April, 1911 
AMERICAN HOMES AND GARDENS 
CORRESPONDENCE 
The Editor of AMERICAN HOMES AND GARDENS desires to extend an invitation to all its readers to send to the Correspond- 
ence Department inquiries on any matter pertaining to the decorating and furnishing of the home and to the developing of the home grounds. 
All letters accompanied by return postage will be answered promptly by mail. Replies that are of general benefit will be published in 
this Department. 
Problems in Home Furnishing 
By ALICE M. KELLOGG 
A PARLOR THAT IS TOO LIGHT 
DP rcat is dst R. I., correspon- 
dent is discouraged about her 
parlor, which has just been re- 
papered. “I. fear | have made a mistake,” 
she writes, ‘as the room looks much worse 
than it did before. The new paper is a 
warm tan-color in two tones and I find 
it accentuates the brightness of the room. 
There is a large bay with three windows, 
besides two windows on the side. The 
‘woodwork is painted white and the win- 
dow shades and thin, net curtains are 
white. The room looks garish and in- 
hospitable. Is it possible to improve it 
without putting on another paper?” 
Under the conditions described a wall 
paper of a gray-brown tone would be 
helpful in softening the light. Another 
suggestion would be to change the thin net 
curtains for cream-white scrim, trimmed 
with a lace edge and insertion, and hang- 
ing them across the glass. Over-curtains 
to hang at the side of the windows would 
also assist in darkening the room. 
DECORATING A CEILING 
A Lincoln (Neb.) reader, G. O. F., asks 
about decorating the ceiling of her parlor, 
and if it would be better to leave the 
plaster in the original white finish. 
The ceilings of houses of moderate 
cost are better treated with a water color 
tint, either cream or buff, rather than at- 
tempting an expensive decoration. If a 
wall paper must be applied to the ceil- 
ing on account of defects that cannot be 
covered with a tint, the design should be 
inconspicuous. Some wall papers have 
ceiling papers to match, but this is not 
necessary. If a considerable amount of 
money is expended on the interior of the 
house, the ceiling may be covered with 
the English relief material made for this 
purpose in various designs. This comes 
in plain white, and is intended to be 
tinted in one or more colors to suit the 
tones of the side wall and general color 
scheme. 
OBJECTS FOR A PARLOR TABLE 
“We have been boarding the past few 
years, and previous to that our furniture, 
then in storage, was all burned up in a 
fire. Consequently, on starting again this 
year to make a new home we have had 
to buy all new furnishings. In the par- 
lor we have a mahogany table with a 
round top thirty-six inches in diameter. 
What would you suggest as ornaments 
for it?’—Mrs. G. A. R., Sandusky, Ohio. 
Usually, a family has odd pieces of 
bric-a-brac on hand to meet the need de- 
scribed by this Ohio correspondent. 
Sometimes wedding presents of one kind 
and another are useful. In purchasing 
new articles it would be well to deliber- 
ate carefully so that each one piece may 
be worth the attention it will receive in 
this conspicuous position. 
(Continued on page xx) 
Garden Work About the Home 
By OLIVER INGRAHAM 
WINDOW BOXES 
‘ST WOULD like suggestions about the 
plants to grow in the boxes at the 
sides of the steps to my piazza and 
on the balcony above the piazza,” writes 
a correspondent from Columbus. 
Evergreens would, of course, be the 
best in winter, and you might use pyra- 
midal box bushes or red cedar trees or 
arborvitae. A high tree at each end of 
the box and low ones in the middle would 
give a pleasing effect. In summer these 
evergreens can be planted in the back 
yard (if they live, which may happen) 
and the boxes can then be filled with flow- 
ering plants. Geraniums. nasturtiums 
and petunias are best because they are 
vigorous growers, bloom continuously 
and make a good show. Plants with pale 
colored flowers like heliotrope will not 
be pretty in such a situation. The foli- 
age of carmas, caladiums and castor bean, 
which are sometimes used in such a sit- 
uation, is too coarse and is out of scale 
with most buildings. 
The Black Walnut is a beautiful tree 
in some localities. It grows best in mod- 
erately rich, moist soil, as in bottom 
lands near rivers. I should not attempt 
to grow it on a rocky hillside or on a 
gravelly knoll. 
it is one of our grandest trees, reach- 
ing a height of 70 feet, and it has a broad, 
open top with the foliage carried well out 
on the branches. 
It loses its leaves early in the fall, 
which is sometimes an objection, but its 
branches are bold and strong and impres- 
sive when bare. 
The gray birch is a charming tree and 
will grow anywhere. ‘There is no hand- 
somer lawn tree. It is easy to transplant 
when young, but the old clumps, which 
are so much admired, are so difficult that it 
does not pay to bother with them. 
To recommend a course of home study 
in Landscape Architecture as S. D. asks 
would be difficult. 
The course in Landscape Architecture 
at Harvard requires four years for com- 
pletion and it must be preceded by at 
least two years of work in the college. 
Such an amount of work it would be dif- 
ficult to accomplish at home, even if time 
is of no value. 
A course of reading, however, might 
be arranged, which could be finished in a 
year or two and which, with the aid of 
outdoor study and observation, would 
give one an understanding of the art and 
a more cultivated taste that might be a 
sufficient return for the labor expended. 
The technical side of the art it will be 
difficult to get from books, but the es- 
thetic side may perhaps be better grasped. 
Such a course of home reading should 
include the following books, read more 
or less in sequence: Bawn’s Essays, “Of 
(Continued on page xxi) 
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