File:American homes and gardens (1905) (18151532015).jpg

Title: American homes and gardens
Identifier: americanhomesgar11905newy (find matches)
Year: 1905 (1900s)
Authors:
Subjects: Architecture, Domestic; Landscape gardening
Publisher: New York : Munn and Co
Contributing Library: Smithsonian Libraries
Digitizing Sponsor: Biodiversity Heritage Library

View Book Page: Book Viewer
About This Book: Catalog Entry
View All Images: All Images From Book
Click here to view book online to see this illustration in context in a browseable online version of this book.

Text Appearing Before Image:
6—A State D when she is engaged in the much higher pursuit of discussing " over soul " or " under soul," it would be enough to bring on a fit of demoniacal fury. There may be pursuits more edify- ing and useful to man than the ethics of the dining-room, but I know of none more conducive to his wel- fare; and considering it is one of the first instincts of creation I do not think it would be wise to neglect it entirely. For my own part, it has always j seemed to me an evil 1 to be retained rather than the means to an end, and I have al- w a y s thought o f those people whose wealth and servants, like " Elizabeth of the German garden," for instance, created a desiretocamp out, that they should arrange to camp out indefi- nitely, and allow the money thus saved to buy as many comfort- able, not to say ideal, dining-rooms for those who can appreciate what the Lord seems not willing we should all enjoy. These are the principles of the artistic dining- room ethically expressed. Everybody wants to express this philosophy without knowing it, per- haps without believing it—that it is the keynote of a dining-room design; even in dining-rooms which are distinctly banal and tawdry, we recog- nize what the owners wished to express very well (see Fig. 1), only they had bad advice about it, and didn't say it. What they did say architecturally was really the opposite to what was intended—artificiality, stuffiness, tawdriness, lack of harmony, nouveaux riches, etc. Com- pare, if you will, Fig. 1 with Fig. 9, and I think further comment upon Fig. 1 by me will be superfluous. Then, anything that departs from the Anglo- Saxon dining-room is not to be recommended in America. Teakwood screens, bisons' heads, French window drapery and a certain heavy kind of Flemish wood carving are all inimical to the successful dining-room, albeit the bison is a dis- tinctly American product. He goes better in the hall (see Fig. 2), barring the Adirondacks cabin chimney-piece, which is out with everything else in the room. This dining-room might look ex- tremely well in Berlin or Munich, but not, we shall say, in New England—too much chance for moths and microbes; besides, we want to open the windows and breathe some air—some American air, which has more vitality in a cubic inch than they have in Europe in a cubic foot. The atmos- phere all over Europe is what they would call in England " relaxing "—dead and very unsalu- brious for the average American, who is used to our atomized champagne; at least, that is what Charles Dickens said it was like. (Read his description of sailing into
Text Appearing After Image:
7—An English Painted Dining-Room

Note About Images