Manaal of Design Richard Redgrave.R.A, i6f Co.'s Prices are for nett Cash only, without Discount. COOPER COOPER & CO., {EXCLUSIVE TEAMEN), 50, King William Street, London Bridge ; 63, Bishopsgate Street Within, E.G. ; 268, Regent Circus, W. ; aad 35, Strand, W.C. (near Charing Cross). South Kensington Museum Art Handbooks. INDEX TO PARTICULARS OF MANUFACTURES AND ILLUSTRATIONS OF TRADE ANNOUNCEMENTS. PAGE Art Furniture — Messrs. Druce & Co.'s 3 Autotype Fine Art Gallery — The Autotype Company's 4 Books, Art — Messrs. Smith, Elder, & Co.'s 6 Books, Art — Messrs. Chapman & Hall's 12 Carpets (Turkish, Persian, and Indian) — Messrs. Cardinal & Harford's . . 14. Carpets (Persian, Indian, and Turkish) — ^Messrs. Watson, Bontor, & Co.'s . 13 Chemical Food — Messrs. Liebig & Co. 's 8 Corn Flour — Messrs. Brown & Poison's 10 Japan, China, and India Art Manufactures — Messrs. Farmer & Rogers's . . 13 King's College ^ Knockabout Bag — Messrs. L. & S. Harron's g Mosaic Pavement and Venetian Glass — Messrs. Dr. Salviati, Burke, & Co.'s 4ih page of Cover Macassar Oil, Odonto, and Kalydor — Messrs. A. Rowland & Sons' 2nd page of Cover Mincing Machines, &c. — Mr. J. F. Lovelock's 9 Music — Messrs. Novello, Ewer, & Co.'s 5 Musicallnstruments— Messrs. Keith, Prowse, & Co.'s 7 Ointment, &c.— Mr. Thomas Holloway's 9 Pens, Steel— Messrs. Joseph Gillott & Son's 12 Persia, Japan, China, and India Art Manufactures — Messrs. Lasenby Liberty, & Co.'s 3rd page of Cover Tea — Messrs. Cooper Cooper & Co.'s 2 Yorkshire Relish, &c.— Messrs. Goodall, Backhouse & Co.'s . . . ir SOUTH KENSINGTON MUSEUM ART HANDBOOKS. NO- 6.-A MANUAL OF DESIGN. MANUAL OF DESIGN COMPILED FROM THE WRITINGS AND ADDRESSES OF RICHARD REDGRAVE, R.A., Surveyor of Her Majesty's Pictures, Late Inspector-General for Art, Science and Art Department, BY GILBERT R. REDGRAVE. Published for the Committee of Council on Education, BY CHAPMAN AND HALL, LIMITED, II, HENRIETTA STREET, COVENT GARDEN. 1882. /2 3&t- CHARLES SICKENS AND £VANS, CRYSTAL PALACE PRESS. PREFACE. During Mr. Redgrave's long and active service in con- nexion with the Schools of Art and the foundatibn of the South Kensington Museum, from which he has so lately- retired, as well as in his appointed duties relating to the International Exhibitions in this country and in France, he was called upon to prepare numerous official reports. On many occasions, also, he was required, when presenting medals and prizes to the Students, to address them on the course of their studies, and on the technical training of the designer. His reports and addresses defined and formulated many new principles of ornamental design, and contained various practical suggestions concerning the methods upon which his system of teaching had been founded. The chief of these documents which have been officially printed, are : — 1. Report on Design. Exhibition of iSjl. 2. Report on Design as applied to Manufactroes. Paris, 1855. 3. Report on Applications of Drawing and Modelling to the Common Arts. Paris, 1867. 4. Report on the present state of Design. Annual International Ex- hibition, 1871. 5. Evidence before the Commission, on the Government School of Design, 1847. 6. On the necessity of Principles in teaching Design, 1853. 7. Catalogue of Cabinet Work, Gore House, 1853. The teaching of these reports has long been acknow- ledged as of recognised authority, and it has been Vl PREFACE. frequently proposed that the matter contained in them should be collated and published, as it would form a useful book of reference and a manual of the principles of design. It has been more than once suggested to me to under- take the duty; but it was not until it was formally pro- posed to me, by the Lords of the Committee of Council on Education, that such a work should form part of the series of South Kensington Museum Art Handbooks, that I was led with some diffidence to see how far I might be able to do justice to this task, involving, as it did, the compilation of so large a portion of the thought and labour of my father's long official career. I felt the more pleasure in attempting this work, from the gratification afforded to my father by their Lordships' selection of me, and from the assurances I received from him of his advice and assistance. In undertaking this compilation, I have confined myself almost wholly to his own words. Indeed, nearly all the matter might be placed in inverted commas. I have studied to arrange and bring together like things in the order and upon the plan which my father has in most cases pursued, to avoid the repetitions which would naturally arise in such a series of documents, and to omit only such matters as had a local and temporary interest. G. R. R. May, 1876, CONTENTS. SECTION I. The Principles of Ornament. CHAPTER I. PAGE Preliminary Remarks 3 CHAPTER II. On the Source of Style 12 CHAPTER III. On the Elements of Style arising out of Construction . 29 ' CHAPTER IV. On Utility, which must be considered before Decoration . 36 CHAPTER V. On Fitness of the Ornament to the Material to which it IS applied 43 CHAPTER VI. On Unity of Style and Decorative subordination. . . 48 viii CONTENTS. SECTION II. The Application of the Principles of Ornament to the Manufactures. CHAPTER VII. PAGE On the Nature and General Application of Ornamental Art . . i 55 CHAPTER VIII, On the Decoration of Buildings . . > • c • 65 CHAPTER IX. On Domestic and other Furniture ... ... 87 CHAPTER X. On Domestic Utensils and Objects op Personal Use , ,112 CHAPTER XI. On the Decoration of Garment Fabrics 133 SECTION in. The Teaching of Ornament, and the Education of the Designer. CHAPTER XII. On Art Education in this Country and Abroad . . .155 CHAPTER XIII. On the Special Education of the Designer . , , .169 SECTION I. THE PRINCIPLES OF ORNAMENT. A MANUAL OF DESIGN CHAPTER T. PRELIMINARY REMARKS. There are certain periods in the history of the world or of individual nations, when some important event, some discovery, or some cause which deeply affects the public mind, produces a corresponding change in art also. Such for instance, in civilized Europe, was the change produced by the discovery of printing and the dissemination by its means of the writings and thoughts of the ancients. These led to the study and contemplation of those fragments of antique art which had survived the injuries of time and barbarism, and the result of their study was to re- constitute beauty as the prevailing principle of art : they led also to the subversion of the religious sentiment which had, for many ages, been the leading and all-pervading idea of art. Again, when from political changes art became gradually estranged from its Italian cradle, to be fostered by the growing power of the French kings ; and when the victories of the Four- teenth Louis had gained him the title of the Great Monarcli, art also was led captive in his triumph. No longer satisfied with .beauty, she decked herself to please him in " barbaric pomp and B 2 4 A MANUAL OF DESIGN. gold": splendour and display became her ruling principles, and the Louis Quatorze style called after his name was formed. As we approach still nearer to our own sera other changes, not so marked, but equally characteristic, might be noticed as influencing art through changes in the outer and surrounding world : all these changes are clearly discernible to us who look back upon them ; we can even trace them to apparent causes ; but rising gradually and imperceptibly in their own age, they were then not clearly noted as points of departure, as they did not sufficiently influence the prevailing taste to form a new and distinctive style. In any critical examination of the present state of design, our attention is in the first place forcibly directed towards France, which has long ruled our taste in such matters. It may, therefore, be as well in the first place to glance at tlie conditions which have led to this state of things, and caused our neighbours for so long a period to rule supreme n matters of taste. The decorative arts, attracted to France by Francis the First, were actively patronized and encouraged by the succeeding House of Bourbon. Colbert, the Minister of the great Louis, established, as royal manufactories, the tapestry and furniture works of the Gobelins, Beauvais, and Aubusson, and in these works the most skilled workmen, aided by the most scientific men of the age, executed the designs of the first artists of France. In the suc- ceeding reign the porcelain works of Sevres became also a royal establishment with the like appliances for artistic excellence. In these royal manufactories every effort was made to attain the highest degree of perfection, and the works were carried on with princely munificence, entirely irrespective of the cost of production. By Colbert also, schools for the instruction of the workmen in drawing and the elements of art were organized in some of the principal seats of French manufactures. By these means France, and more especially Paris, gradually became looked up to for works of luxury. The products of her A MANUAL OF DESIGN. 5 royal manufactories were spread abroad among the other nations of Europe, either by purchase, or as gifts to the various monarchs and princes, and the skilled labours of French workmen gra- dually led the surrounding countries to recognize her as the school of the decorative arts, and the acknowledged arbitress of taste. The Revolution, and the long wars that succeeded it, though repressing for a time the intercourse with France, did not deprive her of those institutions which had tended thus to advance her in the eyes of the nations, neither did they disperse the continuous band of skilled workmen and cunning artificers who would emanate from these factories to raise still higher the pretensions of France tp be considered the chief source of objects of luxury and taste. To the protracted wars which had divided this Island from the Continent, and in many respects the Continental nations from each other, succeeded an equally long peace, during which com- merce increased, and the accumulating wealth of Europe became everywhere invested in those vast undertakings which facilitate the intercourse of nations. By these means we were led insensibly to the first of those gatherings which were to bring together in one place all that science, skilled labour, and the arts could produce, and by which each country endeavours to supply the growing wants, and to tempt the increasing taste for luxury in its own and other lands. It was under this natural tendency of the age, and arising out of it, that the first great gathering of the national industries took place in 1851. It took place, not inappropriately, in our own country, which had most diligently laboured in the improvement of the means of intercourse, and had most actively promoted the free communication of nations, by the construction of railroads and ships, and the removal of commercial restrictions. To this first Exhibition, France, our nearest neighbour, was, after ourselves, the greatest contributor, and especially so in those 6 A MANUAL OF DESIGN. objects for which she had so long held a high reputation. The first gathering of the industries of the world was speedily followed by a second in France itself. In this second Exhibition the fine arts were more fully asso- ciated with industry as an integral portion of the Exhibition than in 1851, and the artists of Europe who had been invited — painters, sculptors, and architects — largely responded to the call. The entire of the arts thus formed a most judicious addition, and one which gave a marked character to the First Paris Universal Exhi- bition, inasmuch as the reciprocal influence of the arts on manu- facture could be carefully examined. Former periods of advance in the products of the artizan in any country have always been connected with progress in the fine arts, and there is reason to believe that taste and skill in manu- factures are seldom attained by a country in which the fine arts are neglected, or not properly cultivated or encouraged. Here then was afforded an opportunity on a grand scale to consider the two in their mutual relations, and to examine the assembled products of the manufacturer and the artizan, together with those of the artists of the several countries ; in order to test if the inspi- rations of the latter had indeed led the others to a higher degree of taste, excellence, and skilful manipulation. It has been already noticed that great public events, and the changed characteristics of the age, result in marked epochs of art and industry ; and it is not too much to believe that these great international exhibitions, arising out of and consequent upon the scientific improvements of the age and upon the improved means of intercourse, may conduce to some such important change in public taste. In these exhibitions the manufacturers of all coun- tries are striving to compete, not so much in works of ordinary excellence, as. in the production of such as shall outvie each other, and be considered markedly in advance of the taste and skill of the times. The result of these competitive struggles must be an advance to real excellence, or a retrograde movement A MANUAL OF DESIGN. 7 towards decline, according as they are made on sound, or on ill- understood principles. There would, however, be little difficulty in showing that, in former periods, the introduction of one false principle in deco- rative art, diverging at first but slightly from the truth, has led gradually to the entire adoption of a false, vitiated, and merer tricious style. It is therefore most necessary that nothing should be taken upon trust, but that a searching investigation should be made at the present time, lest we are led astray by the grandeur of these displays, the vast amount of skilled labour, and the gorgeousness of the materials used, to accept the false for the true, the meretricious for the excellent, or the gaudy for the magnificent. We must not allow the blandishments of false and meretricious excellence, or of skill misapplied, to hinder the con- denmation of works, however rare the talent displayed on them, but rather the reverse, for mediocrity will rarely lead us astray ; it is the sins of genius that lead the multitude to do evil, and in such cases the more the talent the greater the crime. On entering upon such an examination it must be remembered that there are many difficulties in the way of a just judgment. As has been remarked, such exhibitions, however much it may be desired that they should do so, hardly represent the normal state of the manufacture. Each manufacturer is striving his utmost to attain notice and reward, not so much, it is to be feared, by an effort after perfect taste in his goods, as by an endeavour to catch the consumers by startling novelty or meretricious decoration, leading, in most cases, to an extreme redundancy of ornament. The goods are like the gilded cakes in the booths of our country fairs, no longer for use, but to attract customers. Moreover, in endeavouring to form a just estimate of European manufactures the differences of national taste must not be over- looked. It will be universally allowed that the French as a people are more deeply imbued with the love of and the desire for ornament than other nations of Europe, and that, as compared 8 A MANUAL OF DESIGN. with this country, the general knowledge of the middle and lower classes of Paris is, in such matters, above that of the same rank in England. * For this there are many causes, arising from political circum- stances, climate, mode of living, and a hundred other things wherein they differ from us islanders. , Family life abroad differs so entirely from what it is in England. In the case of our nearest neighbours the French, what we understand by home-life is almost unknown — lofty erections of several stories permit several families to live under one roof, and without great cOst to the tenant a more decorative treatment of the general structure is rendered possible. The places of general entertainment, intended for the pleasure of the many, are richly decorated, and each individual lives more or less in public, and in the enjoyment of public splendours. The taste of successive monarchs, suiting itself to the genius of the people, has led to the erection of magnificent palaces in Paris and its environs, and the talent of the greatest artists of France has from time to time been engaged to decorate them. Rich in carvings, in costly marbles, in gilding and painting, in mirrors and arabesques, these palaces contain also collections of the rarest pictures and the finest sculptures of the artists of all ages. They are at certain times open to the people, and on fStes and holidays are crowded, as a matter of right, by all classes, from the ouvrier in his blouse to the shopkeeper, the merchant, and the man of fashion. These great national works, the constant sight of which has stimulated the public taste for ornament and decorative enrich- ment, have been the school for a body of skilled artists and workmen capable of gratifying the taste thus fostered, and we find that many of the theatres, the cafds, the restaurants, and even the shops of Paris, in the richness of their decoration and the splendour of their gilding, vie with the palaces, which they attempt to rival. A MANUAL OF DESIGN. 