January, 1914 AMERICAN HOMES AND GARDENS 
With careful planning a house of this sort can be well furnished at an outlay of $1,500 
How to Furnish a House on $1,500 
By Esther Singleton 
Photographs by T. C. Turner 
HE great rock that wrecks so many persons 
struggling with the problem of furnishing 
a house on a small sum of money is attempt- 
ing too much in the number of articles in- 
troduced into the rooms and too great a 
mixture of colors. The one crowds small 
rooms hopelessly and the other results in perpetual distress 
to the eye, and not infrequently to discontent of mind. 
The great variety of styles in vogue to-day is simply 
bewildering; and the amateur decorator who starts out with 
no definite ideas is soon at the mercy of the tender-hearted 
salesman. Moreover, fashions change. New fabrics and 
colors are constantly being introduced; and therefore, un- 
less one is a sufficiently practical student of house-decoration, 
she will soon 
ascertain that 
.unless advice 
is asked of 
someone that 
knows she is 
likely to buy 
an antiquated 
piece of cre- 
tonne, or to 
hang her cur- 
tains in folds 
that are out 
of date. It is 
not enough 
merely to have a comfortable home; the woman ambitious to 
do all things well wishes also to preside over a house 
that is correct in all of its details and service, no matter how 
simple it may be. 
The general tendency of the age is to simplify and to 
eliminate; and this holds true in house-decoration as well 
as in other things. The day of innumerable ornaments, 
fluttering scarfs, bows on chair legs, sashes on fenders and 
other insensate, so-called decoration, has sunk into oblivion. 
The line to-day is studied as it never, or rarely ever, was. 
Color also receives great attention. In this short article we 
attempt to give a few hints to the modest householder, who 
perhaps has just acquired a little country home and who 
has a limited allowance — let us say $1,500 — to furnish it. 
The house 
that we have 
in mind as 
a model is 
shown in the 
accompanying 
diagram. 1 1 
consists of 
two rooms on 
the ground 
floor, divided 
by the hall, in 
which the 
stairway as- 
cends. Behind 
