Evening star., 1924-11-06
The North Window
BY LEILA MECHLIN


kitchen chair was merely matter of
art. Truth to tell, nowadays some of
the kitchen chairs which are pur-
chasable at small cost are much more
worthy OF being regarded as works
of art than the chairs Of twenty times
their price which are purchased for
the drawing room. But all furniture
comes within the category of art. and
poorly designed chair is, after all,
no worse than a poorly painted pic
ture, except the one has q useful
purpose and the other a purely es-
thetic appeal.
On the 10th of this month a new
wing of the Metropolitan Museum of
Art. in New York, will be opened with
appropriate ceremonies. This will be
devoted exclusively to American dec
orative arts. The rooms throughout
are exact reproductions of rooms.
chiefly early American, built into
houses designed by American archi-
tects or their predecessors, American
builders. Within, the exhibits will
be furniture and furnishings, mostly
American made. and not Of today but
of earlier yesterdays. How little the
makers thought that some time their
works would be procured for the
greatest art museum in America, but
how skillfully and artistically they
produced
X X
Art is not a matter of fashion nor
merely of individual taste, but rather
of the acceptance and following of
certain principles, together with an
intuition as regards fitness or the ad-
Justment of fitness to use. Studying
carefully the furniture Of the early
American types, one comes to the con-
clusion that its real charm is its line
The furniture makers of those days
understood the beauty of line and
demonstrated their appreciation of it
in the design of their furniture. To
be sure, they followed to a great ex-
tent English tradition. Much of the
Work was in the spirit and style of
Chippendale, Sheraton, Heppelwhite
but 1T was not a slavish copying; it
was an Interpretation. There was
consideration for use, and then there
was an effort to secure beauty, and a
pride, moreover, in craftsmanship
The work was beautifully done Why
is 1T that the furniture made by these
great furniture makers in England
or by our less famous but equally
sincere furniture makers in this coun-
try should bring today such fabulous
prices? 1t is not simply a craze for
the antique; it is a knowledge of
what is artistically good. These men
designed chair, a table, a secretary,
cabinet with the same skill and
love of the beautiful that an architect
designs house or a painter COM
poses picture. 1t was a matter, lit
orally, of composition, of rendering
and sheer joy in the doing.
X x
Two valuable monumental works
on furniture have lately been issued.
In ;eL
bear in this country the impress of
Charles Scribner's Sons. One is on
English Decoration and Furniture Of
the Early Renaissance-1500 to 1885,"
by Nj. Jourdain; the other is "A Die
tionary of English Furniture" by
Percy Macquoid and Ralph Edwards
to be published in three volumes, of
which only the first is out.
The former gives an account of the
development of English decoration
and furniture and treats of char
the volume has to do only with fur
niture. the first being given to wall
panels. balustrades, etc. But the two
go well together and show the real
relation between architecture and
this branch of industrial art, limiting,
moreover, at the way some of our
present, everyday terms were de-
rived. For instance, Edward F..
Strange. who writes a foreword to
this volume, says: The chair was a
symbol of power and state, proper
only to kings and such like dignta-
ries lin these renaissance days);
queens even in these harsh. northern
climes, had to be content to sit on
stools, or at least low chairs. Other
folk had benches or the simplest sort
of stools. Tables were mainly boards
with trestles. and in the terms chair
man and board as now used We
have far-off yet absolutely accur-
ate reflection of the state of furni-
ture of this time"
Thus a study of old furniture brings
us to better understanding of the
life Of the time. To quote Mr
Strange again: "One would desire that
the student should give some atten-
tion to the human interest that un-
derlies the changes these old pieces
imperfectly record: for the house and
its contests, more than anything else
bear testimony to the condition and
aspirations of the people who dwell
therein" What an interesting
thought! How shall our condition
and aspirations" be judged in the fu-
ture by the furniture with which we
surround ourselves today: what will it
tell of refinement Of taste, of love of
beauty?
Mr.. Strange urges in his commend
alton of Miss Jourdain's book the i'm
portance of studying this subject, the
importance for every one. nor merely
the collector and the furniture maker;
and points to the present craze for
the antique" as an additional reason
"Old furniture" he says. has become
almost a gambling counter in the
market, so far has the craze for the
acquisition of absurdly styled an
tiques' carried the confiding amateur.
In the early part of the sixteenth
century this term had a definite and
logical significance. 1t cannoted
forms or ornaments derived or be-
lieved to be derived from classical
forms. Now these who concern them
selves with the old furniture trade
Cor Industry apply it even to chairs
and tables of a presumed antiquity
of little more than century" And
exclaims, 1T is time that furniture
was studied with some approach to a
sense of history, and it's value ap-
preciated as a mirror of the gradual
growth of a standard Of good living
and comfort among the classes with
whom in the middle ages such hardly
liexisted."
The Dictionary of English Furni-
ture," unlike most dictionaries, is of
absorbing interest. Dedicated by gra-
cious permission to her majesty the
Queen, 1t is indeed a royal publica-
tion, authoritatively written, sumptu-
ously illustrated. 1t, too. has its in
PRODUCTION, stressing the interest and
Importance Of q study Of this branch
of the decorative arts. Not merely
the people of Great Britain" 1t says,
'Sbut the whole English speaking
world, now takes a keen interest in
old English domestic furniture -
Heretofore it has been difficult to find