9 But all this decoration constantly around the Parisian, imbuing him unconsciously with a knowledge of and taste for ornament, and insensibly forming his inclinations and educating his eye, has its defects as well as its advantages Accustomed to gaze on the splendour, the gorgeous enrich- ments of palaces, to sit weekly in their salons on velvet couches, not alone to enjoy the chastened art of the great works that adorn their walls, but to feast his eyes on the gilded blandishments of the chambers in which these works of art are enshrined ; accus- tomed also to the glittering brilliancy of his cafd, adorned for his delectation, and in many senses of the word more his home than the nightly dormitory he retires to from them, he cannot be con- tent in his own house with the simple furniture suitable to his rank. His small apartments are fitted up for show rather than for comfort, a word not in his language : everything must simulate his out-of- door experiences, and if he cannot afford realities he will obtain the appearance of them by gaudy finery and over-decoration. In his commodes, his armoires, his hangings, his couches, his pendules, and his candelabra, utility is too often overlooked in favour of display and ornamentation. Taste, therefore, which is in accordance with the habits, in- clinations, and general disposition of any people, may be national without being correct. It is with nations as it is with individuals concerning whom we hear it said that one has a vulgar taste, another a refined taste, one a mean taste, another a taste for the beautiful or the magnificent. Thus in referring to the ancients, all who have had any knowledge of ancient art or literature would at once say that the Greeks as a people had a taste for the refined and the beautiful ; in literature, always entering into the most subtile definitions and the nicest distinctions, and in art, refining all they undertook with the most sensitive perception of what is perfect ; never leaving a new creation until they had by continual effort arrived at the most beautiful form, proportion, and colour of which it was capable. 10 A MANUAL OF DESIGN. The Romans, who succeeded to their art, were of a different temperament: grandeur and massiveness were the leading cha- racteristics of their taste. Larger in mind than the Greeks, there was at the same time a coarse strength in their nature ; and a barbaric grandeur to which Greek art never attained, was the cor- responding result. This was shown in the vast extent of their public buildings (such as the Baths of Titus and the Coliseum, compared with which the largest works of the Greeks would appear diminutive), in the coarse vigour and bold relief of their orna- mentation, and the spherical curves of their mouldings. Thus we see, that while each nation had a taste, the taste of each was wholly different ; and in examining French taste, which has so long dominated over the nations of Europe, it is most desirable thoroughly to search into its principles, that we may know when it is worthy of being admitted and followed, and when it is to be rejected, in order that a higher, purer, and more simple taste may be sought after in its stead. We have already shown that French art is accommodated to the mind of the French people, and reacts upon it j that it is up to their requirements, mental and sentimental, and certainly not beyond them. Whatever it might have formerly done, it now ministers to the inclinations of the people, but does not lead them. The French are a pleasure-loving people, of a gay and lively disposition, with a sensuous indulgence in pleasurable enjoyments, a proper national vanity and a love of display. To this their whole industrial art ministers; and from all causes, natural and induced, the tendency of the national taste is evidently to glitter and over-ornamentation to display and finery rather than to decorated usefulness. We repeat therefore that it is most desirable as France has been so long acknowledged as the arbitress of European taste and fashion that we should test thoroughly the ground of her pretensions, and should beware lest unconsciously " the world is still deceived with ornament," and A MANUAL OF DESIGN. ii led astray by pretentious display, instead of advancing in the road to real excellence. The first step in this direction will be to attempt to lay down some general principles of taste in decoration, deduced from those works which in all ages have been considered excellent. Without such principles for our guidance, the inquiry would descend into vague and unsatisfactory assertions, a course which has fostered the idea that taste has no settled laws, but is a mere matter of fashion or individual feeling, against which there is neither dispute nor appeal CHAPTER IL ON THE SOURCE OF STYLE. In attempting to define the principles which should govern decorative design, the first consideration must be given to those dominating influences, which pervading all the works of a period, subordinate them to what is called style. These influences, as we have already seen, may, and indeed must be various : they generally arise out of circumstances which impress the universal mind of the age, or of some nation pre-eminently great in learning, rule, manufacture, commerce, or the arts. Style, indeed, will be universal in proportion as the sentiment which inspires it is more or less widely prevalent, more or less akin to our common nature ; and on this account those styles which have arisen out of the religious sentiment are generally co- extensive with the religion which produced them. When these influences arise out of the purer and nobler qualities of man's nature, the style they produce will be noble also, and being constantly around us, contribute in no small degree to raise the tone of individual and national feeling. The influence of a mean style, founded upon the ignoble or sensual qualities, will in a like degree tend to degrade not only ova taste but our moral intellect also. Thus the governing influences of Greece, when her art was formed, were the worship of the Deity through his created forms and attributes of 6eauty ; and a sentiment of purity and beauty A MANUAL OF DESIGN. 13 became the characteristics of Greek art. In the latter days of this people, when the poetical religion gave way before the subtilty of her philosophers, the sense of the beautiful only remained, and the principle of her art, deprived of the zealous fire that even an imperfect religious sentiment inspires, became more sensual under the domination of abstract beauty only. When the Greeks were conquered by the Romans, and their artists transplanted to serve the conquerors, they brought with them their own dominant principle, sensuous beauty. This, how- ever, alone, ill suited the spirit of their proud rulers. In the full career of universal conquest, pomp and splendour were their governing iniluences, and a new style was formed, wherein a degree of barbarous grandeur dominated over the element of beauty. As the Romans, from being the conquerors, in turn became the conquered, their art died out under the mean and con- temptible desire to appear what they no longer were ; having no influence sufficiently strong to inspire their artists, they became degraded imitators, and even broke down the mighty works of their fathers, to build trophies to call after their own names. The all-pervading spirit which had been present in the growth of Roman art being gone, Europe was ready for the new influence, which, gradually working on society, was to pervade all the nations in various degrees with the spirit of Christianity, and to produce the new styles called Romanesque and Gothic, wherein the senti- ment of religion again largely prevailed. And perhaps the very circumstance that religion was presented by means of art materially to the senses, rather than spiritually to the reason and intellect, increased the universality of the influence. Not only had the churches, but even the houses and all the worldly goods of our fathers, the outward impress of these new styles, which appearing first in the erection and decoration of splendid temples devoted to the worship of the Deity, gradually gave to all things an ecclesiastical character also. 14 A MANUAL OF DESIGN. When, from the causes before glanced at, the renaissance of ancient art took place, it was impossible that any sentiment of leligion, which, in its own age, it might have possessed, could be re-bom with it ; the beautiful only was sought in this revival ; — beauty, however, more or less tainted with the sensuality and pride of the peoples from the study of whose remains the resurrection to new life had been attempted. Revived moreover without a thorough identity between the sentiment of the age, and the sentiment of the past which pro- duced it, this style became at once subject to national modifica- tions. In our own country it resulted in the Tudor, a style redundant yet mean and grotesque; without ingenuity, and without any constructive truth or consistency. It bore the impress of a people willing to borrow their art at second-hand rather than endeavour to cultivate it at home. Flemish, Italian, and French versions of the renaissance were mixed up in a strange medley with the Gothic of the preceding age, and the style had a character arising out of its very errors and absurdities. In France the renaissance was gradually modified by successive monarchs, until the revived love of beauty which had given it re-birth gave place to the sentiment of pride. It was modified to pander to the self-esteem of the monarchs and people of the age, and mere meretricious splendour resulted in that style which is called the style of Louis Quinze. In all that this style differed from the true renaissance, it differed merely as arising out of decoration, and from the love for mere magnificence and display, for which it was admirably adapted, being one of the most suitable styles for gilding, and for brilhancy and sparkle in metal and or-molu work; showy and glittering beyond anything at- tainable in the simpler forms of the renaissance or -of classic antiquity. It must however be allowed to have a sufficiency of marked characteristics to rank as an acknowledged style ; the last in order which decorative art has developed, and, with the other instances A MANUAL OF DESIGN. 15 brought together, tends to establish that one of the first elements of true style is an all-pervading and over-ruling sentiment. In considering the elements of style, it must be remembered, that style does not merely relate to decoration, as is too often supposed, but originates in construction, to which decoration is only subsidiary. All the great seras of style have been notedly jeras of changed construction. The mound-like temples of Egypt> the horizontal constructions of Greece, the arched vaultings of Rome, the vertical aspirings of Gothic buildings, contain elements of STYLE as marked in their bare walls, as when, in their com- pleted state, they are covered with the rich decorative treatments ■peculiar to them. These preUminary arguments being admitted, it will follow, first, that style implies some dominating influence reflecting the mind of the age in all its works, and therefore presumes a CCTtain unity of character throughout Secondly, that the primary elements of style are constructive, and that the design of a work must have regard to construction, and consequently to proper use of materials, prior to the con- sideration of its ornamental decoration. Thirdly, that as construction necessarily implies a purpose utility must have the precedence of decoration. Fourthly, as construction necessitates a proper consideration of materials, and as each material has its own mode of mani- pulation, and is wrought by separate and varied processes j design must be bad which appUes indiscriminately the same constructive forms or ornamental treatments to materials differing in their nature and application. Fifthly, that as the greater regulates the lesser, the building should determine the style, and all which it contains of furniture or decoration should conform to its characteristics ; and thus there would be a proper uniformity of style throughout, and a subordination of all the inferior objects to one another and to the whole. i6 A MANUAL OF DESIGN. Many minor principles are contained under each of these several propositions. In the few words of discussion on each, necessary to connect them with our present subject, these will be noticed, and it is hoped that the preliminary argument will lead to a- better understanding of the whole question of decorative design as illustrated subsequently in our remarks upon our various manufactures. The subject of the first proposition — ^the prevailing influence characterizing works and thus producing style, has already been touched upon. When this influence is neither strong nor general, characteristic indications of style will be slight and hardly notice- able, and the age will be imitative rather than original : even the slight national character that is present in art labours being less observable by the people themselves than by others. Thus although to Englishmen there appeared so little origin- ality in the art applied to oiur own manufactures at Paris in the International Exhibition of 1855 as to incline us to regard them as devoid of any peculiar character, we were less at a loss to perceive a nationality in those produced in Germany, France, or Spain. It was some satisfaction, therefore, on various occasions to hear the same remark from Frenchmen and others on the manufactures of their own land, namely, that they could recognize national characteristics, and many indications of novelty and unity of style in British goods, these qualities being absent to them in their own ; a subject which seemed most justly a cause of regret on their part Our mutual remarks are therefore somewhat en- couraging to each other, and we may hope that there are influences at work to raise us above the rank of mere imitators of the men of other lands and other times — and as imitators necessarily short- comers — and that we may thus impress the national character of our age and people on our art and our works. The great effort that is now made towards a wide-spread development of art education in Great Britain — and this not alone for the upper and middle classes, but for all, even the A MANUAL OF DESIGN. 17 poorest, must tell upon the rising generation. Once properly instructed, there is very little doubt that the plain good sense, the energy of will, and the dislike of mere display of our countrymen will result in works of much higher excellence in decorative art than has yet been attained in this country. The artizan will thus be empowered to add to his admitted manual dexterity and thorough workmanship, the knowledge and taste that will enable him to join beauty to excellence, and to cany out the labours which the advanced taste of the general public will demand at his hands. It has been said above that we are rarely sensible of our own growth and progress, and thus it is most difficult to estimate whether any sentiment arising amongst us is sufficiently strong, per- sistent, and all-prevailing to produce a style. Such, however, may be the case notwithstanding our lack of the power to perceive it. There seem to be many symptoms that the desired change is arising, and will arise out of, or be very materially influenced by the great scientific improvements and discoveries of our times. Not however directly, but indirectly. Changed materials are altering the whole system of construction, and utility, in such works, is of necessity a paramount consideration ; the iron road has opened up to the multitude the power of seeing and enjoying nature ; the camera fixes her most fleeting images, and allows us to surround ourselves with evidences of the marvellous and infinite variety of her beauties ; the art of nature-printing places the very accidents of growth and structure palpably before us. As the altered character of the materials, and the necessity of strictly considering utility in our scientific works, has improved our knowledge of structure and weaned us from mere precedents in constructive art; so the opportunity of seeing and enjoying nature, and of searching into the details of her beautiful variety, has led to such a love and delight in natural objects as may be productive of a new style in decorative art also. If these sources of novelty are rightly understood and directed, they point indeed i8 A MANUAL OF DESIGN. to a most hopeful future, if due regard is paid to the principles of ornamental adaptation hereafter to be laid down. If there was any perceptible advance towards novelty in design in the great Exhibition of 1851, it was the tendency to naturalistic treatments of ornament, pervading not only those fabrics wherein imitative renderings are easily adapted, but those manufactures also in which the primary consideration of structure and use required at least some modification in the application of Nature's details to manufactures — as, for instance, in furniture and metal-work. As an indication, however, of an increased love of nature, and of recurrence to her, as the true source of ornamental decoration, this tendency, notwithstanding its errors, may be hailed with satisfaction and our endeavours should be earnestly directed to avoid former faults, and to teach the right mode of seeing and making use of nature. This must be accomplished not by the mere imitative rendering of flowers and foliage, which is a means of study, but not the end : the ornamentist must be a much deeper student, if he would found a new style. If he seeks out the mode of development of vegetable growth, he will find that regularity and symmetry are the normal laws, while all that is irregular is accidental and extraneous. This is in strict accordance with the principles of ornament in the best times ; indeed, iu this lies the true distinction between pictorial and ornamental art; that which has been called dis- paragingly naturalistic ornament, arises firom the ornamentist for- getting his own laws, and the absolute laws of natural growth, and taking to mere pictorial imitation, which regards the accidents- and disturbances of growth only. These normal laws would instruct the ornamentist that nature is developed in strict geometrical and numerical rhythm. Thus- leaves are placed on the supporting stem either continuously opposite, or alternate, or numerically recurrent ; and as are the leaves, so are the future stems placed also. Again, varied quan- tity would be learnt from the study of nature ; wlule it would be A MANUAL OF DESIGN. 