84 
House & Garden 
IVm. H. Noll Residence, Fort Wayne, Ind. 
Chas. R. IVeatberhogg, Architect 
BUILD YOUR NEW HOME WITH 
INDIANA LIMESTONE 
Many of the world’s finest edifices—including five 
of the seven new United States Federal Reserve 
Banks—are built of Indiana Limestone. 
But the grandeur and beauty of this material is 
not limited to public buildings of great size. It is 
magnificently adapted for home building. 
Whether you contemplate erecting a moderate 
sized residence, or an elaborate mansion, we sug¬ 
gest that you familiarize yourself with the true 
merit of Indiana Limestone. 
The cost of Indiana Limestone houses is not 
higher than of those built of any other permanent 
material, and the warm, velvety texture of the 
stone becomes more beautiful with the years. 
Upon request we shall be glad to send you 
our special booklet giving designs for moderate 
sized homes built of Indiana Limestone 
Indiana Limestone Quarrymen’s Association 
Box 782 Bedford, Indiana 
Metropolitan Service Bureau, 489 Fifth Avenue, New York City 
Collecting Old White For Decoration 
( Continued, from page 82) 
toile de Jouy patterned in white. The 
screen is of book-paper, black ground 
spotted in white and pink. The ward¬ 
robe is painted in imitations of tortoise 
shell, with little white lines suggesting 
ivory, and white butterflies on its door. 
The graduation of difference in white 
is limitless: for instance, there is the 
difference of degree, or digestion. A 
fresh white muslin curtain in a freshly 
whitewashed room has charm and sim¬ 
plicity, but it cannot be compared in 
degree with a yellowing satin curtain in 
an old room where white paint has 
taken on the polished quality of ivory. 
A glass—two glasses—three glasses of 
buttermilk are refreshing, but a glass 
of cream would be surfeiting. It is all 
a matter of quality. White must be 
used sparingly, preciously, to remain 
the motif of an arrangement, and not 
be lost in too great repetition. One re¬ 
calls the amusing trial of Whistler, when 
the critic testified that a certain Sym¬ 
phony in White contained many other 
colors—green, and brown, and so forth. 
“And does a Symphony in F contain 
only F—F—F?”, asked Whistler, “f— 
f—f—fool!” 
A collection of white is best shown 
against some definite tone—canary, or 
pink, or gray, or blue—but some tone 
that itself, in combination with deeper 
color, suggests white. White not too 
insistent, each white object being a 
subtle support, should be used like a 
recurring motif, a delicate repetition, 
of another white object. The play of 
tones and colors in white is great, but 
one has learned that it is more suc¬ 
cessful to use a lighter white against a 
deeper white than vice versa. A white 
porcelain figure—of itself a shining clear 
white—is fine against a yellowish stuff, 
or against deep cream. My living room, 
for instance, is very faintly cream, its 
white marble mantel is bluish white, 
and the two large jardinieres are of 
pinkish white, and yet there is no sug¬ 
gestion of one white melting into 
another. The painting above the mantel 
is from an old Italian screen, and shows 
a gorgeous blackamoor leading in a 
proud white horse. On the mantel shelf 
beneath are two little blackamoors. 
One of the white rooms I most en¬ 
joyed doing was a bedroom in a New 
York house built around a lovely old 
bed of white and gold. I have never 
seen such paint, as smooth and shining 
as a bowl of thick cream. This old bed 
is Italian, with four posts of equal 
height, and a great hanging head board 
with the monogram of the owner 
carved and gilded within an oval. This 
bed has a beautiful polished look, and 
its gold is as smooth as its paint. The 
bedspread is made of an old brocade of 
white ground patterned with little Wat¬ 
teau-like groups in yellow and pink and 
violet. A valance of pink silk hangs 
under the bedspread. 
This room also has many notable 
touches of white against white, the most 
amusing being the lyre-shaped fixture 
strung with pearls instead of crystals. 
To the appreciative eye these pearls 
make no more claim to preciousness than 
do crystal. They are no more an af¬ 
fectation than are the white satin cur¬ 
tains at the windows. Imitation pearls 
are beautiful things: why not use them? 
White satin is always beautiful, and 
age but mellows its beauty. I recall a 
set of old white satin wall hangings of 
the Queen Anne period, yellowed to a 
lovely frail texture and color, painted 
with perpendicular bandings of single 
roses and simple leaves. Every one who 
loves things has a few deeply cherished 
memories like this—and always I’ve had 
a dream of a room paneled in painted 
white satin. But I have only approached 
its realization in these white satin cur¬ 
tains, which are as simply made as 
muslin ones, great shining white masses 
of plain finished with pleated ruffles. 
These curtains are hung over a deep 
peach pink taffeta, so that the light may 
be kept warm. The usual rules were 
disregarded. Instead of pink over white 
we used pink under white. 
Decorative Tiles Inside and Out the House 
(Continued from page 47) 
of the architect and decorator; others 
again are new and original in conception 
and harmoniously achieve their mission 
as pure decoration. In the Enfield tiles 
there is a boldness and feeling for orna¬ 
mental effect that makes them peculiarly 
fitted for outdoor use and they carry 
with them much of the charm that chal¬ 
lenges the attention in the Moravian 
tiles. 
So far in its broadest sense, America 
has not succeeded in developing a dis¬ 
tinctly national art type and it is prob¬ 
able that our arts and industrial crafts 
will vary from European types more in 
spirit than in actual expression. And so 
in decoration. We have developed no 
style peculiarly our own, so for a time 
we harked back to specific periods, 
studying and copying them as nearly as 
we could while we were in the process of 
discovering just what was best fitted 
for our particular mode of living and 
what would best lend itself to our own 
particular environment. In our search 
for adaptable material we have the 
golden fruits of all the ages to choose 
from, and in our present mood we are 
tending towards a revulsion from neutral 
tints and smooth textures towards colors 
more positive and vibrant, and surfaces 
expressive of the nature of the material 
from which they are evolved. Plaster 
is rough cast and left to display its 
natural tone and wood is no longer dis¬ 
guised with varnishing but is allowed to 
reveal the value and beauty of its grain. 
But there are spaces that require a 
richer and more splendid treatment than 
rough cast work and open timber, and 
to produce this needed color enrichment 
tiles are being introduced, sometimes 
massed to get the effect of a body of 
solid color as required in certain walls 
and floors, or they may be distributed 
in small numbers to produce interesting 
spots of color or to supply color balance. 
They have been used most successfully 
in various ways in the structure and 
decoration of some of our most interest¬ 
ing homes. In Mrs. John L. Gardner’s 
palatial house in Boston several rooms 
and corridors are made resplendant with 
tiled floors and walls. One floor is of 
deep rich red tiles and their soft velvety 
texture is as beautiful as an oriental 
rug but more in keeping with the dis¬ 
tinctive character of the room. Another 
floor in this house is of blue tiles, a 
haunting, vibrant blue that sounds the 
dominant color note in the room. Old 
Moorish tiles embellish the walls of the 
apartment and they are as extraordinary 
in their decorative effect as a rare old 
tapestry. 
Texture also plays an equally neces¬ 
sary role in decoration and the texture 
of tiles is quite different from that of 
any other material. To produce a good 
effect, the fixed background upon which 
they appear should be in character with 
its ornament—rough plaster, concrete, ; 
and stone are most frequently used— 
and an outdoor living room, a conser¬ 
vatory, a loggia, a swimming pool or 
breakfast room though treated in the 
simplest way, will, by the addition of a 
(Continued on page 86) 
