96 
A LIVING room that welcomes a 
stranger is an achievement. More 
especially it is a happy harbor to the 
family members who call it home. 
The strong appeal of such a room comes 
from the choice of furniture that provides 
comfort and a place for easy relaxation. 
Appropriate Northfield upholstered pieces 
offer an especially happy choice of furniture 
for the only room open to most visitors. For 
Northfield furniture invites guests to comfort. 
And when over-night guests come the full 
size comfortable bed, folded underneath the 
soft davenport seat, offers still further hos¬ 
pitality. Not a suspicion of its presence, how¬ 
ever, comes from any detail of upholstery 
or design. Northfield designs are all by a 
nationally known designer, their coverings 
are all chosen by a well known interior 
decorator. Their styling is perfect. 
Your selection may be of the period type 
illustrated or of an overstuffed design of 
wonderful comfort or from among those 
colorfully decorated fibre groups so full of 
interest for either the living room or sun 
parlor. Your furniture dealer will show 
them all to you, and tell you of their merits. 
A Booklet, “The Davenport with 
a Secret” sent on request. 
THE NORTHFIELD COMPANY 
Jlakers oj Good Furniture 
SHEBOYGAN, WISCONSIN 
fd 
BED D AVE/N P O R.TS' 
Everyyenuine North- 
field piece bears the 
Northfield 
trade mark 
House G ar d en \\ 
GARDENS IN TAPESTRIES 
{Continued from page 60 ) 
from several high jets into a broad basin 
and the architecture and ornament char¬ 
acteristically Gothic. 
With the advent of the Renaissance 
the hand of man supplanted the vagaries 
of Nature and gardening became a 
branch of architecture. All casualness 
was gone. The formal plan was superim¬ 
posed on every plot and even a small 
park became interlaced with paths, 
steps and bridges with a pavilion to 
mark every intersection. The passion 
for antiquity found its full vent and 
made of these pavilions miniature 
Greek temples. Even the plants were 
dignified by being put in Roman urns. 
Fountains became elaborate sculptural 
achievements and the more romantic 
classicists recreated on their hillocks 
Acropolic and Forum ruins of broken 
columns and isolated pediments. 
So elaborate did the gardens of the i6th 
Century become that they form without 
any personnages an adequate theme for 
tapestry design, many cartoons having 
been created to depict their marble intri¬ 
cacies. Strangely enough, the formalism 
in these gardens seems to have been 
confined to the architecture, what trees 
and plants there are being left in their 
native state. But trees and plants are in 
decidedly minor roles. Often in the 
immediate foreground there is a trellis 
upheld by caryatides. Through this is 
seen the vista storied up to a high narrow 
sky with balustrades and gateways, two 
tiered porticoes, arches, detached pedi¬ 
ments, lone columns and all the odds 
and ends of Roman ruins. Sometimes 
there are, immediately around the castle 
itself, narrow garden beds with carefully 
schooled patterns of evergreens, and 
occasionally there is a maze. 
In the 17th and i8th Centuries land¬ 
scape gardening was a fully developed 
art. Gardening as gardening rather than 
as an excuse for architecture came into its 
own. In place of imitation temples and 
ruins the designers created the long vista 
down an alley of spaced trees and formal 
garden plots. Thus the main design was 
developed, as of course it should be, in 
the planting. But it was still very formal, 
essentially architectural in feeling. 
The tapestries show these designed 
garden beds cut in geometrical shapes ] 
symmetrically placed to combine into i 
larger geometrical figures. Every one has : 
its own patterned planting, low trimmed 
bushes in scrolls and arabesques, each i 
complete in itself but, in this respect too, ■ 
all combining into a continuous outline. , 
There is real skill and beauty in many of 
these brocaded gardens, though it is to be 
sure a beauty not truly of gardening but 
of draughtsmanship. 