19 found that all vegetation is developed under a law of numbers ; those numbers most largely prevail whose correspondent geometric forms give the greatest variety consistent with symmetry. Thus three, corresponding with the triangle, is the law of inflorescence of all endogenous vegetation, whilst the flowers of exogens are developed numerically as five, corresponding with the pentagon, much more largely than as four, the less varied root of the square ; thus contributing to the greatest amount of symmetry consistent with variety. Moreover, the ornamentist might learn something of restraint, and be warned against over-ornamentation, by seeing how nature restricts her true ornaments, the flowers, to the most salient and culminating points of plants, and sprinkles them sparingly, con- trasted with the foliage. It is not in place here to allude to the colours of nature, because the endeavour is simply to prove that the principle of symmetrical arrangement, advocated as the true law of ornament, is to be deduced from the study of nature's laws of growth. Our aim, while referring to the hope that an increased acquaintance with nature may be operating to produce a style, is to insist upon the necessity of a thorough examination of and not a mere superficial acquaintance with her works : we shall then find " the art itself is nature," and that as Shakespeare tells us — " Nature is made better by no mean, But nature makes that mean ; so o'er that art. Which you say adds to nature, is an art ' That nature malces." There was ever a true sense of ornamental distribution in the early Italian works which extended even to pictorial art when applied decoratively to walls, the principle being derived from Byzantine sources. This principle was not wholly neglected by artists so late as the time of Francia and Bartolom^o, as is evidenced in their balanced and symmetrical compositions. When, however, pictorial art began to assert itself over the decorative, and to assume its own high place and ofiice, then the c 2 20 A MANUAL OF DESIGN. ornamental principle succumbed to pictorial treatment, and the painted ornament, as well as much also of the ornamental sculpture of the early renaissance, became pictorial and un- symmetrical. This will at once be seen by anyone who examines the bas-reliefs, or even the fruit and foliage of the architrave of the Florentine gates by Ghiberti. Herein pictorial art reigns paramount ; the frieze which surrounds the gates is an imitative rendering of nature, hardly disposed according to the law of geometrical distribution; even the bas-reliefs are pictorial not sculpturesque : many planes enter into their composition ; so that it may be said that the painter rather than the sculptor — the artist certainly rather than the omamentist— has composed them. The return to classic examples stayed the innovation for a time in sculpture of the cinquecento period ; but the irregular treatment became more dominant than ever in the 17 th century. It must be admitted that there are styles dependent for their A MANUAL OF DESIGN. 21 character oii the absence both of symmetry and of constructive truth. The style called after Louis Quatorze ignores all con- structive truth : — Supporting forms are twisted and have even their continuity broken, and in the ornamental details symmetry is pur- posely disregarded, the aim evidently being to startle or surprise us by novelty and magnificence. Thus rich veneers, costly marbles, finely chased or-molu, with a profusion of gild- ing, give a mere- tricious splendour viciously alluring and dangerous to young designers. We reproduce here a sofa (Fig. i), from Assilineau, to illus- trate the foregoing observations. The opening of Japan also has brought the art ot this people more prominently before us of late; an art which rejects sym- metry as a principle. But in the beautiful productions of this art-sensitive people, the absence ot symmetry is compensated for by their refined feeling for balance of quantity, both of form and of colour^— and this, aided by its novelty and from its very quaintness, makes us overlook the distortion arising from the unsymmetrical coii- A.Reid. del. Fin. 2. 22 A MANUAL OF DESIGN. struction of their furniture. Eventually, however, even here the absence of symmetry is felt to be an error in principle. The little cabinet (Fig. 2) will serve as an illustration of the Japanese irregular treatment. Yet from what has been said, it must be evident that the law of symmetrical arrangement is not only in accordance with a deeper insight into nature's working, but moreover lends itself to the absolute necessities of many manufactures, especially in this age of machinery, and proves the best means for the display of form and colour in all. The naturalistic view on the other hand is not only difficult of execution in many manufactures and fabrics, but is a mere surface view of nature, only concerning itself with what is open to every one, and neglecting those hidden truths which lie at the root of the whole subject. That man's love of nature who studies her inmost secrets to apply them anew to his handiwork, must be much more intense than his who only looks at her to make false and exaggerated imitations of roses, poppies, and peonies, to sprawl them over carpets and who reverses even her simplest laws to stand brass candlesticks on the points of leaves ; who causes gas to jet out of the corollas of flowers, or who covers with bunches of grapes or sprays of ivy the fronts of cabinets or buffets. The one studies nature, the other caricatures her. It is in this spirit of a loving study of nature, coupled with a due appreciation for art, that the courses in our public art schools are now arranged. Alternately with the study of ornament, the pupil has natural foliage, fruit, and flowers placed before himj he is taught to imitate natural objects carefully, then to investigate the laws of their growth and development ; and finally, as a step to invention, he is instructed how to arrange according to like geo- metrical laws and principles the unnumbered beautiful forms and varied colours with which nature supplies him. Moreover, many able writers and earnest workmen in this country have of late years endeavoured to inculcate the true A MANUAL OF DESIGN. 23 principles of decorative art, and of the application of nature's forms to ornament ; and a general sense of the truth of these principles begins to prevail. The question of the direct imitation, or the conventional treat- ment of natural objects as the details of ornament, has been of late much discussed, and requires indeed the fullest consideration, if, as has been suggested, there is a likelihood that the electrotype and the camera are leading, through a deeper insight into nature, to novelty of style ; while a recurrence to nature for new elements is enforced in our schools. It must be remembered that absolute imitation, difficult in fine art, is almost impossible in many manufactures, whether pro- duced by hand or by the machine, and therefore imitation can be but a question of degree. Take for instance the application of art more peculiarly to manufacture by machinery ; say in the case of calico-printing. Here the precise imitation of natural objects is impossible, since relief is unattainable, although the appearance of relief may be given by light, shade, perspective, and colour. But is the mode or degree of imitation peculiar to the artist flower- painter that which is most suitable or conducive to the desired €nd ? In the first place, the processes of production control the application of colour, which must be laid on in separate and un- blended masses by means of machinery, and not by that curious and delicate instrument the human hand, while the several tints also must be applied by successive and distinct processes; so that it would seem scarcely possible that calico-printing could compete with the imitative means at the disposal of the flower- painter. Let us, however, allow that by improved mechanical and scientific aids the imitation of flowers, foliage, or other natural objects in light, shadow, growth, colour, and relief could be rendered as perfect by machinery as it is by a Van Huysum or a Daniel Seghers ; still the art is to be applied to a specific use, and not to be examined as a picture is. The fabric on which the 24 A MANUAL OF DESIGN. painting is to be impressed is partly transparent, and the forms are at once blurred and indistinct ; the garment it is intended to be made into is to hang full and in folds ; thus the light, shade, and the very forms of the object which has been imitated, are con- fused and hidden, and that imitation which the manufacturer has been at such pains to produce is entirely lost and destroyed. The garment moves with every motion of the wearer, and any ex- amination of this rare art, as we are enabled to examine the painter's work, is, by the very use of the material, as impossible as it is undesirable. Printing again necessitates a constant repetition of the same details ; and what would be said of the painter who, instead of a rare flower or group of flowers, offered for our admiration a dozen or a hundred, of the same monotonous form, the same unvaried colour, the same tedious arrangement of imitation? if the painter's imitation is sought for by the calico-printer ; — let at least each flower, each sprig, each group, be varied and different JBut, no ; such is not the end in view : it is not to imitate the painter, it is not to attempt to vie with nature that is the true aim of the calico-printer. The legitimate art to be applied to such fabrics is at once seen to be simply to decorate or enrich the surface with agreeable forms and colours, and if for this purpose we employ the beautiful forms and colours of natural objects, it must be consistently with the true use and purpose of the material and with the means at am command to produce the effect sought for. As the machinery by which the art is reproduced acts by a constant repetition, a geometrical distri- bution of forms is more or less a necessity which cannot be overcome. As the tints must be laid on separately and suc- cessively, and cannot be softened or blended, the simplest com- bination of tints and colours must be sought for rather than the more intricate ; a condition necessitated also in point of cost and called for by the market offered for such goods. If varied hues of colour are introduced ; to be agreeable to A MANUAL OF DESIGN. 25 the eye, colour must be distributed according to fixed laws of quantity and juxta-position ; and this is scarcely attainable by that mode of imitation which is called naturaHstic, while it lends itself readily to that symmetrical and regular display of the plant which is called a " conventional treatment," a treatment shown to be consistent with the natural laws of the growth of plants, as it is also with that simple impression which flowers in their natural state of growth make on the casual observer. It has been already said that direct imitation of nature pertains to fine art, but not to ornament other than as a means of study. Even in fine art, imitation, although the necessary language of the art, is impertinent and mean when it becomes the end sought, or as an eloquent writer has expressed it, "so degrading a thing is deception even in the approach or appearance of it, that all painting which even reaches the mark of apparent realization is degraded in so doing." (Ruskin, Seven Lamps, p. 31.) Thus we acknowledge at once the sublimity and grandeur of Rembrandt, the deep mysteries of his generalised imitation of nature's great truths, while we despise the mean littleness of his pupil Dow, who wasted the capabilities of his art in the deceptive treatment of the rind of an onion, the knitting of a stocking, or in producing hair by hair the texture of fur. The sculptor, moreover, does not seek deceptive imitation, but rather the normal form only ; otherwise it would not be neces- sary to consider if the colouring of flesh or draperies was permis- sible to the statuary : it would, as being the nearest approach to deceptive imitation, be the highest effort of his art. Such, how- ever, is not the case ; and although the ignorant are in the habit of making imitative deception a ground of wonder, the more in- .telligent and educated have consented to place it very low in the scale of artistic qualifications, and to agree with the assertion " that no art is noble which in any way depends on direct imita- tion for its effect on the mind." But if mere imitation is inconsistent with nobility in fine art. 26 A MANUAL OF DESIGN: it is also as inconsistent with the principles as it is with the means at command in ornamental art, which seeks either symbolic expres- sion, or the merely beautiful, or both in combination. Its forms and colours of beauty and richness must be derived from nature, but are not of necessity copies of her works. "Symbolic ex- pression," as has been said, "appeals altogether to thoughts, and in noways trusts to realization." Thus the well-known wave scroll of the Greeks was not imitative : it truly s)fmbolized the ever-recurring waves of their inland sea, but at the same time it was an abstract form of beauty also. This was indeed the case with all their ornament ; they chose, no doubt, the most elegant forms from leaf and flower, but they cared not to preserve the least actual resemblance to the type they copied. Their orna- ment was all abstractedly beautiful, the most elegant and refined curves being chosen and the most rigid s)Tnmetry observed ; some- times as simply recurrent as in the wave scroll ; sometimes alternately recurrent, as in the anthemion and tulip form of the frieze of the Erectheum, but always rhythmical. The Egyptians, although deriving the details of their orna- ment more evidently from nature, still treated them strictly as ornament and arranged them accordingly ; and not to tire with instances, the Jews (to whom, if there ever was a true inspiration of genius, we are to believe such inspiration was given), deriving their ornament from natural objects, were taught by divine com- mand to arrange it symmetrically and in a continuous order, the robe of their Ephod being bordered with " a golden bell and a pomegranate, a golden bell and a pomegranate upon the hem of the robe round about." These principles of symmetry — of conventional treatment— and geometrical arrangement were handed down to us from the nations of antiquity through the Byzantine omamentists, and pre- vailed almost exclusively in Romanesque decoration, and largely, if less decidedly so, in Gothic. If such laws of arrangement A MANUAL OF DESIGN. 27 were necessary when ornament was produced by handicraft labour, how much more so are they in our age of production by machinery. In all ornament so produced, whether by printing, stamping, or weaving, some law of geometrical recurrence, both of form and colour, is enforced by the requisite repeats, and takes place, however we may strive to disguise it, at oft-recurring in- tervals ; and the question is whether we shall strive to ignore and hide it in efforts aitex pictorial art, or whether it is not more judi- cious to accept it as a law and make it subservient to our own purposes, in the extended use now more than ever advocated, of nature's treasures. While on the subject of style we must remember that old styles are, and perhaps ever will be imitated : and indeed the larger number of modern works are based upon imitations ; but the mere imitation of past works will not renew or give real vitality to an old style. In order to do this, the artist must enter into the spirit of the past age, and be imbued with the same feelings that then prevailed; and not only the artist, but the world also for whom he labours. The artist must go with the spirit of his own time, or be strong enough to lead it, and this can only be done by an earnest and convinced will. Indeed, it must be allowed that in general the age as much makes the artist as the artist the age. Even in reproductions of old styles, national character has much to do with the result ; thus in English works some sympathy with the Gothic is largely evident, while in France the styles reproduced are mostly the cinquecento renais- sance, and that of Louis XIV. and XV. It appears a curious anomaly, although, as has been shown it is really very consistent with the French character, that in France, a Catholic country, there is so little tendency to revert to the truly ecclesiastical styles. The direction of French taste is certainly not to the Gothic, far less so indeed than is the case in Protestant England. Even in those objects and utensils which 28 A MANUAL OF DESIGN. are for the service of the Church, the Gothic style is rarely used, the Romanesque occurs perhaps more frequently, while there is a strong tendency to take renaissance types for these purposes, not only in chalices, flagons, monstrances, &c., but also in altar work. And yet the renaissance is essentially a sensuous style, and far more fitted for the banqueting-table than for the altar. CHAPTER III. ON THE ELEMENTS OF STYLE ARISING OUT OF CONSTRUCTION. The second preposition states that the primary elements oi style are constructive, and that the design of a work must have regard to construction, and consequently to the proper use of materials, prior to the consideration of its ornamental decoration. That the primary elements of style are constructive will at once be manifest when it is remembered that the constructive application of materials gives the broad distinction between the architecture of the ancient and of the modem world. The ancient races sought grandeur and sublimity by building temples formed of enormous masses of stone simply imposed on one another, the remains of which we still gaze at with wonder and surprise. It is true that the feeling inspired is of the earth, earthy, the building of necessity clings to earth : we think less of the gods that were honoured by these labours than of the men that wrought them ; yet, lookmg upon the huge cyclopean walls, the monolithic pillars, and the enormous lintels of these mighty structures, we acknowledge that, if man is magnified rather than God, " there were giants on the earth in those days." Such is the horizontal system of construction. Our Gothic fathers wrought altogether in another spirit ; in all their doings they were looking upwards. Like the Israelites of old, each had his own offering, each as it were brought his gift to 30 A MANUAL OF DESIGN. the altar, his stone to the building, and lifted it higher and higher towards the God of heaven, to whom the sacrifice was made, and who alone was to be magnified by the work. Such is the vertical system of construction, differing alike in the sentiment that in- spired it and in the mode of using the materials of construction, and consequently in all the elements of style. The primary consideration of construction is so necessary to pure design, that it may be taken as a rule that when- ever style and ornament are found to be debased, it will be seen that constructive truth was first disregarded, and that those styles which are considered the purest ; and the best periods of those styles, are just those wherein constructive utiUty has been rightly understood, and most fully attended to. Thus in the masterpieces of Gothic architecture, the necessities of construction produced much of the decoration ; for instance, flying and other buttresses and pinnacles, constructively necessary to resist the thrusts of the inner groined work and roof, were by the skill of the Gothic architect rendered strikingly beautiful and ornamental features, materially ministering to character. In castellated architecture also, the battlements and machicolations, at first constructed for use, were made to contribute largely to enrichment. On the contrary, the renaissance architect being in too many cases but the mere revivalist of ancient classic constructive de- tails, was obliged in order to apply these details to modem uses to resort to continual constructive shams and falsities. The introduction of the arch into construction by the Romans had tended, even in their own age, to modify the ancient principle, and when classic architecture was revived at the aera of the re- naissance, the men of those days, who had seen the Gothic temple in its glory, were tempted to endeavour still more to unite the horizontal with the perpendicular principle. The two thoughts, however, are essentially distinct, as are all the constructive details they lead to, and a mixed or composite system of architecture is not to be formed by taking the ranges of columns, the porticoes^ A MANUAL OF DESIGN. 