AMERICAN HOMES AND GARDENS 
August, 
Igi2 
WITHIN THE HOUSE 
SUGGESTIONS ON INTERIOR DECORATING 
AND NOTES OF INTEREST TO ALL 
WHO DESIRE TO MAKE THE HOUSE 
MORE BEAUTIFUL AND MORE HOMELIKE 
EE OGes 
from subscribers pertaining to 
The Editor of this Department will be glad to answer all queries 
should be enclosed when a direct personal reply is desired 
ome Decoration. Stamps 
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THE DECORATION OF REMODELED 
FARMHOUSES 
By Harry Martin Yeomans 
Photographs by T. C. Turner 
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q| HERE is a certain fascination about the re- 
j|| modeling of an old house, and one’s interest 
will grow and be stimulated as the necessary 
changes are planned and visualized, to make 
it conform to the modern standard of living 
conditions, and in this manner a certain per- 
sonal element will be imparted to the house which will 
make it peculiarly one’s own. 
The tremendous interest recently evinced in all forms of 
country living, and the great number of abandoned farms 
which have been offered for sale, especially in the New 
England States, has resulted in a large number of farm 
properties being acquired by urban residents for pleasure 
or profit, or both. 
If there is a substantial, well-built house on the farm 
lands, it is always well to consider seriously the advisability 
of remodeling it in preference to building a new house. 
The old, rambling farmhouses of New England, the Dutch 
gambrel-roofed houses of New York and Long Island, and 
the old, stone farmhouses of Pennsylvania, all possess won- 
derful possibilities to the discerning eye, and satisfactory 
results can usually be obtained by remodeling, if too elabo- 
rate effects are not attempted. ‘The sturdy frames and 
honest construction of these old buildings bear silent testi- 
mony to the fact, that they were erected before the advent 
of the trade’s union, when the aim was to build, not for a 
day, but for all times. ‘The long, low roof lines, the many- 
paned windows and the simple details of the front door, 
of some of our old farmhouses, impart such an air of quaint- 
ness and charm, that these details have recently been in- 
corporated by architects in numerous modern houses of the 
farmhouse type. 
The interior arrangements can be transformed to meet 
the requirements of the present mode of living, and the 
“best parlor” and “spare bedroom” thrown into a good- 
sized living-room, the kitchen reduced in size to make possi- 
ble a larger dining-room, and, perhaps, a wing added to give 
an outdoor living-room and an additional bedroom above. 
The woodwork of the old houses was often crude, but 
it was the honest product of hand labor, and therein lies 
the indescribable charm of some of the wood-trim to be 
found in not a few old farmhouses. In some Colonial farm- 
houses will be seen rooms with paneled wainscotings, 
built-in cupboards and closets and mantelpieces that are ex- 
quisite examples of cabinetwork. All such woodwork should 
be retained, as far as it is possible to do so, and in that way 
preserve the old-time atmosphere. 
In a remodeled farmhouse, all kinds of old mahogany 
furniture can be used to advantage. It need not be so true 
to style as the furniture intended for a more pretentious 
house, and the mahogany American Empire furniture, so 
popular about 1820, will become a farmhouse dwelling. The 
old, painted rush or flag-bottomed chairs, which have but 
recently returned to favor, are appropriate for a farm- 
house, as well as the old, maple furniture, Windsor chairs, 
old oak or walnut furniture, in fact, all furniture that will 
impart a sense of comeliness and cheer, is at home in the 
remodeled farmhouse. But do not commit the unpardon- 
able sin of placing modern furniture of the Mission type 
in a home such as this. The writer recently saw what was 
otherwise a perfect dining-room, having beautiful Colonial 
detail in wood-trim and mantelpiece, which had been hope- 
lessly ruined by using a Mission dining-room set, which 
was good in itself but entirely out of place in the environ- 
ment of a Colonial farmhouse. 
Rag rugs and carpets, braided rugs, simple curtains at 
the windows, plain wall-papers, tinted or painted. wall-sur- 
faces, and hardwood or painted floors are all commendable, 
depending entirely on the amount of money to be expended. 
The bedrooms should be simple, and simplicity should 
be the keynote of the whole house, remembering that an 
elaborate decorative scheme is not consistent with a house 
of this character, one which requires the furniture indicated. 
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MUSEUMS AND DECORATIVE ART 
(Continued from page 293) 
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eee to our museums to keep alive an interest in the beaute 
ful things that helped to make life pleasant in the days of 
our forbears. 
The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York city, has 
one whole wing devoted to the display of its collection of 
decorative objects of art. This wing was designed especially 
to hold the collection and it is shown to the best possible 
advantage. Briefly described, this part of the museum con- 
sists of a large central hall, surrounded by two stories of 
smaller galleries, so that the lover of the beautiful can wan- 
der through twenty-five galleries and study the progress . 
made in the various crafts and decorative arts, as expressed 
by the workers in wood, stone, weaving, ceramics and metals, 
from the Gothic period down through the mahogany furni- 
ture of our own American renaissance. 
Those who are interested in interior decoration will hail 
with delight the chronological arrangement of these spacious 
galleries, which afford an opportunity to study from original 
pieces the furniture and woodwork of the Gothic, Italian, 
German and French renaissance periods, the French art of 
the seventeenth and the eighteenth century, and especially 
interesting to us, the English Georgian and American 
Colonial furniture of the sixteenth to the early nineteenth 
