International studio (32.1907)

Architecture and Decoration

often found in getting these
effects in posing should
make this publication use-
ful for ideas and sugges-
tions in church decoration,
poster work, decorative
painting, etc. The plates
are tied in an attractive and
durable portfolio backed
and edged with cloth.

Much practical informa-
tion is compacted in Paul
N. Hasluck’s little primer
“House Decoration” (Cas-
sell and Company, Lim-
ited). The book is fully
illustrated with line draw-
ings and diagrams, and the
instructions are presented
succinctly. Persons who
try their hand at the actual
processes of putting on paint, mixing pigments,
working with distemper, wallpaper, etc., without
being able to boast any appropriate training in the
corresponding trades, should, if they have any
knack for the thing, be able to shift and experiment
for themselves with the aid of this handbook. The
chapters on decoration of walls and ceilings and on
painting and papering rooms are in themselves
short handbooks of instruction. Those on pig-
ments, oil, driers, varnishes, tools, mixing paint,
etc., are conveniently arranged for reference. A
useful description of a variety of brushes is given
with directions for their use and care.

In “House Hints” (House Hints Publishing
Company), C. E. Schermerhorn describes details
concerning the site, location, arrangement, con-
struction, plastering, heating, plumbing, lighting,
decorating, and furnishing of the house, an admir-
able notebook of practical advice. The book is
arranged in little paragraphs with index, which
makes it a convenient treatise to turn to. Some-
thing like 150 subjects in all are treated in brief
fashion. The author’s view shows itself in the
foreword:

“Many of the annoyances that attend house
building would be avoided if the knowledge ac-
quired during the process had been possessed in
the beginning, and the house builder should, there-
fore, familiarize himself with as much as possible
that concerns the erection of houses before he
starts. Bear in mind that, in building enterprises,

the unexpected is bound to happen, and the house
that exists in the mind’s eye is rarely embodied and
the ideal seldom realized.”

If there is one thing which no good gardener
can tolerate it is the “rockery.” But a heap of
stones and brick rubbish with a few stunted ferns
and a tangle of dusty ivy is not a rock garden. More
often than not, too, the attempted rock garden is
laid out in some tree-shaded corner where sun and
air, the very essentials to the happiness of rock
plants, never penetrate. If a crop of stones is
desired, on can alwrays go and farm on a glacial
morain. It is to those who are genuinely inter-
ested in the Alpine plants themselves that Charles
Thonger addresses himself in his “Book of Rock
and Water Gardens,” (John Lane Company). It
is commonly supposed that plants usually found
in high mountains cannot be grown successfully in
lowland gardens. The fact is that it is not so much
the altitude that suits these delightful miniature
flowers, but rather the absence of plants of robust
habit and coarse growth in the surroundings. The
silene and diminutive mosses find a shelter in the
crannies, and the Alpine poppy secures a foothold
on barren spots because there more vigorous
growth will not smother it out of existence. Nine
rock gardens out of ten are hopelessly overgrown
and overcrowded. The plants must be kept in
colonies for successful results and, with larger
plants in the neighborhood, root restriction becomes
of first importance.

xxrx