Decoration Past and Present

Sun (Auckland), Volume IV, Issue 1043, 6 August 1930, Page 6

Decoration Past and Present

Changes Since the Days of “Cranford” ROOMS IN FICTION Perhaps the one universal interest, dating from earliest doll-house days, that women possess in common is their love of house-decorating and furnishing (says Phyllis Megroz in the “Morning Post”). It is an obvious channel for the expression of individuality and character, and possibly that is why there are so many descriptions of imaginary rooms to be found in literature both ancient and modern. Turning over the pages of classic fiction, one discovers glimpses of interiors which, though they were most certainly the glory of their own age, contrast quaintly enough with presentday taste. Here, for instance, from “Cranford” is the Hon. Mrs. Jamieson’s with-drawing-room: “The furniture was white and gold . . . the chairs were all in a row against the walls, they were railed with bars across the back and nobbed with gold—neither the railings nor the nobs invited to ease. There was a japanned table devoted to Liberature on which lay a Bible, a Peerage and a Prayer-book. There was another square Pembroke table dedicated to the Fine Arts on which were a kaleidoscope, conversation-cards, puzzle-cards tied together with faded pink ribbon, and a box painted in imitation of a tea-caddy. There was also a worstedworked rug. . . .” IN WHITE AND CRIMSON Mrs. Jamieson's drawing-room, however, notwithstanding all its knickknacks, pales into insignificances when compared with Mr. Rochester’s apartment, which undoubtedly appeared a marvel of elegance and beauty to Jane Eyre: “The boudoir was spread with a white carpet on which seemed laid brilliant garlands of flowers: it was ceiled with snowy mouldings of white grapes and <-ine-leaves beneath which glowed in rich contrast crimson couches and ottomans. The ornaments on the pale Parian mantelpiece were of sparkling Bohemian glass, ruby-red, and between the windows large mirrors repeated the genera! effect of snow and lire.” Equally rich and recherche is Mrs. Reed’s sleeping chamber described in the same book:

“A bed supported on massive pillars of mahogany, hung with curtains of deep red damask, stood out like a tabernacle in the centre. The two large windows were half-shrouded in festoons and falls of similar drapery, the carpet was red, and the table at the foot of the bed was covered with a crimson cloth. The walls were of a faint fawn colour, with a blush of pink; the wardrobe, the toilet table, and the chairs were of darkly-polished old mahogany, and out of these deep surroundings glared white the piledup pillows, the mattress and the bed spread with a snowy Marseilles counterpane. . . .” PRESENT-DAY CONTRASTS After this orgy of scarlet hangings and gleaming mahogany our own modern ideas of decoration appear sadly wan and “greenery-vellery.” Jane Eyre would certainly have been incapable of appreciating this twentieth century drawing-room by Margery Lawrence with its delicacy and restraint: “The walls, painted the cool sea-green tint of an aquamarine, were bare but for a few marvellous Chinese prints, and in one corner hung from floor to ceiling a long strip of antique pm broidery, a riot of mauy-tinted flowers worked on pale maize-coloured silk with a sudden dramatic edge of black. The curtains, like the deep, invitinglycushioned chairs, were of heavy silk in subdued greens shot with mauve, peacock-blue and silver, and the waxed floor was covered with a glorious old Persian rug. One or two graceful pieces of black lacquer furniture and a grand piano lent character to the elusive charm of the room. . . .”

As for a dining room described in "Dark Hester” by Anne Douglas Sedgwick, carried out in the futuristic spirit of Young Chelsea, what would our grandmothers have said, could they but have seen it: “It was so gaunt, so glaring, so unadjusted to human needs and frailties, so cut off from all complicity with the past. It seemed to challenge you to disagree with it as you entered to * nudge you maliciously on its angular chairs, to suffocate you sur reptitiously with the many cushions of its enormous divan. On the walls the perspective of the few pictures slanted dizzily toward you; you wanted to push the knife, the mug, the herring and the apple back to equilibrium. On the mantlepiece stood three small sculxttured animals menacing in their solid, misshapen vitality. The batik curtains, of a dramatic purple shade, seemed inappropriate as a background to afternoon tea and London gossip. . .” Last of all comes a room which is a very far cry from the Hon. Mrs. Jamieson’s white and gold William the Fourth drawing-room—a room roofed with glass to admit the ultraviolet rays whose meaning and purpose that good lady would never have surmised: “There were red linen covers on the low chairs that were scattered about the little louuge; red, brown and amber Persian mats lay upon the tiled floor, and the curtains drawn back to allow the full force of the sun to heat in were of striped red and gold Egyptian silk. . . With this brief glance at Margery Lawrence’s conception of a sun-parlour on the Riviera, an end must be made, although many more fascinating glimpses might be given of interior decoration in fiction.