With a striking architectural treatment 
bright-colored rugs are effective 
Almost anyone could build a rustic seat like the 
one by this Adirondark shelter-camp 
Furnishing the Camp 
or Summer Home 
SUGGESTIONS FOR AN IMPROVEMENT OVER 
THE COMMON USE OF CASTOFF FURNITURE 
by Louise Shrimpton 
Photographs by Jessie Tarbox Beals and others 
The Indian baskets lend color to this 
gray stone chimney breast 
T HE ordinary summer camp or cottage is often used as a 
dumping ground for cast-off furniture. Chairs and 
tables representing the fads of the past thirty years or so jostle 
each other on the living-room floor, in startling contrast with 
rough walls and a simple fireplace. The constructive features 
of the camp, usually in harmony with rugged surroundings, are 
completely overshadowed by this motley method of furnishing. 
In the camp of distinction more restful conditions prevail, 
and furniture and fitments are planned with especial regard to 
their environment of woods and fields. The old furniture of a 
city home is thought unsuitable for use in such a camp, as an 
old top-hat or a discarded ball-gown are judged unsuitable for 
wear in the woods. 
Built-in furniture is employed wherever possible and is, like 
the interior woodwork, of inexpensive wood. Rough seats and 
tables as well as cupboards and shelves are often built against 
the walls of a camp, adding greatly to its attractiveness and 
saving space. A large screen fastened to a wall is used in one 
instance to divide a room in two, and is folded back against the 
wall when not needed. In another case a movable partition is 
formed by a large dish cupboard reaching nearly to the ceiling, 
with doors opening on each side, and drawers that are pulled 
out in either direction. This cupboard is the division between 
kitchen and living-room, so that the 
space devoted to either room can be 
changed at any time. Built-in window 
seats are often made in bedrooms, with 
leather hinges and straps, and are used 
as clothes-chests. 
An interesting variety of camp fur¬ 
niture is made of cedar posts, planed on 
inside surfaces that come into contact 
with the hand, and with outer surfaces 
left untouched except for the removal of 
the bark. These primitive pieces, mas¬ 
sive in construction, seem a natural out¬ 
growth of the woods, and are stained in 
forest tones of grayish green or brown. 
It is easy for an amateur cabinet-maker 
to build furniture of this type, and rainy 
days at camp are often utilized for this 
occupation. A good example of a simple bedstead is shown in 
our illustration of a camp bedroom. This bedstead is unusu¬ 
ally large, and is built of massive cedar posts, fastened together 
with wooden tenons and wooden pins. The natural contour of 
logs and saplings is preserved on the outer surfaces, and the 
piece is stained a green that is modified by the warm tones of 
the cedar. The bench in our photograph of an Adirondack 
shelter camp might easily be built as an indoor settle to place 
in front of a fireplace, and could be made comfortable with 
seat-cushion and pillows of inexpensive material. Morris and 
other chairs could be built in similar fashion. As much atten¬ 
tion is given to design anil proportion in this style of furniture 
as in any other, but the only finish is the satin-like quality pos¬ 
sessed by the wood next the bark. In some pieces such as gun 
racks or cupboards the bark is left on, together with little 
branches that are utilized as hooks. 
The furniture used by our pioneer ancestors in their log 
cabin homes was built in a simple and primitive style that is in 
perfect keeping with the camp of to-day. Those of us who 
possess a great-grandfather’s chair with rush or splint bottom 
seats, or old chests and tables of simple pattern, can put them 
to no better use than in the country lodges, in surroundings that 
duplicate the earliest stage of their existence. Many of these 
relics of former outposts of civilization 
are still to be found in country attics or 
kitchens, and cheap reproductions are 
made by a few furniture firms in unfin¬ 
ished woods that can be stained or 
painted by the purchasers. 
It is a futile undertaking to attempt 
to “decorate” a camp or summer cottage. 
The natural grain of the interior wood¬ 
work. the interesting grouping of stones 
or brick in the fireplace, are decorations 
enough for the walls. If other wall cov¬ 
ering than a rough wainscot is needed, 
then building paper, a cheap Japanese 
matting, or even the matting from tea- 
chests, may be utilized. Old fence rails, 
or the weathered gray boarding from old 
houses, are sometimes employed for in- 
Have your local blacksmith hammer out 
a pair of andirons 
( 230 ) 
