The Studio yearbook of decorative art (1906)

Furniture

of environment. What is
it then, if not the fact that
this handsome piece of
furniture has just the
amount of bizarre char-
acter to give it a pleasing
piquancy, yet not enough
to do violence to European
surroundings ? The same
thing surely applies to
Persian rugs and Turkey
carpets, which nobody ever,
on the score of their incon-
gruity, shrinks from intro-
ducing into the most
uncompromisingly British
homes.

At the same time it must

dining-table in mahogany designed and executed by be UP°n. ^ ^

liberty & co., ltd. furniture of any given room

ought in the main to be
such as carries out the

And though it stands to reason that glaring incon- decorative scheme of that room. This is particu-
sistencies are to be avoided, it does not necessarily larly true in the case of old houses, which may
follow that the ideal room may never include happen to have retained their original panelling
together pieces of furniture
of more than one style
and provenance. Thus, \
to name a very familiar

instance, the old-fashioned ^Ta ''^SBm

Chinese cabinet in black, JL , 'm^^BuSi

decorated with gold lacquers BB» mkx. HBBI BjLJH^T^^H

and fitted with metal B5S!!?SlSBS——
hinges and mounts, elabo- .^fife. as

rate in design and richly ■BF/^Sfll H^WH|^5S^^- KTlm

chased, hardly ever strikes WKs$wm mtm ■ «***•* wmS Bh

place in an English room, ^nSffiflSfi*t \**~*^<

although, ^ apart^ from j »n*' j; ^ r-^g^^^^j^f^j^^^ "

together the severe sim- R§

plicity of the cabinet's | j

outline, nor its strictly . ■ mWf^S^SSBSI^m ' ^-J^^^^^^^"^M I

conventional ornamenta- ^--^SS^" ■^flSBSSl BW*^"'

tion, though both these
factors, no doubt, have
something to do with it:
neither again is it the
English-made stand that ' - -----

renders the cabinet happily sideboard in waxed oak designed and executed by

congenial to divers types shapland & petter, ltd.

54