31 and roof-formed pediments of classic architecture, and piling them one upon another, as a child raises higher and higher his house of cards. If such a mixed style is to be arrived at, it can only be accomplished by an entirely new departure, by some master- mind starting from the constructive root, thence building up the necessary parts, and gradually decorating the construction as it arises. Half the gross faults of bad styles may fairly be traced to false construction, and the use of constructive parts merely for decoration, and this whether in architecture or in ornament, which is ever dependent upon it. It was this that debased the Gothic in its last period ; it was this that reversed the columns of the Tudor style ; tliat broke through pedimental roofings, or placed them un- necessarily within one another j and finally it was the want of even constructive probability that led to the gross extravagances of the Rococo style, and in the characterless age, which has just passed away, crowded our streets with absurdities, and made our archi- tecture a byword and a reproach. Architecture became the mere bond slave of precedents — precedents followed perhaps in the letter but never in the spirit ; and thus the mere imitator lorded it over the original thinker. If a church was to be designed, the last consideration of the architect was the arrangement of the general plan, the constructive utility, the comfort and convenience of the people who were to hear and pray, the modes and require- ments of the worship that was to be therein celebrated ; these were wholly overlooked in order to patch together some Grecian portico and Gothic spire. Or, was a museum to be built, so long as some classic structure could be adapted to the elevation, what care was there concerning the contents that were to be arranged or dis- played therein, the convenience for lighting the objects so as to be, seen to the best advantage, the best arrangements for visiting them, the provision for future extensions, or the characteristic expression of the whole that was to arise out of all these con- siderations. How best to stint the various heights within to the 32 A MANUAL OIi DESIGN, diameters and proportions of some oft-reproduced portico was the great question, thus the whole was evolved with the cold frigidity of a dead and classic period, ill adapted to modem wants. From the same causes our theatres looked like prisons so far as any- outward character was observed, and our workhouses assumed the jaunty air of cockney palaces. But if this was the case with our public buildings, it can scarcely be said that our private ones fared better. In our towns, the archi- tect was so hedged in by fiscal regulations, and tied and bound by Acts of Parliament regulating the form, the size, and the number of openings for light and air, the mode of structure, and the very scantlings of his materials, — so watched was he by district surveyors, and so prevented, by all possible means, from any attempt at originality ; in consequence of being required to build streets to pattern, with houses all alike within and without, that his imagination, was spell-bound, and the new quarters of our towns were neces- sarily as regular as, and far less striking than, a range of cottoa mills. How different this from the vigorous licence of our fore- fathers, whose picturesque barbarisms and careless vigour yet surprise and delight us. What wonder that men who were to design houses to be erected by dozens to the same pattern became so chilled down to the one dead level of imimaginative uniformity, that to fit a plan to some classic elevation from Greece or Rome was the utmost stretch of their inventive powers. Happily, how- ever, these times have passed away, and a new race of architects has arisen with the new order of things. But while our architects were content to put columns that supported nothing, roofs that covered nothing, and parapets and balustrades that protected nothing ; to contrive sham attics to hide the construction of ugly roofs, to make us peep through the scroll-work of a frieze, or the channels of a triglyph instead of a window, or to make the pedestal of a statue into a chimney-pot ; how was it likely to fare with furniture, which became a sort of toy architecture ? Was it to be wondered at that all constructive A MANUAL OF DESIGN. 33 shams were increased tenfold when used as ornament ? was it surprising that Grecian stone altars formed our sideboards, Roman temples our cabinets, sarcophagi our cellarets and wine coolers, or that our harpsichords stood on lyres instead of legs ; that constructive truth, in short, was wholly and entirely disregarded, in order that some favourite type might be reproduced ? Was it to be wondered at, moreover, that men broke loose from these dead shams, and, getting sick of these classicalities, entirely deserted constructive truth and symmetrical arrangement; went mad first after Rococoism, and then, in our own days, after picturesque naturalism, and that the very revolution of taste, produced the wildest contradictory faults. It has already been remarked that true constniction includes the proper use of materials ; and it might be added that much of what is ornamentally constructive will naturally arise from this source. Thus, how much of beauty in architecture is owing to the arch, at first no doubt a structural necessity, arising out of the impossibility of quarrying blocks of sufficient size to bridge over the wide spaces and intercolumniations of the trabeated system in large buildings. Again, how much beauty is due to the tracery formed by the ribs of groins in Gothic architecture, necessary in themselves to combine lightness with strength. How much also of real character and even of beauty is to be observed in the displayed construction of our old timber houses, with their quarterings and braces, their projecting bays, carved knee timbers, and pierced barge-boards ; things apparently tending to an unpromising effect, but when honestly treated, contributing to picturesque beauty and character. So also it might be with our brick buildings — a neces- sity of our geographical situation on a vast bed of clay, where stone is a costly material — if the material were treated in good faith, and not hidden by the smooth hypocrisy of stucco. How much of life and vivacity might be given to the dull monotony of our streets by the varied interchange of the colour of the bricks, helped perhaps by coloured surface glazings, which would resist 34 A MANUAL OF DESIGN. damp and smoke, and which, but for the cheap facility of cement, would surely have been perfected long ago. Our present space will not allow us to enter upon this subject at any length, or it might be fully shown how much that is of importance in " design " is contained in the right use of materials. What is true of stone, of brick, and of wood, is true also of metal. How diverse, for instance, is, or should be, the whole treatment of cast as compared with wrought metal — take forged and cast iron, the lightness and elegance obtainable in the one, contrasted with the necessary solidity and weight of the other : the play of form, fancy, and variety obtainable in wrought iron, now, alas ! almost wholly laid aside for the heavy, mechanical, commonplace repetition of cast work. Even in minor construc- tive operations the true use of materials often evolves the true ornamentation; as for instance, in weaving, as contrasted with printing processes, in basket weaving, &c. &c. Our age is an age of new materials and new processes, which want carefully considering with a view to evolving from them and for them new and appropriate designs. Gutta-percha and electro- depositing should, equally with iron and glass, have earnest study on the part of the artist, not necessarily to make the former do cheaply what wood carving and metal embossing and chasing accomplish, or to bind the latter, when used as building materials, to the five classical orders, but to find the right use of these materials and the decoration consistent with that use. It is worthy of remark that the true novelty of our own time arose almost fortuitously out of the useful application of iron and glass treated honestly in construction in the Palace of Crystal of 185 1. More earnest study on the part of the artist may be ex- pected to give more artistic combinations, combinations not arrived at by the mere juxtaposition of materials, so often seen in modem buildings. If there is one rule more than another which may lead us to a style characteristic of our own age, it is that of making the pur- A MANUAL OF DESIGN. 35 pose and utility of our buildings or furniture, and every object and utensil the first consideration ; then of selecting the proper materials, by the use of which that utility may be most completely obtained ; and, thirdly, ornamenting consistently with the nature of the materials chosen, the leading forms arising out of such construction, irrespective of the mere reproduction of the bygone elements and ornamental details of any style. And reverting to what has been already said, that all the great seras of style have been seras of changed construction, it may not be too much to hope that the mighty constructive works of our day, and our changed materials may at last originate some characteristic style, which, impressed with the " mind and body of the time, its form and bearing," may give to the nineteenth century characteristics as strongly marked as those of the eleventh were marked in the ecclesiastical styles which then arose. D 2 CHAPTER IV. ON UTILITY WHICH MUST BE CONSIDERED BEFORE DECORATION. The terms of the third proposition are, that as construction necessarily implies a purpose, utility must precede ornament. In all arts applied to articles for the use, convenience, and comfort of man, from the building which shelters him and the objects of his care, to the meanest utensil which he values enough to desire to render it ornamental, the utility and fitness for intended pur- pose is, or ought to be, the first consideration. It has been said that design must commence with the choice of the first structural form and the best use of the materials to be employed, and after- wards proceed to the enhancing, enriching, and ornamenting of that utility, or in other words, in accordance with the well-known rule, we must ornament construction, not construct ornament. This seems an obvious and an almost unnecessary proposition, but it is often completely overlooked ; if, however, it were kept prominently in view, it would correct so many grave errors, that it is worth being earnestly enforced and constantly repeated. Thus, with respect to the external structure of both public and private edifices, the errors that arise out of useless constructive ornamentation have already been noticed. Nor are the faults within the building, its furniture, its decoration, or its utensils, likely to be less grave, in consequence of the neglect of the principle of the prior claims of utility. A MANUAL OF DESIGN. 37 The way in which utility must control decoration is not always so patent as might be inferred, and oftentimes requires most attentive study and research. Thus, after the consideration of the general uses of any building, must come that of its individual apartments, regulating and characterizing the decorative treatment of each ; and the hall, the library, the dining and withdrawing room, should each be considered having regard to their separate uses. What, for instance, can be more practically absurd in a public building, serving as a picture gallery, than to cover the upper part of the halls and ceilings with pictorial subjects, surrounded by gilding and coloured decoration, whose coarse execution, vivid colour and brilliant " entourage,'' call away the eye from, and quite overpower, the more modest and thoughtful labours of the easel ? Would not utility at once suggest that the character of the decorations should be sufficiently grave and simple, quiet and reserved, to support and display, without interfering with these far more valuable works of art ? Yet in many of the galleried apartments of the Louvre used for the display of easel pictures, the very reverse of this is the case, and the walls and ceilings are redolent of decorative painting and gilding. So also, in many of our private houses, you will see those who have spent thousands and tens of thousands on rare and costly works of art, sacrificing them entirely to gaudy wall-papers, manufactured decorations, or glaring carpets. Here utility would at once set the inquirer right. Again, how often do we find cabinets so covered with carved ornaments, that they will not open, so embossed with useless reliefs that it is dangerous to come near them, so heavy that they hide without exhibiting the invaluable rareties they are intended to contain ; rich and costly buffets, that have neither sideboard for the dining utensils, nor shelves for displaying the plate, chairs that give no repose to those who sit in them, and caskets that, from being too fragile to be touched, are a misery to their possessors ? 38 A MANUAL OF DESIGN. There can be no doubt that the cabinet-work of this country is far beyond that of other nations, and that for plain but sound workmanship, including easy action, excellence of framing and joinery, substantiality, and general utility, a chest of drawers, a sideboard, or a table, of English make is unequalled by foreign workmen ; and if not exactly beautiful it is certainly not vulgar. But when beauty is to be added to this utilitarian excellence, we are apt to have " upholsterer's ornament" in the shape of some coarse scroll-work or some Louis Quinze coquUlage, originally intended for gilding but rendered heavy, clumsy, absurd, and essentially vulgar by carving it in the same coloured wood as the furniture. Granted that "design" includes both construction and ornamentation, and that this latter should arise naturally out erf the appropriate decoration of suitable materials, we shall arrive, at a law of good taste, which, while it applies to architecture primarily, is equally to be observed in regard to the furniture and fittings which buildings contain, and to the smaller articles of everyday use. If in architecture, for instance, it is false in. principle as it is weak in invention to impose on the face of a structure meaningless columns, purposeless porticoes, or useless pediments, it is equally so in furniture to make cabinets, armoires, buffets, or bookcases into miniatiure temples, with columns which, so far from having anything to support, are moved from under their entablature whenever it is necessary to open a door, and niches equally useless, trenching upon any space which may be devoted to purposes of utility. Yet in these adaptations, we have, to a certain extent, precedent to guide us, and some sort of architectural rule and lore to refer to. Far more erroneous is the taste when natural imitation is pushed to extremes and the ornaments on a piece of furniture are made to look less like the work of man than nature's own growth, decayed and withered on some old wall or ruined paling. This very idea has in fact occurred to some designers. A MANUAL OF DESIGN. 