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The Decoration of Houses Summary
The Decoration of Houses, co-authored by Edith Wharton and Ogden Codman Jr. in 1897, is a seminal work on interior design that critiques Victorian excesses and advocates for classical simplicity, emphasizing principles of symmetry, proportion, and the integration of architectural elements in home decoration.
The Decoration of Houses Excerpt
Short Summary: This influential guide challenges the ornate Victorian interior design trends of its time, promoting a return to classical principles of design that prioritize architectural harmony, functionality, and aesthetic simplicity.
"Rooms may be decorated in two ways: by a superficial application of ornament totally independent of structure, or by means of those architectural features which are part of the organism of every house, inside as well as out. In the Middle Ages, when warfare and brigandage shaped the conditions of life, and men camped in their castles much as they did in their tents, it was natural that decorations should be portable, and that the naked walls of the medieval chamber should be hung with arras, while a ciel, or ceiling, of cloth stretched across the open timbers of its roof. When life became more secure, and when the Italian conquests of the Valois had acquainted men north of the Alps with the spirit of classic tradition, proportion and the relation of voids to masses gradually came to be regarded as the chief decorative values of the interior. Portable hangings were in consequence replaced by architectural ornament: in other words, the architecture of the room became its decoration. This architectural treatment held its own through every change of taste until the second quarter of the present century; but since then various influences have combined to sever the natural connection between the outside of the modern house and its interior. In the average house the architect's task seems virtually confined to the elevations and floor-plan. The designing of what are to-day regarded as insignificant details, such as mouldings, architraves, and cornices, has become a perfunctory work, hurried over and unregarded; and when this work is done, the upholsterer is called in to 'decorate' and furnish the rooms. As the result of this division of labor, house-decoration has ceased to be a branch of architecture. The upholsterer cannot be expected to have the preliminary training necessary for architectural work, and it is inevitable that in his hands form should be sacrificed to color and composition to detail. In his ignorance of the legitimate means of producing certain effects, he is driven to all manner of expedients, the result of which is a piling up of heterogeneous ornament, a multiplication of incongruous effects; and lacking, as he does, a definite first conception, his work becomes so involved that it seems impossible for him to make an end."
This passage underscores the authors' advocacy for interiors that are integral to a building's architecture, criticizing the trend of superficial decoration disconnected from structural design. They emphasize that true decoration arises from architectural elements, not merely applied ornamentation, and lament the shift towards viewing decoration as separate from architecture, leading to disjointed and aesthetically displeasing interiors."