But the most delightful inventions of 
the garden architects of this period were 
in their pools and fountains. Water, still 
and flowing, was an essential part of every 
plan. Sometimes the long vistas carry 
down a succession of narrow unrufiled 
pools instead of down the more usual 
garden walks. From deep grottoes a thin 
unexpected stream jetted out into a low 
basin. Other grottoes made a veritable 
lace work of spray with many jets bursting 
to different heights and tumbling back 
one above the other in foamy tiers. The 
sculptors, adding their ingenuity, almost 
exceeded themselves in the quaint aper¬ 
tures that they devised. The rustle and 
splash of water purls through all of these 
palace gardens, making itself heard even 
through the tapestry weave. 
A garden is a charming theme for 
tapestry. It fulfills every requisite of the 
design. It is full and rich and varied, 
providing endless delicate detail. It can 
be conventionalized without losing its 
realism, can be enlivened with minor 
episodes, and can be pitched in almost 
any range of colors. The leafy softness 
withdraws into the background of the 
room but yet it offers interest to leisurely 
e.xploration, a most adaptable motive. 
Could modern gardens and modern 
garden painting inspire a new school of 
tapestry cartoons? Not, surely, any of 
the painting that uses gardens as one 
more opportunity to experiment in the 
interplay of lights for light has no place 
in woven wool. But modern gardens in 
their richness and variety should stimu¬ 
late some painter to a rendition in terms 
of forms and pattern with deep full 
colors and so lead to a revival of this high I 
textile tradition. | 
FOOTLIGHTS AND FURNITURE 
{Continued from page 65 ) 
an audience, do not quicken the play. 
The attention of the audience is stum¬ 
bling continually over furniture. Take 
the classic example of the need of sur¬ 
roundings to accentuate a psychological 
condition. In Mr. Belasco’s “The 
Return of Peter Grimm”, the poignancy 
of Peter’s coming back after death lies 
in his immaterial presence amidst his 
old things—the absence of certain objects, 
like his tobacco and hat and cloak, 
emphasize his death; but his sentimental 
recognition of familiar details adds to 
the poignancy of the gulf which separates 
the living from the dead. I feel assured 
that the full force of Peter’s return could 
have been more directly effective, had 
the stage been less filled with so many 
small details—perfect of their kind, but 
distracting because of the close attention 
they demanded. As it is, Mr. Belasco 
triumphed over a difficult scene; but I 
am sure today he could do it better, 
now that the philosophy of scene craft— 
simplicity—is the accepted decorative 
creed. 
The dramatist is his own architect; 
he must know the house in which his 
characters dwell; otherwise he might 
send them upstairs where stairs are 
impossible to be placed. The architect 
in the audience w'ould be quick to feel 
that. The dramatist sets the scene. 
and his choice is the wEole range of ■ 
life’s external background. Pinero’s ; 
“The Amazons” had a scene in a gymna¬ 
sium; Belasco’s “The Governor’s Lady” 
called for a Child’s restaurant; Zoe Akins’ 1 
“A Texas Nightingale” showed a model 
kitchen; Shaw’s “You Never Can i 
Tell” designated a dentist’s office. 1 
The scenic artist’s ingenuity must meet 
all such emergencies. But in a way he 
is freer than the interior decorator. 
He may to an extent be his own architect 
also, and so arrange his rooms or his 
windows or his halls or his staircases 
in such position as to aid him in his de¬ 
sign. The interior decorator goes into 
a house already fashioned, and has to 
select the accessories to fit the shape, 
height and lighting of the room. In view 
of what I’ve seen on the stage and what 
I know happens in homes, I believe I 
will consult my decorator at the same 
time I am talking matters over with 
my architect, when it comes to building 
the home of my dreams. 
The dramatist clearly indicates that at 
certain moments his characters sit—some¬ 
times on chairs, sometimes on sofas; that 
a letter is to be written, that a telephone 
is to be used, that a piano is to be played 
by the heroine or some minor character. 
These accessories are essential; they are 
{Continued on page 98 ) 
