The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1885-10-30
FURNITURE FOR A MILLIONAIRE.
Tamsda's Exquisite Designs In GoIOrs-
Incompatible TvOodvyOrk-The Piano.
London Truth

Tamsda's Exquisite Designs In GoIors-e
Incompatible Wood wOrk-The Piano. =
London TRUTH
The suite consists of two very large
touches, a piano, music cabinet, tables, Z
chairs, foot stools and curtains They
are designed and made for New York
millionaire, who has given no limit so
far as price is concerned, so that the
very finest materials and the most
skilled work have been secured. The
designs are by Alma Tadema, whose
picture, GA Reading from Homer" now
in the academy, is to be hung in the
drawing room for which the furniture
is intended I hear rumors of freizes
and panels by Sir Frederick Leighton,
of Roman sculptOrs at work upon the
marble for the same fortunate room and
of other details, which lead me to the
conclusion that if money is the root of
all evil it is also the root of all art
The touches, chairs and stools are
upholstered in silk of beautiful shade
Of pure gray, traversed by bands Of ex-
quisite embroidery in eolors which are
rich, but carefully subdued, as one sees
them in Mr.. Tademas pictures. The
ground of this embroidery is also silk,
the color being precisely that of the
bloom of ripe plum. Upon this the
tints of gold and orange, blue, red and
brown, with slender curved lines of
pure white giving a peculiar delicacy to
the whole, form beautiful scroll pat
tern A rich trellis fringe of mingled
gray and gold runs along the edges of
the touches, and beneath it is deep
silk fringe of the plum-bloom color,
which does not show, except in the eff
feet of depth and richness it 1mpartS
10 tho 11voE1ar frinna
The woodwork of all this is simply in
comparable, being mingling of cedar
wood, ebony and lockwood, inlaid with
the finest mother of-pearl to be had.
Wherever there is a corner a swans
head is carved out of the ebony, large
carbuncles forming the eyes. The labor
of bending the ivory has been immense,
for it is essentially brittle substance,
and affords an inverted illustration of
the proverb, BEND, not break. " On
the arms of the touches there are long,
curved lines of tapering ivory, which
approach each other closely at the base,
but gradually increase the interval of
width as they rise. This, it appears,
was a very difficult matter to manage.
The piano is not yet completed. The
upper part of the music cabinet is
copy of an Asiatic temple. The pillars
are of fiuted cedar wood, the delicious
red-broWn of that beautiful wood COM
ing out with great effect by reason of
the carving. The capitals are carved
ivory, in a mellow tint of warm cream
color The rest is ebony, iniaid with
the various woods | have already emu
merated and with the exquisite mother
of-pearl, which g!itters like jewels. The
curtains that vail the recesses intended
for holding the music are of gray silk,
occupying the center.
A large curtain, also Of gray silk,
with a curious EN- roidered dado, the
ground of which is plum bloom silk,
with quaint design in sections, in each
of which is a straight piece that re-
minds me of old studies in comic Soc
tions) in blue and red.
The round tables are too lovely. The
woodwork matches that of the other
furniture, but is not repetition. In
fact, no two designs are precisely alike.
There is some thing to study in each
back of a chair, each side of stool,
each arm of a couch. The tops of the
tables are of Aleer onyx, and they
are like bits of golden sunsets, caught
and fixed, to be joy forever. So deli
cately, pretty, transparently, efful-
gently pink is the ground of one of
these that it looks as soft as a rose loaf,
though marble cold. DaShes of yellow
and orange are splashed upon the
ground and have cloudy, dreamy look
that makes one think Of summer sky
soapeS.
But to be practical Just fancy the
ordinary housemaid let loose on those
lovely embroideries, with their delicate
eolorings? Think of her doubtful buster
swooping around!