April, 1918 
p; 
YOUR 
COUNTRY HOUSE LIVING ROOM 
Its Personality and Possibilities for Decoration—The Furniture, Rugs, Curtains 
and Accessories—Nine Suitable Color Schemes 
COSTEN FITZ-GIBBON 
U NLESS you are utterly blind to the beau¬ 
ties of the great outdoors, something of 
its spirit will inevitably creep into the furnish¬ 
ing and decoration of your country house living 
room. Something of the wide, open reaches of 
lawns. Something of the disorderly order of 
gardens. Something of the intimacy of the 
garden close and the cool shade of tall trees. 
Something of the vivid colors of old Dame Na¬ 
ture who is never too proud to be bright. 
The room can be at once formal and in¬ 
formal. Informality in decoration, however, 
never means disorder or bad taste; in the 
country house living room it means freedom 
from the stuffiness and impersonal atmosphere 
which you often find in city homes where it is 
desirable to have a formal background for 
winter entertainment. 
One should be able to move about and be 
comfortable —- and presentable — in sports 
clothes or any of the multitude of al fresco 
frocks that “go” on the lawn 
or in the garden. 
Another expression of the 
informality of such a room is 
the fact that it affords the 
perfect place to ride one’s 
hobby publicly. In the city a 
hobby has to be hidden away 
in the more personal rooms, 
but in the country house liv¬ 
ing room one can flaunt his 
penchant for boat models or 
hunting or her weakness for 
pewter or French prints or 
gardening—flaunt it, and ap¬ 
pear quite attractive. 
The Advantage of Wicker 
This informal, intimate 
spirit is expressed in the kind 
of furnishings used and the 
way they are arranged. 
Wicker, willow, reed, rattan 
—there’s a furniture family 
that is perfectly at home in 
such a room. With it go 
brilliant chintzes, furniture 
painted in strong, full colors, 
and the multitude of fiber, 
grass, rag and carpeting rugs. 
In general, the furniture 
should be such as can be 
readily moved about. This is the advantage 
of wicker and its cousins. Moreover, it can be 
painted or stained a new color each year. Good 
wicker needs no bush; it has already proven 
its value. But a room completely furnished 
in wicker is monotonous. Mix with it some 
painted furniture or even a piece or two of oak 
or walnut. One might be bold enough to go 
to the extreme of wrought iron in a room with 
wicker—a wrought iron console, for example, 
with gold and dull reds and blues rubbed 
into the turnings. 
The inexpensiveness of wicker, willow and 
reed has put them at the command of even the 
most modest purse. The same modest purse 
can afford to make the most of it by using 
interesting pillows and covering the heavier 
pieces with slip covers. 
Ten years ago slip covers meant striped Hol¬ 
land—that and nothing more. Today the 
whole gamut of chintzes is used — glazed 
chintz and plain linen piped in a contrasting 
shade—and one can readily freshen up a coun¬ 
try house living room with a new set. More¬ 
over, slip covers cover a multitude of furniture 
sins, and are quite the easiest solution for the 
problem of old furniture that must be used. 
Wall and Floor Treatments 
The walls of this living room afford a great 
variety of plaster, fabric and wood treatments. 
Molding panels are always in good taste; 
paper can readily be done over every year or 
so; lattice is interesting if handled with re¬ 
straint; rough plaster affords an unusual back¬ 
ground if tinted; and the plain painted or 
stippled wall is safe. The choice of wall 
treatment will very much depend on the kind 
of room you want to create. For the general 
run of rooms, you will require a wall light in 
tone. Keep it unobtrusive, where it belongs 
—a background, simply and solely. 
The same applies to rugs. 
Keep them down on the floor. 
They may be of carpeting, of 
fiber or of rags; they may be 
the old-fashioned hooked rugs 
or the latest of Chinese design. 
If the rug is worthy of display, 
it should not be entirely con¬ 
cealed by furniture. In gen¬ 
eral, however, the average sum¬ 
mer living room rug is merely 
something to walk on, some¬ 
thing soft under the feet, some¬ 
thing to be easily taken up, 
easily cleaned and easily laid 
down in place again. 
Perhaps the coolest floor one 
can have for summer and the 
most readily kept clean is til¬ 
ing. More expensive than wood, 
it offers an infinite variety of 
color and design treatments. 
Its apparent hardness can be 
toned down with rugs. The 
room with a tiled floor is espe¬ 
cially suitable for using 
wrought iron; there is a subtle 
connection between the two. A 
wrought iron table, a wrought 
iron mirror or two, a wrought 
iron plant-stand—these fit in 
harmoniously. Add to them 
Gillies 
In the residence of H. H. Rogers, Esq., at Southampton, L. I., is a 
little room, containing a number of boat models, that would serve for a 
bachelor’s country house living room. Walker & Gillette, architects 
