HOUSE AND GARDEN 
February, 
1914 
dinarily, not being able to pursue this deliberate, experimental 
and reposeful method, we must do the next best thing and try 
to hit upon some system of disposing of our goods and chattels 
in their new places without resorting to continued experimental 
shiftings. 
In the first place we must try to do what a great many people 
find extremely difficult—visualize. As a powerful auxiliary to 
this attempt to see in imagination how things will look in certain 
positions it is advis 
able to draw a dia¬ 
gram floor plan of the 
room under consider¬ 
ation, taking care to 
keep all the propor¬ 
tions quite accurate. 
If the proportions are 
not kept accurate the 
diagram will only he 
misleading and cause 
mischief to your at¬ 
tempts. 
On this floor plan, 
as a guide in furnish¬ 
ing, the proposed lo¬ 
cation of the rugs and 
various pieces of fur¬ 
niture must be map¬ 
ped out and experi¬ 
mented with. Experi¬ 
ment is absolutely 
necessary to get the 
best result. Nothing 
short of superhuman 
omniscience could 
hope to achieve suc¬ 
cess without it. But 
experimenting on pa¬ 
per is much less try¬ 
ing than experiment¬ 
ing by lifting and 
pushing heavy 
weights. It is also 
less damaging to the 
furniture itself. If 
you use pieces of 
paper cut to the shape 
of your rugs and fur¬ 
niture and in scale 
with the plan they 
may be moved around 
to give you a good 
idea of the available 
spaces. 
Before making this 
plan, however, and 
setting to work on 
our diagrammatic ex¬ 
periments we must thoroughly study the properties, the natural 
history and disposition, so to speak, of the room we are about to 
furnish. We must consider most carefully its length and breadth 
and any peculiarities of shape that may characterize it. We must 
determine whether we wish to accent the breadth and diminish 
the appearance of length, or vice versa. We must decide whether 
we wish to make the room appear larger or smaller than it really 
is. 
Next, the height of the ceiling demands thought. If it seems 
too high we must plan to “bring it down.” If it appears too low 
we must see how it can be raised. After this the location of the 
doors and windows must be studied and their relation to each 
other noted. Likewise we must think about the available wall 
spaces against which we may set the larger pieces of furniture.. 
This done, in due order we study the exposure or lighting so as- 
to determine the colors of paint, paper and upholstery and the 
most advantageous arrangement of curtains and hangings. 
Now, all this may 
seem very complex,, 
and to many it may 
appear quite unneces¬ 
sary. The only an¬ 
swer that can be 
made to such people 
is that whatever is- 
worth doing at all is 
worth doing well, and 
that to do anything 
well we must not 
grudge pains or close 
attention to detail. 
It is quite true that 
some may dispense- 
with this course of 
procedure and arrive 
at happy results by 
chance, but haphaz¬ 
ard ways are always* 
fraught with uncer¬ 
tainty. Or again,, 
others with m ore 
power to visualize 
than most people are 
blessed with, may 
plan out the room to 
the minutest detail 
and see the whole 
picture so plainly in 
their mind’s eye that 
they do not need fur¬ 
ther guidance and 
can work perfectly 
well from their men¬ 
tal survey. For the 
majority of people,, 
however, the meth¬ 
odical plan will be 
found far safer even* 
though it be slower. 
There are certaini 
well defined prin¬ 
ciples of optical illu¬ 
sion that must be¬ 
taken into considera¬ 
tion when we are- 
making the prelimi¬ 
nary study of a room and getting ready to use the furnishing 
diagram. For one thing, it is a well-known fact, at least among 
decorators, that vertical lines on a wall will increase the ap¬ 
parent height of the ceiling, while, on the other hand, horizontal 
lines on the walls will bring the ceiling down. Therefore, striped 
papers and all vertical lines are to be avoided when the ceiling is 
too high. By the same token, a picture molding, or any other 
horizontal lines, will help to remedy the defect. It is also a per- 
fectlv demonstrable fact that horizontal lines carried around the 
This is in reality a moderate-sized room, yet the open arrangement and the clear center give the impres¬ 
sion of great space 
In this German study the position of the desk out from the window, and the disposition of the surround¬ 
ing pieces show a judicious and logical arrangement 