39 who have improved it into a reality and rendered the stiles and rails of their works into the crumbling wall and broken paling carving on them, by way of enrichment, the brown, shrivelled, and clinging ivy. It is the merely imitative character of architecture to which we have already alluded, which has so largely contributed to decorative shams, to the age of putty, papier-ma,chd, and gutta- percha. These react upon architecture ; and, from the cheapness with which such ornament can be applied and its apparent excellence, the florid and the gaudy takes the place of the simple and the true. A popular writer describes the wearer of cheap finery as having his jewellery " a size larger than anybody else ;" and so it is with the cheap finery of imitative ornament : it is always " a size larger " than it should be — bolder, coarser, and more impudent than the true thing ; it excites our contempt by its flashy tawdriness, so incongruous with the meanness and vulgarity it is intended to adorn. From this manufacture of ornament arises all that mixture of styles, and that incongruity of parts, which, perhaps, is itself "the style" of this characterless age. Through it, also, the plasterer and the paper-hanger too often usurp the place of the architect, to the certain dismissal of the mason and the wood- carver ; and ornament, perchance in itself unobjectionable, is sure in such hands to be grossly misapplied. The errors to which we have directed attention in our architecture and in our .furniture, are equally prevalent in our domestic utensils. The simple forms which were at first evoked by the rudest arts of the potter or the smith, become, as luxury advances, so overladen with superabundant and unnecessary ornament as to render their daily use a constant misery, and their application for domestic purposes a source of continual annoyance to us. Take, for instance, our pottery ; here purity of form almost of necessity arises out of con- stiTictive utility, and the reliefs governed solely by the imitation 40 A MANUAL OF DESIGN. of natural objects and not by the requirements of use or the rules of art are quite unsuited to the material ; yet how often do we find in porcelain imitative flowers in high relief, glowing and brilliant as the tints of nature, yet looking gaudy as ornaments, and, from their fragile projections, liable to injury from every touch. Even the Dresden may-flower pattern, la production of great beauty on the principle of a diaper of form and colour ; in consequence of its minute hollows is quite incapable of being cleansed, and, from the thickness which it adds to the form, contradicts the true effects of porcelain, which should unite lightness with capacit)'. A further consideration of the question of design as applied to that division of pottery and porcelain which more especially com- prises works of utility, would lead us to assign to constructive form the first attention ; and in such works as are intended for vessels of capacity those forms should be adopted which, while they are most elegant, are best fitted for containing or holding. Such articles, moreover, being of continuous use, the power of ready cleansing is of great importance, and should have due attention from the designer. It is to be remembered, also, that the means of receiving that which is to be contained is as neces- sary as the facility for its ready outpouring ; since it is hardly desirable to have to apply a funnel to fill a pitcher or jug intended for constant use, although this may be permitted in a bottle which is required to keep its contents cool, and may have to be carried about, and which is liable to spill the contents by jolting, and therefore needs a smaller aperture. Moreover, a jug, or pitcher, which will admit the hand to cleanse it thoroughly, must be more suited to daily use than one which will not. A due consideration of utility would regulate the form in many other cases ; as, for instance, in cups and other drinking vessels though it might be most graceful to curve the top edge outwards yet, since such a form is likely to overflow the person in drinking, however superior it may be in elegance, it should not be adopted. A MANUAL OF DESIGN. 41 When utility is considered before ornament, numerous truths of the like kind will be arrived at, which are entirely overlooked when the order is reversed; thus relief, when used, should be extremely low, and without indented hollows in the composition, as well as without undercuttings, in order to give faciUty for cleansing ; but, while this is required for utility, it is necessary for elegance and beauty also. The Greeks were fully aware of this fact as an important truth, and in their pottery abstained from reliefs, or kept them to the lowest impost: the vases of Etruria have generally their line unbroken by the ornament, and the reliefs on the celebrated Portland vase are so extremely low as entirely to Fiu. 3. preserve its outline. The eastern nations are sensible of the same truth, and their decoration of pottery is on this principle, being entirely subservient to the lines of the form. The application of handles is another important point con- nected with constructive design. The easiest and most convenient means of lifting the weight, when lifting only is required, and of lifting and pouring when both are requisite, being the question to be determined. Too often this is arrived at more by chance than by calculation. We see, for instance, the form of an Etruscan vase, such as is shown in Fig. 3, No. i, adopted as a pitcher; the 42 A MANUAL OF DESIGN. original having two handles, formed for its occasional removal only ; for its new purpose, a spout is substituted for one of the handles ; perhaps it is to serve as a ewer, requiring raising and reversing at every effort to pour, and yet, so changed, it is acted upon by the hand and wrist at the greatest possible disadvantage, the hand having to lift the weight, as it were, at the end of a long lever, and reverse it by the power of the wrists, as is shown at a (No. 2), while a much less power applied at b (Nos. 2 and 3) would suffice to reverse the pitcher and pour forth the fluid. The height of the handle is of less importance when the contents have to be delivered from near the bottom, as in the eastern form at No. 4; since the shghtest tilt of the vessel would begin to empty the contents through the spout, which would not be the case if they had to be discharged from the top. These hints will serve to show how important the proper consideration of the insertion of the handles is in such works, and how easily errors arise from merely adopting inconsiderately a form fitted for one use in order to adapt it to another one. It is also to be remembered that utility may be departed from and over-ornamentation be produced by a false or excessive use of colour, with which fault so many of our manufactures are charge- able. It does not suffice for true excellence in the case say of woven fabrics, that rare skill is shown in the gradation of the various tints, or rare brilliancy has been obtained in the dyes, or that even the individual pattern has been well and harmoniously arranged. It is the effect of the whole that is to be considered, and its due subordination to the general surroundings and to the position in which it is to be placed. But this will be noticed in the fifth proposition. CHAPTER V. ON FITNESS OF THE ORNAMENT TO THE MATERIAL TO WHICH IT IS APPLIED. With regard to the fourth consideration, that " design must be bad which applies the same constructive forms and ornamental treatments indiscriminately to different materials." It has already been shown that the due ornamentation of construction produces unexpected beauties in architecture, and this is no doubt the case also with those secondary objects of furniture, utensils, and fabrics, which are supplementary to archi- tecture. Moreover, some remarks have been made on the architectural faults arising from the misapplication of decorated constructions to other purposes and materials than those for which they were originally designed. Each material has its own peculiar constmctive qualities; stone those of homogeneity of texture combined with strength, its weight and mass rendering it extremely suitable for arched con- struction ; wood those of continuity of fibre, and strength conjoined with lightness, rendering it available for bridging over wide spaces, and from the direction of its fibre necessitating right-lined rather than circular or arched construction ; metal those of strength due to tenacity of fibre, combined with a large amount of homogeneity rendering it equally fitted with wood for crossing wide spaces, with less bulk of material in proportion to weight than either wood or 44 A MANUAL OF DESIGN. stone, and fitting it by its tenacity, for either right-lined or curved constructive forms. With reference to the decoration of these several materials, the homogeneity of grain in the stone, and its perfect freedom under the tool, admirably adapt it for carving, but necessitate a different treatment to that for the continuous fibre of wood. The latter will bear more finesse of execution than the former, and a more detached relief; the colour, as light or dark, or veined and mottled, the hardness or softness, the intractibility or freedom of the grain in wood, moreover, require peculiar renderings of the ornament ; while metal, whether the ornament be cast, chased, or embossed, evidently demands a totally different treatment to either. Again, the position of the ornament requires special con- sideration, as, for instance, its height above the ground, or point of view, which will govern both its relief and execution : while much more varied quantities, bolder relief, and coarser execution are not only allowable but absolutely necessary at heights con- siderably above the eye. The practice of cutting the ornament after the stone has been placed in the structure, so universal with the best Gothic carvers in mediseval times,* and still practised by the French workmen, admits of a right estimate of the true relief and just quantity of ornament, but from this very circumstance (its relation to situation,) the mere reproduction of such ornament is often very unsatisfactory ; for it must be remembered that the fitness of ornament for its special situation, and for the peculiar material in which it was to be wrought, was a necessity in its first production, but is overlooked in its mere imitative repetition. If then the translation of ornament, even from one position to another, requires that it should be greatly modified and changed, * An instance of this may be seen in one of the west towers of Rouen Cathedral :— the stone is built into the structure with the requisite projections, but much of the carving has never been completed. A MANUAL OF DESIGN. 45 still more so is this the case when the material in which it is to be wrought is changed also. The heavy scroll-work of a Roman frieze carved in stone, although appropriate in its place far above the eye, must be quite unsuitable carved in wood as the back of a sideboard, and still more so, cast in iron as part of a gate or a balcony, where it is not only close to the eye, but pierced through between the foliage, which in the original was backed out and supported by the ground from which it was carved. Still more absurd is this same scroll- work imitated in relief on a carpet or tablecloth, or a muslin curtain. Yet such anomalies are continually occurring, arising perhaps from the use of casts of antique ornament as a means of study; their beauty becomes so impressed upon our minds that it is hard to appreciate fully their unsuitableness for every purpose. In this respect, indeed, originality is less to be hoped for in each succeeding age. As a writer is sure imperceptibly to repro- duce something of the books he has read, so the artist cannot entirely forget those works through which his studies have been conducted. The path to excellence may be shortened, but other minds have set up their landmarks upon it. Thus studying art, as we must do, in and through art, nature is apt to be overlooked, propriety to be neglected, and fitness to be disregarded, and all that we do is liable to become more or less a varied repetition of what has been done before. Moreover, each fabric and each material has its peculiar texture, lustre, &c., and even when the uses are the same the translation of ornament from one fabric to another is rarely successful and is often productive of very bad taste. Thus in the case of woven hangings, what might be suitable and beautiful in silk would be dull and heavy in worsted, and coarse and extra- vagant in muslin. The same holds good in garment fabrics also, where forms that may be unobjectionable in silk of a self colour would be large and extravagant in varied colours, and utterly 46 A MANUAL OF DESIGN. tasteless in a printed de laine. Thus ornament must be studied for the special material it is to be wrought in, or however agreeable it may be when seen on paper as a design, it will be found to be in bad taste when it is executed. Again, each mode of execution has its characteristic qualities, and each produces its own peculiar and varied beauties, and thus requires its special application of ornament. It is one of the difficulties of manufacture, to render by the machine and in the particular material to be used, all that the mind and hand has shown in the design, or to indicate in the design all that the material will add to it of lustre, beauty, or richness. Again it is a matter of extreme difficulty and one requiring long experience in manufacture, to tell how a design will work ; and connected with this difficulty is the due appreciation of the changes that must take place in the translation of the design from the paper to the fabric to produce the effect sought for. Nor does the consideration end here. There is still the difficulty which remains to the purchaser, and requires an effort of judgment, which many are wholly incapable of exercising : viz., the power to know how the decora- tion of the material will appear in use. Thus a garment fabric may be beautiful in itself, but look ill when made up for wear, and a silk hanging or a paper hanging which we admire in the pattern may, and often does, disappoint us extremely when it is hung ; and this supports a former remark on the appropriateness of ornament being governed in some respects by position as well as material. As the lustre and brilliancy of silk must be considered in its ornamentation, the material itself lending so much beauty to the design wrought in it, so there are many other cases wherein the material has a rare beauty, which must be preserved, sometimes arising from its purity and translucency, as in the case of glass and white marble, sometimes from its colour, as in ivory, some- times from its beauty and purity of surface, as in porcelain. Thus, as it would not be desirable to paint marble or to stain ivory A MANUAL OF DESIGN. 47 neither is it desirable to destroy the whole surface of porcelain by decoration, however rich or however beautiful. In no other branch of our manufactures perhaps is the fitness of the ornament to the material so much disregarded as in metal work, and more particularly in the characteristic and marked differences which should arise in the proper treatment of wrought in distinction to cast metal. CHAPTER VI. ON UNITY OF STYLE AND DECORATIVE SUBORDINATION. We have yet to consider that unity of style and proper sub- ordination of one work to another, and to the whole external and internal decoration, which is so necessary to true taste. It has already been said that there must be some predominating influence, some prevailing sentiment present in the minds of men to produce a style. Did this influence really exist, it would be seen in all that a man possessed, and a certain unity of character in his house and all his belongings would be the necessary result. In the mediseval times this predominating sentiment was the respect of the many to the outward forms of a material religion ;, thus the aspect of all that a man possessed was ecclesiastical — his furniture carved with emblems of the church, and his walls covered with the choice precepts of religion — as in the times of Judaism, when in the same spirit of outward respect the Pharisees wore the holy texts on the frontlets of their brows, and wove precepts, which they ought to have acted upon, into the borders" of their garments. In our own times any wide-spread sentiment is unfortunately wanting, and the greater number of even wealthy people are content to live in dwellings and to be surrounded with furniture totally incongruous in character the one with the other. This. A MANUAL OF DESIGN. 49 being the case, additions are made from time to time with the same careless indifference as to the harmony of the whole : each work is purchased for itself alone, with little reference to others, either as to style, to colour, or to relative subordination in deco- rative richness, till the house is like a museum, and the taste of the possessor being more and more vitiated and vulgarised, it becomes hard to impress him with any belief in the beauty which would result, not from uniformity, but from the mere absence of incongruity. It may be objected that the principle of unity or congruity, however observable in the mediaeval period, was never attended to by the great artists of the renaissance, and that we continually see in their works and in their additions to other works, the strangest inconsistencies and anomahes. This is perfectly true, but it most probably arose from reasons quite apart from their rejection or recognition of the justice of the principle. These revivalists, coming with all the ardent enthusiasm of converts from the study of classic art, and convinced in their own minds of its ideal perfection and beauty, found the land covered with vast and magnificent temples and structures, deep in the love and reverence of what they deemed the vulgar public, and vene- rable from age and from consecration to God, yet of a style and character wholly opposed to the one they sought to introduce. The reconstruction of these time-honoured edifices was hopeless, and the new race of architects began to seize upon and adorn the interiors of the old cathedrals and churches of Europe with rood- screens, stalls, altars, confessionals, pulpits, and monuments, in the new style of the renaissance, quite irrespective of the character of the original stmcture. In process of time they even ventiured to make additions to the very structure itself. Thus, in our own country, Inigo Jones, not foreseeing the fiery purgation that was to prepare the way for the great monument of the new art, did not hesitate to build a classic portico to the Gothic structure of old St. Paul's ; and it is impossible to enter the churches and cathe- 50 A MANUAL OF DESIGN. drals of France and Belgium without seeing how continuous was the endeavour to seduce the people gradually into the new faith in art, by additions such as those we have spoken of above. The apostles of the renaissance did, in fact, but follow the prac- tice and example of the early missionaries of Roman Christianity. These sought to humour the superstitions of the Pagan woi- shippers, and to wile them into truth by adopting, not only their festivals and holidays, but also their temples and altars, consecrating them to the new faith, and at the same time smoothing down those distinctive differences that were most repugnant to their old belief. In our own day, and following out the same course of action, an eloquent writer on art proposes to revert to what he considers the sounder taste of our Gothic forefathers, by making piecemeal additions and alterations to our houses, and patching their bald and characterless horizontalism with gazebos and porches of a mediaeval character. As was the result in respect to Christianity, where a like practice propagated all sorts of errors and .superstitions, whose parasitical growth nearly strangled the parent plant, so the various compromises and adaptations which architects thought reasonable in reviving classic art, have been the source of errors which have grown up side, by side with the new style, and by their grotesque absurdity marred the beauty with which they had common birth.