the bride's bouquet.