Hopkinsville Kentuckian. [volume] (Hopkinsville, Ky.) 1889-1918, 1889-07-12
rURNIIURE FOB SUMNER
How The Country Houses Should
Be Furnished This Year.
Mahogany Taking tho Place Of the Light
Woods-To tit Upa chintz bedroom.
Last Century Fashions Revived
In Huuuings.


ooPYRoHT 1884
As the dresses of our grandmothers are
this Summer the styles, so also for tho
country house are the furniture and the
hangings. Indeed one is necessary to the
other.
The gay soft sweeping gowns OF India
silk girdled close beneath The arms, the
scant skirts falling straight and even, the
tiny bodices laced up the back, the pulled
sleeves that extend only half way from
shoulder to elbow, the kerchiefs and the
snowy necks encircled by simple strings
OF pearls, the hair piled high OH cushions,
the delicate feet in high-heeled buckled
shoes of the old time beauties who will
soon he sauntering up and down the box
bordered walks OF country gardens would
be sadly out OF place, even mt so modern
an entertainment MS n lawn party, among
nineteenth century plenishings. II we
cannot often build In houses which are
occupied for part of the year only the
heavy mahogany staircases which used
to respond TO the touch OF lightly tly-
ing feet we can introduce, and
In our June fittings are liber-
ally introducing the brown and yellow
walls, the high wooden mantels with frieZe
of acanthus and decorated with heads
|
amaranth, the deepest fire places, the old
brass andirons, shovels, bellows and tongs.
the polished floors strewn with rugs, the
sconces with their twinkling oandlelights,
the four post tester beds, the high.backed
chairs, the quaint old rockers and tea ia
bles which were used by ladies In the
| century which ladies now dress to repre-
sent.
That mahogany is fast regaining its old
Importance goes almost without saying.
There is springing up. even among people
| OF moderate means, some notion Of found
| ing families, and the idea of permanence
| implies root In the soil, n country house
almost equally important with the place
in town, the accumulation OF belongings
not to be hustled about ut May moyings, IN
word. solid mahogany rubbed till it
shines like polished glass.
With mahogany goes chintzand the two
make favorite country combination.
| Hardly a pretentious new house at Tux
edo or Lennpx which has not its chintz
bedroom. Old-iashioned chint2, you may
believe, in designs that were called the
new India printings' q hundred years ago.
Reds and creams and soft blues and yell
lows abound in the clvings, adapted es-
| pecially to the hard dark wood furniture
and trim. To correspond with the chintz
| hangings come the new chintz wall papers,
| reproducing the same cream grounds and
the same patterns, but outlined in colors
instead OF filled In,
have seen charming ohintz bedroom
In the summer cottage of an artist on
Long Island, on which comparatively little
money was expended, but which ndmira-
bly, illustrates the idea, the door stained
very dark red, rubbed with shellac var
nish and made soft to the feet by the addi-
ton of few good rugs aud II strip OF rag
carpet, which is the owners special pride;
the woodwork mahogany, with deep pan
elled window seats and high mantel, tiled
with brown red tiles with golden lights IN
them; the bed u huge mah0gouy four pos
ter, with brass tester rails and canopy OF
satin chlntz, the ground of which
Is pale, delicate green, with hints Of
brown, figured with golden rod sprays
and the deep red cardinal flowers. The |
same lowered chintz makes the bed |
spread, the window curtains, cushions In |
window seats and upholstery for the high |
backed rockers and most sumptuous |
divan which has for its foundation heavy
old straight backed mahogany sofa, picked
up in secondhand furniture shop,
stripped of its horsehair covering aud
given in exchange n riot of chintz cushions.
The wall paper has the shadowy green
chintz ground, with golden rod and cardi-
nal flowers in outliue The picture rail is |
mahogany and the frieze Is like the side |
wall, except that the flowers are printed
solid, precisely as on the hangings. The
ceiling Is tinted In still more delicate
shade of pale green.
And does not the dark wood and deeper
L.. bsa ~. l
than Is appropriate for August and July :
The water greens are introduced to save
the GOODNESS, and In another favorite com
bination the creamy ground of chintz and
wall paper preserves the mahogany from
the suspicion of sultriness Besides, the
country house is no longer a roughly
finished structure, occupird for ten weeks
or three months only, and becoming unin-
habitable AS soon as the autumn chill
strikes through its unfinished walls. 1t
receives its tenants as soon M the hobolinks
begin to sing, entertains the major part of
the company Of the twelvemouth, and, II
not SO fas from town as to Inconvenience
seriously the business man of the house,
hold, often sees the Christmas stockings
hung In the light of its ingleside, the
winter fitting cityward being for COM
paratively brief period. Decidedly the
country cottage has a right year by
year to richer and more serviceable
Light wood trimmings have not van.
ished; they have merely divided their EN-
pire. The new enHmeed furniture is very
pretty aud tasteful, both for parlor and
bedroom, though far less seryiceable than
the mahogany Much the same effect, in
deed, can be produced In brass and iron
and wicker at one-fourth the cost and half
the risk Of damage. | remember delight
full little room In one of the mountain cot
tages of Onteora, whose owner is one OF
those new products OF evolution, the girl
bachelors who set upan Summer indepsnd-
ent households. This young bachelor,
whose parents 20 to tho seaside while she
perches with Dora Wheeler and the rest Of
that artistic colony among the Catskills,
seats herself in wicker rocker cushioned
with Morris patterned cretonne of sort
of crushed strawberry or salmon pink |
shade. Her bed is iron, knobbed with
brass, with valance Of the cretonne and ,
spread of lace lined with cretonne. A
cheap little washstand bought at the near
est country store has been turned into the
most tasteful of toilet tables by the use OF
cretonne covered with dotted Swiss, The
walls are covered with a creamy paper In a
Louis Seize design OF narrow pinlSish
stripes, ia shade corresponding to the Gre
tonne, alternating with bouquets tied with
ribbons. The ceiling is very
delicately stenciled round with flowers.
With cretonne hangings aud half dozen {
little pictures such rs one gets with the
art magazines, framed some in white and
some in pink lacquered frames, the room
comes as near the midsummer ideal as
ono often approaches where narrow limits
are set to why's AMI means.
Mahogany inlaid with mother OF pearl In
Eieht eenth century festoon designs and
white mahogany finished with gold
rosettes and scYoll work. with brass
handles and inlaid with dark mahogany, ,
are fashionable compromises between
light wood and dark. for the country
season. Cherry, not stained to initiate
mahogany, bat left Of its natural salmon
hue, quartered oak and even the old fash
Ioned black walnut which is trying to
engineer boom on its own account are {
In ho L ,