* The Gothic principle of progress in style was essentially dif- ferent from that of the renaissance. New and increased enrich- ment invariably began in the interior of the building, in the shrines, altar-screens, stalls, and monuments of churches, and the * Even the faults and absurdities which were thus admitted are now so hallowed by time, and moreover offer such marked characteristics and illus- trations of the age that produced them, that one would hesitate to surest their removal, however much we may object to them as errors, and protest against their reproduction. There can be but little doubt that the florid classic altars, the chubby, cloud-borne cherubs, with their gilt palm branches, however incon- grvious with a Gothic cathedral, as truly exemplify the pretentious age of Louis le Grand, and the preaching of Bossuet, Bourdaloue, and Fenelon, as the ^vritings and sermons addressed to it which these authors have left behind them. A MANUAL OF DESIGN. 51 furniture and utensils of private dwellings (more particularly in the former however, as the style was essentially ecclesiastical), and gradually these enrichments passed from within the building, from its enshrinements as it were, to the decoration of the outside of the building itself In the renaissance, on the contrary, as has just been shown, the constructive ornamentation of the exterior of the building became the model of the interior furniture and fittings, and hence arose many of the faults that have been already pointed out. It is in the nature of imitators to seize on the most salient points, whether good or bad, and to exaggerate them ; in the same way that a tasteless portrait painter caricatures a feature or expression in order to give a coarse and telling likeness. So the more recondite beauties of the renaissance, those which appeal to the highest minds, have been overlooked, and the grotesque and the novel features have been considered as the elements of the style, disregarding much in it that was spiritual and refined. This very incongruity, a fault, perhaps a necessary one at the period of the revival, has been thus perpetuated as a beauty, while it is in reality an error and a mistake ; for unity of style and de- corative subordination are indispensable to true taste ; all admit this in a degree, since none trust completely to indiscriminate selection. Most people allow a subordination in the apartments of the houses, and do not decorate the hall, the library, or the dining-room so richly as the drawing-room or the boudoir. More- over, there is usually some desire, often, it is true, with little knowledge, to have a due subordination in colour also in the furniture of individual apartments, and an effort is at least made that the carpets, the hangings, and the walls should have some harmonious agreement. Is it too much then to assert that there should be a subordina- tion as to uses also, and that the carpets and the wall-papers' should be subdued and quiet, as forming the background of the apartment ; while the chairs and tables, the cabinets and com- E 2 52 A MANUAL OF DESIGN: modes, the mirrors and picture-frames should each have such an amount of decoration, and only such, as is justly relative to their importance to the whole ? If this is true of furniture collectively considered, it is true also irrespective of this condition, and many of the gross errors, and much of the useless and improper expenditure, evident in all sections of our manufactures, would be avoided by proper atten- tion to this rule. If also the previous arguments are correct, it will be seen that the authority of antiquity in its best periods, the authority of Nature as displayed in her works, the natural laws of form and colour, as well as the conditions and limitations of manufactures and the purposes of utility, are in favour of some such principles of decora- tive design as those which have been laid down. One reason for the prevalence of so much lawlessness and absence of correct principles in our manufactures is due to the fact that the law of pictorial art prevails rather than the law of ornamental art. Now, although the office of a picture is to bring some object, some incident, some history or subject to the eye of the spectator, and to touch and please him with the passion, sen- timent, or feeling which it is fitted to instil, it does this quite irrespective of the material in which or on which it is wrought. What have the canvas, the paper, the mere copper, or the panel to do with the enjoyment of a work of fine art ? But ornament, on the contrary, if what has been said is in any degree correct, cannot be dissevered from the material, from which indeed much of its varied effect arises ; and the character of the decoration adopted should be in accordance with the material, and with the uses of the object decorated. So much so ought this to be the case, that it might be expected, that to see the design, or even a careful description of the ornament, would be sufficient to enable us to determine the nature and the uses of the object itsel£ END OF SECTION I, SECTION II. THE APPLICA TION OF THE PRINCIPLES OF ORNAMENT TO THE MANUFACTURES. CHAPTER VII. ON THE NATURE AND GENERAL APPLICATION OF ORNAMENTAL ART. The desire evinced by the rudest, as well as the most civilized nations for the decoration of their buildings, utensils, and clothing almost raises ornament into a natural want, and must render its proper application of the utmost consequence to tne manufacturer, since upon it the value of his manufactures in the various markets of the world chiefly depends. Whether we regard the war-club and the paddle of the savage, or the priceless jewel of Cellini ; the simple woven matwork of the South Sea islander, or the gorgeous masterpiece of the Utrecht loom, we find that the orna- ment in every case has been governed in its application by certain definite rules or principles, and these principles we have en- deavoured to formulate in the foregoing chapters. By some such well-defined laws all design and all decoration must be judged, and it is only by a careful study of the best works of all periods, and an earnest search after what is found to be good and true in the art of each people and each period that we can devise rules for the guidance and instruction of the designer. In our opening chapters we have endeavoured to gather some of the principles which should govern the application of ornament, and before we proceed to apply these principles to the various branches of our manufactures, we may glance briefly at the nature 56 A MANUAL 01' DESIGN. of ornament and the conditions of its employment in the arts and manufactures. We have spoken of design and of ornamental decoration. These are two essentially different things, and it is highly necessary that they should, from the first, be considered as separate and distinct. " Design " has reference to the construction of any work both for use and beauty, and therefore includes its ornamentation also. " Ornament " on the other hand implies merely the decora- tion of an object already constructed. Ornament is thus necessarily limited, for, so defined, it cannot be other than secondary, and must not usurp a principal place ; if it do so, the object is no longer a work ornamented, but is degraded into a mere ornament. The tendency too much of the present time is, as we have already shown, to reverse this state of things, to the utter subversion of all true principles of taste. The ornament of past ages is the tradition of the omamentist, and tradition ever hands down to us things both good and bad, each equally consecrated to most minds by the authority of antiquity. But a moment's reflection will show how necessary it is to dis- criminate before receiving anything on such authority. A church or temple built in a rude age remains undisturbed by some happy chance, a villa or a theatre in a remote provincial town escapes the fatalities of accident or time, some tomb is opened, some over- whelmed city exhumed from the debris of ruin that had gathered over it. The ornamental details found therein are copied and illustrated by the notes of the antiquarian, or published in the proceedings of learned societies, and are at once regarded as authorities for imitation, forgetting all the whUe that they may have been perhaps the works of obscure provincial artists, of a barbarous age perchance, or of a people among whom art, no longer studied for its principles, had ceased to progress or had rapidly declined. Such traditional ornament moreover had or had not a local use, a consistent application to domestic, ecclesiastical, or funeral purposes, ia fact a local symbolism ; but whether it had such or A MANUAL OF DESIGN. 57 not (a fact mostly overlooked) is sure to be soon disregarded; and not only have we ornament of a degraded period, of a declining age, or by inferior artists, but to this must be added, one whose symbolic life is totally extinct, and, perhaps, fortunately so, for when revived it is indiscriminately used, for purposes totally at variance with its first application and original intent. Ornamentists may fairly be divided into two classes : the traditional, who superstitiously reverence the remains of past ages and are wedded in practice to existing styles ; and those who despise the past and feel themselves at liberty to adopt from the abundant sources of nature a mode and manner for them- selves, without regard to the works of their predecessors. The first class desire simply to follow where precedent leads them, and to be able to claim the sanction of authority for their works. These, even when taste duly regulates their choice, are men of limited ideas and small progress. Those of the second class, who pay no deference to authority, who think that ornament is governed by no laws, and who recognise no principles by which they are to be guided, are little likely to raise the art to the level of past times, and, still less are they likely to advance its aim and widen its scope. The true ornamentist would seem to be one who seeks out the principles on which the bygone artists worked, and the rules by which they arrived at excellence, and, discarding mere imitation and reproduction of details, endeavours, by the appli- cation of new ideas and new matter upon principles which he believes to be sound, or which time and the assent of other minds has approved to be fundamental, to attain originality through fitness and truth. The antiquarian ornamentist, however, will always have a certain reputation, and justly too if he has the taste to select what is best from the great masters of past times. In any case the critic must be bold who speaks against the authority of the fathers of the art '; and praise is safe when great names are on the critic's side. From this latter class of ornamentists we may at least demand purity of style, we may require that marked seras 58 A MANUAL OF DESIGN. should be kept distinct, and that the adopted ornament should be fitly applied to fabrics or manufactures of the like nature, and, as far as possible, for the like uses, as those for which the ornament was first designed. From the labours of the second class of omamentists, united to that constant search after novelty at any sacrifice of true taste for which manufacturers are so constantly urgent, there has arisen a new species of ornament of the most objectionable kind, which we cannot too strongly deprecate on account of its complete departure from just taste and true principles. This to which we have already alluded may be called the natural or merely imitative style, and it is seen in its worst development in some of the articles of form. Thus we .have metal imitations of plants and flowers, with an attempt to make them a strict resemblance, forgetting that natural objects are rendered into ornament by subordinating the details to the general idea, and that the endeavour ought to be to seize the simplest expression of a thing rather than to imitate the thing itself. This is the case with fine art also, in every phase of which, mere imitation is an error and an impertinence ; and true ornamental art is even more opposed to the merely imitative treatment now so largely adopted. Let any one examine floral or foliated ornament produced in metal by electrotyping the natural object, whereby every venation and striation of the plant is reproduced, and compare it with a well and simply modelled treatment, where only the general features of the form are given and all the more minute details purposely omitted ; and if this latter has been done with a true sense of the characteristics of the plant, the meanness and httleness of the one mode will be perfectly evident, compared with the larger manner of the other. But this imitative style is carried much further : or-molu stems and leaves bear porcelain flowers painted to imitate nature, and candles are made to rise out of tulips and china-asters, while gas jets gush forth from opal arums. Stems, bearing flowers for various uses. A MANUAL OF DESIGN. 59 arise from groups of metal leaves standing painfully on their points, and every constructive truth, and just adaptation to use, is sacri- ficed for a senseless imitative naturalism. In the same way, and doubtless supported by great authorities, past and present, enor- mous wreaths of flowers, fish, game, fruits, &c., imitated a mervcilk, dangle round sideboards, beds, and picture-frames. Glass is tortured out of its true quality to make it into the cup of a lily or an anemone : not that we may be supposed to drink nectar from the flower, but that the novelty may catch those for whom good taste is not piquant enough, and for whom chaste forms are not sufficiently showy. In fabrics where flatness would seem most essential, this imitative treatment is often carried to the greatest excess ; and carpets are ornamented with water-lilies floating on their natural bed, with fruits and flowers poured forth in over- whelming abundance in all the glory of their hues and shades; or we are startled by a lion at our hearth, or a leopard on our rug, his spotted coat imitated even to its relief as well as in its colour, while palm-trees and landscapes are used as the ornaments of muslin curtains. Though far from saying that imitative orna- ment is not sometimes allowable, still it will at once be felt that the manner of its use wants a determined regulation to exclude it in most of the above-mentioned cases from all works aspiring to be considered in just taste, and to leave it to be adopted by those only who think novelty better than chaste design, and who con- sider that display is preferable to truth. The constant search after novelty has just been alluded to as one of the sources of bad taste in modern adornment. Manufac- turers are eager to obtain it at any sacrifice of truth, and at any cost. The efforts of those past ages, when taste was most indis- putable, appear, as we have already shown, to have been directed rather to the continually perfecting and refining their designs and inventions, than to creating new ones. Thus in architecture the robust simplicity and grandeur of the Doric order remained un. changed from generation to generation, the only discernible effort 6o A MANUAL OF DESIGN. being to perfect just proportions and true symmetry of parts, rather than to add any novelty of feature or ornament, untO, in the Parthe- non, it seems to have arrived at the most perfect development that taste, science, and alrt could unitedly effect : even among the more voluptuous inhabitants of Asia Minor, at least until the age when their artists became servants and panderers to the coarser magnifi- cence of Rome, the details of ornamentation were few, and those universally received. The volute, the acanthus, the anthemion, the sechinus, and a few frets and guilloches, seemed to pass the ordeal of criticism, not that they might be rejected for more novel treatments, but that the symmetry of their parts might be more justly balanced, the commoner curves rejected for those more varied, beautiful, and refined, and the true impost given to their projections. Proportion and symmetry being thus sought after instead of novelty, Grecian ornament has come down to us with authority like that of Scripture, rather than of tradition, and all the after efforts of artists, who have adopted and adapted it, have failed either to improve its elegance, or to add to its beauty. In the eastern nations we find the same usage prevail, and to this day Indian ornament is composed of the same forms as it was in the earliest known works : the principles that governed ornamental practice in those works seem still to be a tradition with the artist and the workman, and still to produce the same beautiful results, as is abundantly seen in the fabrics and tissues of modem Indian workmanship. Now, however, our efforts are of an entirely different nature, and the hunger after novelty is quite insatiable ; heaven and earth are racked for novel inventions, and happy is the man who lights upon something, however outre, that shall strike the vulgar mind, and obtain the " run of the season." Such patterns result as often from the caprice of accident as from any effort of thought — witness what was called the diorama pattern in cotton-printing, once very popular, which was the result of an accidental folding of the stuff on the cylinder in printing. Ac- cepted for the season, these fantasies no sooner pass away than A MANUAL OF DESIGN. 