The Studio yearbook of decorative art (1906)

Furniture

ornamental plaster patterns in relief; or mouldings,
as in the billiard-room (p. 49) at Wingfield,
Bournemouth. Or again, the ceiling may be
diapered by mouldings of wood (as in Mr. Wyburd's
dining-room,) or of plaster (as in numerous instances
here shown, e.g., Messrs. Goodyer's library, p. 26;
Messrs. Waring &: Gillow's drawing-room, p. 29 ; or
Messrs. Wylie & Lochhead's drawing-room, p. 34 ;
in a repeating pattern, set out for the given space;
the sunk spaces within the mouldings being left
smooth or being decorated in moulded relief
with medallions, chimerical, floral or heraldic
ornament.

The style of ceiling decoration selected
should, of course, be such as harmonises best
with the leading features of the room. Innu-
merable precedents for the last-named form of
decoration exist in old ceilings of Elizabethan or
Jacobean houses. Or, yet again—and this is
the style most characteristic of the brothers Adam,
for instance—the whole area of the ceiling may be
regarded as one large panel of itself and be treated

accordingly • the cornice being one large frame,
and every item of ornament within it, the
corner pieces included, converging to one central
point. Elegant as this type of design is, it has a
besetting tendency towards meagreness of form.
Thus the surrounding ornament, in process of time,
grew thinner and thinner, until it died away, leaving
only the excrescence in the middle, the device
beloved of suburban villa builders, to wit the
Victorian " rose," itself doomed, one may fondly
hope, to disappear altogether in favour of more
reasonable and beautiful methods of decoration.

FURNITURE.
As regards movable furniture, it is, truth to tell,
a commoner fault to have too much than too little.
One may be quite conscious of having accumulated
more possessions than one really wants, and yet be
unable to resist the spell -of the collector's craving
for fresh acquisition. In such cases a judicious
process of weeding out is often the best course to
pursue.

SIDEBOARD IN BURR ELM DESIGNED BY ERNEST W. G1MSON

WITH BRASS HANDLES EXECUTED BY H. DAVOLL

52