THE MODERN DRAWING ROOM.

Otago Witness, Issue 2612, 6 April 1904, Page 63

THE MODERN DRAWING ROOM.

- Mr Aymer Vallance, in the Magazine of !Art, deals witih the drawing room in his series of furnishing articles, His protest against the "knick-knacTts," which are so plentiful and amazing, is worthy of quotation : —

"Whatever be .the case with regard to the rest of, the house, somehow the drawing room, its decorations and all that it contains, seems to be regarded 1 as belonging so peculiarly to the ladies' province that it amounts almost to an impertinence for alieM-maa to offer any suggestion or criticism upon it. I venture to submit, however, that from, a male point of view the drawing room would be a far more profitable place if it were less crowded than it usually is with, superfluous and! flimsy knick-knacks of alt sorts.

It " is unnecessary to particularise the rubbish with which my readers cannot but be painfully familiar. The feminine mind cannot resist the seduction of a "bargain" ; and consequently every "charity" bazaar, every "after-season clearance sale at enormous sacrifices" at over-grown drapers' stores, discharges into the ladies' quarters tons of trifles of the kind indicated.

In vaiD does the long-suffering man, who generally has both to pay the 2ost as well as to endure the intrusion into his home of all this contemptible frippery, chafe against its vexatious tyranny ; until, in. desperation, he seeks refuge at his club, where common-sense and practical convenience hold undisputed sway. But if, as a. compromise, the man submits to a crowd of things which, short of being actively mischievous, are simply .useless, the lady on her part surely might at least concede co much as to spare him the irritating presence of whatever does violence to its native purpose. The perverse ingenuity which (to name but a few specimens) turns drain-pipes, set up on end, into vases for bulrushes and dried grasses; milking-stools into flowerEtands; cauldrons "Into coal-scuttles ; whereby square pianos, disembowelled 1 of their become "silver tables," and Bedan chairs, fitted with shelves, become china cabinets, is truly marvellous, and worthy of being expended ir a better If iadies would consent to abandon only so much and no more than is now forced to serve some misapplied function of the son; above mentioned, ho^ great and how bsneficial a c-leaipn*e in the drawing room would he effected*