DECORATIVE ART IN AMERICA. 



249 



of Miss Louise McLoughlin to secure effects 

 similar to those produced at Limoges. These 

 were measurably successful, but the outcome 

 has been of more importance, since it has pro- 

 duced new wares of great beauty, and inde- 

 pendent methods of decoration that are of 

 value. The Ohio clays have proved not only 

 to be adapted to various kinds of pottery, but 

 to have qualities that approach porcelain in 

 delicacy and translucence. The Rockwood 

 pottery is known by a very desirable cream- 

 bodied ware, and the chief direction of its 

 efforts is to the production of household arti- 

 cles of more artistic shapes. The work, how- 

 ever, has been carried much farther than this; 

 the finest specimen of ware from this pot- 

 tery is a pale creamy, translucent body to 

 which a hammered effect has been given. The 

 decoration is modeled and applied, and its 

 careful drawing and harmonious, delicate color- 

 ing place it in every way among the best ex- 

 amples of its kind. The work in the natural 

 clays has been very interesting, especially in 

 pate sur pate, and illustrates the resources in 

 the clays of that locality. The imitations of 

 Doultonand Hispano-Moresque wares have been 

 very good, but are at best but imitations. The 

 Chelsea manufactories of art-pottery have been 

 chiefly devoted to good shapes, and to the pro- 

 duction of colors and glazes. The work is 

 chiefly due to Mr. Robinson, whose labors in 

 certain directions have met with great success. 



Iron. Work in iron has been limited for the 

 most part to special orders. Elihu Vedder has 

 designed some fire-backs brought out in cast- 

 iron, that have attracted attention. There 

 have also been some reproductions of Japanese 

 work, a fine sample of which is seen in the 

 Villard house. The work in this country in 

 wrought-iron has been chiefly confined to the 

 reproduction of the work of famous periods. 

 Ferdinand Brothers, of Paterson, N. J., have 

 been thoroughly imbued with the spirit of fif- 

 teenth-century work, and to this firm we owe 

 much of the revival of wrought-iron. It is to 

 their credit that they have disdained all the 

 easier methods of producing work that simply 

 resembles the designs they reproduce, but ad- 

 here to the legitimate handicraft of the old 

 masters of wrought-iron. They have done 

 something in modern and more realistic de- 

 signs, and these are executed with the same 

 technical fidelity. A pair of andirons, for ex- 

 ample, simulate a crooked branch of oak, with 

 leaves and acorns. These details, by modern 

 mechanical short-cuts, might have been cutout 

 and brazed on. But, on the contrary, they are 

 hammered and drawn out, preserving carefully 

 the drawing and peculiarities of the natural 

 growth. 0. A. Wellington & Co., of Boston, 

 must be credited also with admirable work of 

 this sort. Mr. Wellington was once a jeweler, 

 and applies to his new craft the consideration 

 that he gave to his former work. 



Tracery. Some allusion must be made to 

 the introduction of Indian design in this coun- 



try by Lockwood De Forest, and its adapta- 

 tion to American wares. After a two-years' 

 sojourn in northern India, Mr. De Forest re- 

 turned to this country, bringing with him a 

 multitude of samples of the fertile tracery 

 found in the Mohammedan temples of that 

 country. This tracery he has copied for him 

 in wood, brass, and stone by the native work- 

 men, and it is coming into very general use 

 in this country as panels for furniture in brass 

 and wood, registers, window -screens, and nu- 

 merous other ways. A conspicuous example 

 of its use is in the dining-room ceiling of 

 the house of Charles J. Osborne, at Marnaro- 

 neck. The room is paneled in red mahog- 

 any, with a frieze of the wood incised in 

 Moorish designs. The ceiling is divided into 

 panels filled with the brass tracery and over- 

 laid with a more open design in perforated 

 wood-carving. The panels are framed in bands 

 of finer wood-carving, and combine to make a 

 ceiling of great richness and beauty. 



In General. While the interest in decorative 

 art has been wide-spread, there are very few 

 buildings that can be mentioned as instances 

 of anything that is either complete or per- 

 manent. The most conspicuous example is 

 Trinity Church, Boston, which, from its in- 

 ception to its completion, was intended to be 

 unique. But this intention, although the 

 church is in a measure finished, and in every 

 way interesting, has not the value of a com- 

 plete decorative expression, since it is, as it 

 stands, the result of compromises, and some 

 times of effects misapprehended. The Union 

 League Club Building, and the Veterans' room 

 of the Seventh Regiment Armory, are inter- 

 esting examples of some of the earliest work 

 done. The decoration of the Brick Church on 

 Fifth Avenue, to be remarked for its Byzan- 

 tine character and use of early Christian sym- 

 bolism, illustrates the disadvantages under 

 which the artist must work when hampered by 

 the architecture of earlier years. The Metro- 

 politan Opera-House, when finished, will be one 

 of the best examples of coherent decoration. 

 Thus far, nothing permanent can be said to 

 exist, beyond the dome. This marks a new 

 era in the decoration of buildings of this kind 

 in America, and there is no house of the kind 

 in Europe, the decoration of which belongs to 

 any class to which it can be assigned. 



The progress of decorative art, however, is 

 not to be found alone in the centers of wealth. 

 From another point of view, its spread through- 

 out the country has been most beneficial : while 

 we find much that is crude and much that is 

 extravagant, the level of appreciation and taste 

 is higher. A point not to be overlooked is, 

 that it has given a new interest to the homes 

 of those who live in the remoter parts of the 

 country. Travelers perceive in the domestic 

 architecture of the humbler sort the influence 

 of the modern revival made known through 

 the agencies only of publications of different 

 kinds. Queen Anne is a household word, and 