6i the world wonders how it could ever have looked upon them with satisfaction, or tolerated for an instant such solecisms in taste, such strange incongruities, or such gross absurdities. The ornament of past ages was chiefly the offspring of handi- craft labour, that of the present age is the child of the engine and the machine. This great difference in the mode of production causes a like difference in the results. In old times the artist was at once designer, ornamentist, and craftsman, and to him was indif- ferent the use of the pencil or the brush, of the hammer, the chisel, or the punch : his hand and his mind wrought together, not only in the design, but in every stage of its completion, and thus there entered a portion of that mind into every minute detail, and into every stage of finish, and many a beautiful after-thought was embodied by the hand of the " cunning artificer," many a grace added to the work by his mastery and skill. He worked, not to produce a rigid sameness, but he worked as Nature works : — she produces nothing exactly similar to its fellow ; in every turn of every stage of growth, in every flower, and in every leaf, adding a changing grace, a differing beauty ; so he varied his labours with every feeling of his overflowing mind. But this is not possible with the stamp, the mould, the press, and the die, the ornamental agents of our days : after the type or model is made, all the pro- ducts are rigidly the same, whence arises a tiresome sameness, a sickening monotony, unknown in the works of nature and peculiar to these artificial works of man : the varying mind has no share in their production, and man himself becomes only the servant of the machine. Moreover, the old ornamentist worked generally from feelings of piety, from love of his labours, or from the desire for fame, motives hardly known to the artist of this class in our days, at least in this country — Who seeks fame from the ephemera of a season ? Who loves a labour that is so soon to pass away ? Who cares for a work that is not to be the child of his own hand, but to be produced in thousands by the aid of machinery? The toil of the 62 A MANUAL OF DESIGN. artificer of olden times was spent upon the thing itself, and not upon a mere model for it : the chalice, the cup, the lock and key, or the reliquary, were to be without repetition, and without rivals : he sought to give them their highest excellence, and, labouring from one of the feelings we have described, threw his whole soul into his work, so that it became a thing for future ages to look upon and to prize. Not that handicraft or art-workmanship is utterly excluded from our manufactures ; it is only partially so, making it all the more painfully evident how greatly ornamental art has suffered from its new union with machinery. Wherever ornament is wholly effected by machinery, it is certainly the most degraded in style and execution ; and the best workmanship and the best taste is invariably to be found in those manufactures and fabrics wherein handicraft is entirely or partially the means of producing the ornament, as in china and glass, in works in the precious metals, carving, &c. These faults arise partly from the facilities which machinery gives to the manufacturer, enabling him to pro- duce the florid and over-loaded as cheaply as the simple forms, and thus to satisfy the larger market for the multitude, who desire quantity rather than quality, and value a thing the more, the more it is ornamented. This state of modem manufacture, whereby ornament is multiplied without limit from a given model, by the machine or the mould, ought at least to awaken in the manufacturer a sense of the importance of the first design. One would think that what was to be produced by thousands and tens of thousands should at any rate be a work of beauty, and that no pains would be spared to insure its excellence. The cost of the first design or model must in such a case be a mere atom when divided among its myriad reproductions. It would seem strange, however, to judge by the results, in some cases, that any one could be found to throw away great expense upon dies and moulds, to carry out a design which in itself was hardly thought worth paying for. Yet often in this country artists are paid little better than workmen, and a belief seems to prevail, that knowledge, skill, and taste A MANUAL 01' DESIGN. 63 come by nature : the artist has seldom any interest in the result of his labours, his name is unknown, his pay is niggardly, and what there may be of beauty and excellence in his work is often spoiled by the alterations of the manufacturer, who makes no scruple of setting his own taste above that of the artist, and altering and changing a design at his sole pleasure. In France, and in some parts of German)^, where taste has long been cultivated, and the value of ornamental design is better appreciated, these relations are better understood also ; and in this country, if good taste is to prevail, the manufacturer must learn to appreciate more highly the value of the designer's labours, must seek to foster his talents and stimulate his amour propre by giving him some increased share in his successful endeavours. Society also must be prepared to contribute more largely than heretofore to public education in ornamental art, and taste must be disseminated by every available means ; for it is not only a truth, but a truth that should everywhere be told, that, notwith- standing our skilful workmanship and our excellence in the manu- facture of most fabrics, we have been until quite lately sadly behind-hand in the design applied to them, and greatly indebted to foreign artists even for what little that was good. Moreover, our greatest difficulty consists even less in the want of designers than of skilled art-workmen to carry out designs. A design for cotton-printing may be spoiled by the " putter-on," or for silk by him who prepares it for the loom. The sculptor may design a statuette, but there are few able to chase the bronze, to retouch the clay, or to unite the parts when they come forth from the mould. Even where such are found, they are mostly men of slow minds, who enter little into the spirit of the artist's labours, and who work without feeling as without fire. We find plenty of chasers able to imitate the fur of animals, or the texture of draperies, but few who understand the bones and the anatomy of the parts, and fewer still who carry an artist's spirit into their works. In decorative painting, also, the painter on glass and 64 A MANUAL OF DESIGN. china is generally a mere copyist, or he works too entirely by rote, and without feeling. The lily and the rose which he paints are always the same lily and the same rose, a work of the hand and eye, in which the mind has no share. There are honourable ex- ceptions, no doubt, but with the many art is a mere handicraft, partaking only in the smallest degree of those higher qualities which, as we have seen, animated the art-workmen of mediseval times, and prior to the introduction of machinery. One of the best tendencies of the present age, and also the one holding out the best promises for the future, is a desire in some manufactures to return to the typical forms of hand-worked ornament, and to bring into its due prominence the superior value of honestly hand- wrought decoration. CHAPTER VIII. ON THE DECORATION OF BUILDINGS. Having in our last chapter glanced at the general nature of orna- ment, we may now proceed to the second division of our subject, viz., the application of the principles formulated in our first section to the different branches of our manufactures. It will be advisable for facility of reference to classify the subject under four general heads : — Decoration of Buildings — Domestic and other Furniture — Domestic Utensils and Objects of Personal Use — Garment Fabrics. These general heads may again be subdivided as follows : — 1. Decoration of buildings, consisting of — 1st. Architectural decoration, painted, &c. 2nd. Stone, carved wood, terra cotta, carton-pierre, and other relief decorations. 3rd. Stained glass. 4th. Inlaid floors, mosaic pavement, inlaid tiles, &c. 5th. Paper and other hangings. 6th. Metal-work. 2. Domestic and other furniture, including cabinet-work of all kinds, and furniture of all materials. 1st. Cabinets, sideboards, and furniture generally. 2nd. Stoves, grates, fenders, lamps, gas-fittings, and other hardware. 3rd. Carpets, portieres, table-covers, and floor-clotlis. 4th. Curtains and hangings. 5th. Table-linen. 60 A MANUAL OF DESIGN. 3. Domestic utensils and objects of personal use. 1st. Porcelain, pottery, &c. 2nd. Table and ornamental glass. 3rd. Works in the precious metals and jewellery, clocks, &c 4th. Bookbinding. 4. Garment fabrics. 1st. Woven in patterns of any material, and hand- worked. 2nd. Printed. 3rd. Lace. 4th. Ribbons. In reviewing these classes we shall endeavour under each of the above headings to point out the more salient defects arising from the introduction of false principles ; selecting here and there a few good examples for the sake of illustrating our meaning, and showing more clearly what we have to expect when correct and true principles have been followed. We may now pass on to the consideration of our first group : — THE DECORATION OF BUILDINGS. Properly speaking, the design for the decoration of any building, both externally and internally, is the province of its architect, since in this case decoration is essentially a part of architecture. If the principle we have before enunciated, that ornament is the decoration of construction, be just, it will be apparent that it is hardly possible to judge of the one without the other. In works wherein the decorator makes his own sham construction in order to ornament it, as well as in those multiplied manufactured " parts " which form the staple ornament of a large class of workmen in this line, we may admire the skill of the execution, the cleverness of the details, the excellence of the manufacture, or the imitation of early works of acknowledged merit ; but to appreciate " decoration " we must view it as a whole in the place for which it was specially designed, and in harmony with the building whose construction it ornaments. Moreover, it must mainly originate in local circumstances, and ought to have an individual significance. In this respect we soon become sensible how impracticable it is to lay down any general rules for A MANUAL OF DESIGN. 67 our guidance under the singular complications of modern house decoration. Papier-mach^, carton-pierre, and a host of other cheap modes of ornamentation, have no doubt a substantial value commercially- considered. As regards design, however, they are but dangerous subsidiaries, often doing more injury than good, owing to the tasteless, misplaced, and false decoration arising from their use Apart from that monotonous multiplication of the same forms, necessarily resulting from the unvarying productions of the mould and the die, which has been before alluded to, there are other evils sure to accompany manufactured decorations such as those now under consideration. The great cheapness of the substitute, compared with the real material, inevitably leads to excess. Such ornament always seems added or applied, stuck on as it were, and can rarely be made to appear as a part of construction ; it therefore constantly carries with it a sense of untruth, till the mind and eye, from habit, become satisfied with it, and at the same time deadened to what is really true and good. Moreover, decoration consisting ot such materials must neces- sarily always be patchy and incomplete. When the parts to be ornamented are large, this evil is seen in its most exaggerated form ; a florid and gaudy centre has perhaps to be united with coarse corners, either by other ornaments or by the repetition of the centre portion, and all sorts of expedients must be resorted to, to " bring in " the parts so as to suit the architectural distribution of the apartment; it can indeed barely be possible that the quantities, or the geometrical arrangement in which the ornament has been originally constructed, will agree with the place to which it has to be adapted, and more or less of make-shift must be the result. The whole system of modem house-finishing, so far as regards the appliquk work of the plasterer and the decorator, is utterly false and untrue. A cornice so many inches in depth is foimd to be F 2 68 A MANUAL OF DESIGN. needed, and from a well-filled storehouse of such works in every style the plasterer, disregarding every other consideration, seeks the pattern which most readily complies with the necessary conditions of depth and projection. A centre-flower for the ceiling so many feet in diameter is the next requisite, and, the labours of the plasterer at an end, the decorator and the upholsterer step in, and the former touches up his work with colour applied with no regard to relative fitness and appropriate gradation, while the upholsterer sends in the hangings and furniture suited to another country and another age. Scale seems to have been quite disregarded in the work of the plasterer, since the fruit and flowers, the birds and game, of one part, are different in size from those of another part. The style, again, is mixed, one part being two centuries earlier than the other. There is, besides, far more pains taken with the exact rendering of fur or a feather, than in perfecting the form of a moulding, or the shape of a panel — the architecture has, in the designer's mind, been subordinate to the ornament, and an ill-formed ellipse, or a coarse and unrefined moulding, appears of less importance to him than the mere imitation of the feathers of his birds, or the fur of the animals of which his ornament consists. Carry this treatment a little further, and it will result in having the game, the fruit, the foliage, and the flowers not only modelled to the exactest imitation, but the skill of the painter called in to add to its naturalism, and the whole painted with the colours of nature ; thus decoration will be thought perfect only when it competes with those strange groups in relief we sometimes find framed to form a picture. One great cause of evil in the use of the materials under con- sideration consists in the fabe principle of tlieir application to decorative purposes. It is found, for instance, that peculiar qualities, which are difficult of attainment and an effort of great Jskill in other materials, can easily be obtained by a new means ; instead, therefore, of carefully studying its just adaptation to ornamental production, the effort is only to emulate in excess of A MANUAL OF DESIGN: 69 skill those peculiar qualities which are trials in the more intractable material It too often happens, moreover, that the original works imitated were in false taste ; and this becomes far more apparent in the copies, since the mind can no longer dwell on them with that admiration which is caused by a sense of difficulties over- come, and which compensated, in some degree, for the absence of good taste in the works they emulate. As instances the exact imitation in wood or stone carving of the individual details rather than of the general character of objects used as ornament, extreme relief, under-cutting, lightness, thinness, and picturesqueness of the forms of foliage and flowers, whereby their natural growth is attempted in carving rather than a due ornamental disposition of their forms — all tending to excess and exaggeration, and to be avoided rather than copied. Another source of error consists in rendering what should be true constructive forms into mere ornament ; thus pilasters, and even columns, consoles and trusses intended to support weight, are manufactured in these imitative materials, and introduced only to decorate, until all sense of utility and construction is lost, and ornament becomes the principal instead of the subordinate. During the past few years there has been a marked revival in the use of terra cotta for structural purposes, and there are numerous signs in the buildings recently erected and still in progress in many parts of the metropolis that its proper treatment as a material for ornamentation is becoming appreciated by our architects. As an enrichment for brick buildings there can be no fitter material, and from the fact that, although it at first originates from the mechanical process of moulding, terra cotta admits of any amount of subsequent perfecting by hand, there are few materials more deserving of careful and considerate treatment The points to be regarded are chiefly these : — First, to beware of a stone treatment or the attempt which so many terra cotta manufacturers have always before their eyes of making terra cotta a substitute for 70 A MANUAL OF DESIGN: stone ; and second, to remember that, as it has to be produced in numberless repetitions from a mould, the ornament should be in low relief and free from undercutting. The above observations apply of course to terra cotta as a material to be used in con- struction. It has for very many years occupied a prominent position for the manufacture of decorative objects for our gardens and suburban villas. The constructive forms of many of such works are, it is true, to be traced back to the antique, but so vulgarised in proportion and in their curves, as to be wholly spoilt The ornamentation moreover of these forms is, as a rule, too redundant; the material is so pliant under the manipulation of the modeller, lends itself so readily to ornament, admits so easily of additional details, that, unless in the hands of a true artist, over- ornamentation is sure to result One great rule for such works is that beauty of form should first be sought for, and then that the leading lines should be sparingly decorated. STAINED GLASS DECORATION. The art of painting on glass, or glass-staining, has come down to us so intimately mixed up with the ecclesiastical architecture of the middle ages, that it is almost impossible to view the one un- connected with the other. It was bom of the same parent (the Church), and from the first both were equally devoted to her service. Of Gothic architecture, and of it almost exclusively, stained glass has always formed a necessary decoration : it follows, therefore,' that its ornamentation is almost wholly traditional, and has relation to the various periods of the Gothic architecture which it accompanies. Not that it is necessary, or even desirable, that the epochs of the two arts should, in their revival, continue to correspond ; but the periods of each, whether simultaneous or otherwise, when utility and beauty were most fully understood and attained, should be dihgently studied in search of the principles that guided the A MANUAL OF DESIGN. 