February, 1919 
23 
The little low screens, not more than 
3' high, have always fascinated me the 
most, and they are less used than any. 
The tall, rather important Coromandel 
screens are better known, but the small 
ones are even more delightful, though 
serving an entirely different purpose. I 
saw one effectively used next to a vivid 
yellow damask settee, its Chinese de¬ 
sign on a black ground making an in¬ 
teresting color contrast. Placed near a 
doorway as it was, it was both effective 
in color and useful. 
Fireplace Screens 
Another happy use of a small screen 
is near a fireplace, not as a fire-screen 
(they are a story in themselves) but 
just a low, two or three-fold screen, 
either of damask or silk, placed near a 
big armchair, making a little more 
friendly group in front of the fire. 
These little screens may be made in a 
variety of materials, and I saw a fas¬ 
cinating one made of heavy beige col¬ 
ored paper on which little old color 
prints had been inset in oval medal¬ 
lions. The edge of the screen, as well 
as the medallions were finished off with 
a narrow green paper border. 
What a delightful touch this would 
be for a boudoir! 
An artist in the small decorative ac¬ 
cessories has devised a screen made of 
pergamyn through which the light fil¬ 
ters sufficiently to bring out the quaint 
Persian design in delicate tones. This 
was placed in a bedroom directly in 
front of the door leading to the dressing 
room and was made about 5' high. 
At a very wide doorway where the 
thoughtless architect has omitted doors 
altogether, the screen is absolutely in¬ 
dispensable. There one will need a 
very tall one and I have seen a pair of 
tall Chinese screens fitted into such a 
doorway so as to actually close. 
Their Advantage 
There is one great advantage about 
screens: they may be really as simple 
and inexpensive as you please if made 
of a good wall-paper. Even for 
the rather dignified living room, if the 
paper be chosen with great discrimi¬ 
nation and lacquered to a good tone 
such a screen would be very effective. 
There are a variety of black wall pa¬ 
pers which are excellent for this pur¬ 
pose and one or two pastoral designs, 
not to forget the bird and flower designs 
reproduced from the 18 th Century 
papers. 
The simple chintz covered screens 
are useful for the bedroom, or if one 
pleases, one may have a plain linen in 
a good color with the main design of 
the chintz repeated in the applied mo¬ 
tifs on the panels of the screen. In 
fact, inexpensive and yet effective 
screens are so easily made that one 
wonders that the department stores are 
still able to dispose of their cheap sup¬ 
ply of pseudo-Oriental variety. 
A tall Coromandel screen in an Orien¬ 
tal design may be used to cut off the 
service door in a dining room. Walls 
are oak paneled; hangings, blue dam¬ 
ask. Mrs. Edgar de Wolfe was the 
decorator 
A translucent screen of 
pergamyn on which a de¬ 
lightful Eastern landscape 
is painted insures privacy 
at the entrance to the 
dressing room. Karl Freund 
was the decorator 
To cut off the corner of a 
bedroom, a screen has been 
placed in this fashion. It is 
of plain linen with a Chi¬ 
nese motif repeated in cir¬ 
cles. Decorations by Mrs. 
Woods 