71 artists of those times, and that which is best should be chosen, irrespective of mere correspondence of epoch or antiquarian authority. Moreover the errors, which the ignorance of an early age evidently occasioned, should be carefully separated from the truths, and not considered as of necessity a part of the style of the period in which they are found, — such, more particularly, as bad drawing and want of knowledge of the human figure ; at the same time, that simplicity of treatment which is so highly characteristic of early works, which overlooks all details, and renders a com- position from the Scriptures, or a single figure, more as a symbol than as a picture, should, as a principle of excellence, be carefully retained. As is the case with all other manufactures and fabrics, so it is with painted glass : the question of utility, rightly considered, will lead us to some knowledge of what is most suitable in its treatment as a decoration. Glass was introduced into the numerous windows of Gothic architecture to temper the glare of light, and to serve in a manner as a blind by preventing the direct entrance of the sun's Tays, and also to shed that solemn religious light which so well accords with the sacred mysteries of religious worship. The mosaic glass of the early artists of the 12th and 13th centuries was most admirably adapted for this purpose : being composed of many small pieces of full and pure tints, with little white glass, the rays of the sun were broken and dispersed, the light was lowered in brilliancy, and the whole effect was homogeneous, rich, and solemn ; sufficient light being still permitted to enter for the per- formance of the religious services of the church. Even com- positions of figures were subject to the principle that regulated the whole : the figures were small, so that the colour of their draperies and accessories might be broken up into many pieces to give the same equal distribution as in the ornamental parts of the -window. It would seem, indeed, that the painter did not intend to simulate a picture, but rather to symbolise a sacred text or thought, and the figures, therefore, were not so much pictorially 72 A MANUAL OF DESIGN. arranged, as composed with extreme monumental simplicity ; thus, they not only partook of the general effect of the window, but the attention of the spectator, impressed with the solemn yet beau- tiful light, was, at the same time, filled with the holy thought conveyed by the subject, without being distracted by too great an individuality of parts. The representation of shadow, strictly speaking, was not ad- missible, the composition consisting only of flat forms of the greatest simplicity. For this, even, there would seem to be just reasons : the light being transmitted through the glass to the spectator within, shadow would appear to be anomalous and out of place, since the Ulumination in such a case emanates from the figures themselves; moreover the simplicity of the shadowless forms was better suited to impress the eye from the distance at which such works must necessarily be viewed. Such would seem to be some of the principles which ought to regulate, and which in the best times did regulate, the design for painted glass. An entirely different view of the art has however sprung up with its revival, and has obtained many advocates, especially on the Continent. It has been felt how greatly art has advanced in the hands of the historical painter since the times spoken of : that the principles of composition, of foreshortening, of perspective, of light and dark, and of the arrangement of colour, then quite un- known, have been discovered and developed ; that drawing, then in its infancy and unaided by knowledge, has now arrived at maturity j and that science has given us power over the materials which they failed to possess, and enabled us to conquer difficulties which they considered insuperable j and it is asked why the painter on glass should not avail himself of all these advantages, to perfect his art and render it as pictorial as the works of his brethren. By artists who entertain these views, the surface of the window is treated almost as a canvas would be ; the forms of the figures are large, even as the size of life ; the draperies are massive, and the heads painted with great imitative skill and completeness. Chiaro- A MANUAL OF DESIGN. 73 oscuro and perspective are studied, and foreshortening and pictorial attitudes in the figures supply the place of the monumental and statuesque delineations of the earlier artists ; in fact everjrthing is done to treat the window as a picture. To the advocates of this style it may be objected, that a picture is specially intended to address itself to the mind and imagination only, while painted glass has a reference to use also : and that, apart from this consideration, each and every art has its own mode of rendering nature — ^not necessarily implying deceptive or complete imitation ; thus, for instance, the art of the sculptor is a generalised imitation of form, and even the painter of high art does not desire to make his picture deceptively imitative, but listens with impatience to the remarks of the ignorant, who are apt to praise his work for this quality above others proper to it which they do not understand. An outline of Flaxman's fills the mind with a perfect sense of beauty and with the fulness of a poetical idea ; surely, then, the flat and simple treatment of sub- jects in glass-painting, if such treatment is requisite for its utUity and most in consonance with its other qualities, may be found sufficient to give as complete an expression to the pictorial render- ing of a scripture truth as the material and situation of such works require. The reader will readily recall examples of both these modes of treatment, and in the South Kensington collection are fine speci- mens of mediaeval glass from the Sainte Chapelle at Paris, and of the more recent and more pictorial manner of the Munich school. The window by Professor Bertini, of Milan, is a beautiful example of the transparency treatment of glass. Here the forms are simple and broad, the masses of colour large, and the effect thoroughly that of a transparent picture, with all its details well drawn, carefully painted, and rounded by shadow ; while the composition is arranged with regard to the masses of %ht and dark by colour. But instead of that general and harmonious effect of sobered light, which is so de- sirable in stained glass for the windows of a religious edifice, the 74 A MANUAL OF DESIGN. effect is painful to the eye from its extreme brightness, and the window would irresistibly obtrude itself upon the attention of the spectator, and rather distract his thoughts than induce that solemn repose of mind which is so consistent with the place for which it is intended. It is to be observed also that the construction of the window is greatly in the way in these pictorial treatments, and that a false construction is too frequently adopted to the entire disregard of architectural fitness. The other method of treatment has many able exponents in this country, and the tendency of the modem school of glass-painters is, in many cases, to revert to the principles we have endeavoured to deduce from a study of the best works of mediaeval artists. It would seem to be a great fault in glass to have a prevailing tint or hue, since by a truly harmonious composition of colour such a result would be avoided. This is often the case with the modem French glass, as seen in some of the restored churches of Paris, more especially the pictorial glass, in which a warm, red hue IS often present, sometimes to a painful extent : the flesh especially is hot, and dirty in the shadows. It is to be doubted, indeed, i^ with all our knowledge of the harmony and complements of colours, we have yet attained to the principles by which the old glass-painters arranged their agreeable combinations. Whatever was the method, the effect was coolness of general tone : the flesh had little local colour, the prevailing tints of .the draperies and accessories were blue, cool green, and amethyst, and even the red was cool, inclining to crimson. The brown hues of the flesh in the modem glass, together with its opacity, are often very dis- agreeable, and the effect of scarlet instead of crimson tends to in- crease the hot and glaring effect of the whole. In the Parisian churches, where ancient and modem glass is to be found side by side, even when the former is not of the best period, as in St Germain I'Auxerrois, for instance, it is quite refreshing to turn the eye from the modem to the old glass, showing how far more harmonious the one is than the other. A MANUAL OF DESIGN. 75 In estimating the excellences of the one or the other methods of glass-painting we have spoken of, the superior durability of the earlier method is to be noticed ; also the much smaller liability to accidents from the diminished size of the pane, and the compara- tively small amount of damage done if a fracture does take place : an unlucky blow may immediately destroy the finest portion of a pictorial window, while it could do but srnall injury to a work on the older principle. These are minor merits, but to them may be added the greatly increased brilliancy of colour occasioned by the more frequent interposition of the dark line of the leading, and the lustre occasioned by the slight change of plane, in the smaller pieces of the early method bringing out thereby the richness of the glass, as the varied facets of the lapidary increase the lustre of the precious stone. Indeed it may be doubted if the subject of leading has had all the attention it so well deserves. The skilful manner in which this was executed in the early works is apparent from the preservation of the windows, unharmed by the storms and winds of centuries. It is certain that a varied surface was at times adopted in such works, for resisting, as has been supposed, the pressure of the winds : thus at Haddon Hall, in the long gallery, glazed in the reign of Elizabeth, each window is waved inwards and outwards over the whole surface, and each piece of glass cut to adapt it to this treatment : the result has been great durability, even although the lead itself is extremely narrow. These are, it is true, windows of uncoloured glass ; but it may probably point to the use of some similar method in decorated windows, to enhance their brilliancy and increase their effect. INLAID FLOORS, MOSAIC PAVEMENTS, INLAID TILES, ETC. The ornament of this section of our manufactures seems to be in the soundest and most satisfactory state, the most free from false principles, the most thoroughly amenable to true ones. 76 A MANUAL OF DESIGN. Although this no doubt partly arises from the conditions of the manufacture, it is, in a degree, to be attributed to other causes. The modem introduction of such works in England was at a fortunate time, when the attention of the ecclesiologists and of able artists was called to the revival ot mediaeval art, and to the study of the best works of Greece and Italy. The designer, there- fore, started upon just principles, and continues to adhere to them, even repudiating some of wha>^ must be considered errors in the ancient works which liave been Tianded down to us, such as those arrangements of light and dark inlays, giving the appearance ot relief, which are found occasionally even in the best ancient examples. We here reproduce a few speci- mens of floor and v/all tiles, which appear to us to combine a true application of principle with a thorough comprehension of the necessities of the material. The illustration (Fig. 4) is of an enamelled wall-tile, imitated from one found at Salisbury, and is given here to show the mode in which flowers were used as ornaments in such works by the mediaeval artists. The flower is displayed perfectly flat, in one colour, and arranged geo- metrically. Fig. s is given as a more intricate treatment on the same sound principles, and is from a design by Mr. Pugin. Fig. 6 is an impressed and enamelled tile of a Moorish pattern, for covering the surface of a wall with an ornamental texture, and with a broken harmonious ricliness of colour, in very durable materials, for which purpose it is admirably adapted. Many novel and praiseworthy works in burnt and coloured clay are now pro- duced to facilitate the application of design and colour to the ex- terior of buildings. Among others, a species of Majolica ware. FIG. 4. A MANUAL OF DESIGN. 77 •with ornament in relief, coloured with delicate tints, intended to be introduced into friezes, string-courses, panels, &c., and other combinations of the art of the designer with the skill of the tile- maker and the potter, which will enable the architect to break the monotonous surface of brick buildings, and introduce ornamental forms and colour without the necessity of resorting to plaster and na s. stucco, so long the wretched resource for such purposes. From the geological position of London, bricks must always be the prevailing material for building purposes : such means, therefore, for the safe introduction of colour and ornament, are especially desirable, and should be carefully studied, that the most judicious and sound principles of ornamentation may be adopted in these newly-revived materials. It is curious to see how instantly the 78 A MANUAL OF DESIGN. removal of the excise-duty on bricks was followed by the infusion of a new life into the manufacture, both as to novel forms and the application of coloured ornament to their surface ; it must be remarked, however, that the ornament of each separate brick should be perfect in itself as well as perfect in combinations. From the general use of carpets, considered, as they are, as a necessary comfort in this country, inlaid floors are far less used here tlian on the Continent, and we therefore obtain our chief supply of marqueterie work for floors from abroad. The principle of ornamentation, of course, is the same as that for mosaics and other inlays ; care, however, should be taken to select wood without a strongly marked form in its grain, since this is likely to interfere with the pattern of the inlay in general ; also right-lined figures are preferable to curved ones, in consequence of there being less need of crossing the grain of the wood in cutting. jjg g PAPER AND OTHER HANGINGS. If the use of such materials is borne in mind, the proper decoration for them wiU at once be evident, since materials of this class ought to bear the same relation to the objects in the room that a background does to a picture. In art, a background, if well designed, has its own distinctive features, yet these are to be so far suppressed and subdued as not to invite especial attention; while as a whole it ought to be entirely subservient to supporting and enhancing the principal figures — the subject of the picture. The decoration of a wall, if designed on good principles, has alike office : it is a background to the furniture, the objects of art, and the occupants of the apartment. It may enrich the general eflect, and add to magnificence, or be made to lighten or deepen the A MANUAL OF DESIGN. 79 character of the chamber : it may appear to temper the heat of summer, or to give a sense of warmth and comfort to the winter : it may have the effect of increasing the size of a saloon, or of closing-in the walls of a library or study : all which, by a due adaptation of colour, can be easily accomplished. But, like the background to which it has been compared, although its ornament may have a distinctive character for any of these piu'poses, it must be subdued, and uncontrasted in light and shade ; strictly speaking, it should be flat and conventionalized, and lines or forms which are harsh or cutting on the groimd should be as far as possible avoided, except where necessary to give expression to the ornamentation. Imitative treatments are objectionable on principle, both as intruding on the sense of flatness, and as being too attractive in their details and colours to be sufficiently retiring and unobtrusive. Some of the best examples of correct style as well in paper as in silk, velvet, and other hangings, are manufactured in varied treatments of texture in a self-colour ; as for instance of flock on plain or satined ground in paper, of tabby and satin in silk hangings, of stamped forms or cutting in velvet, or the same contrast of pattern with the ground in various mixed stuffs. By these means the ornament is necessarily flat, and does not disturb the general effect. With the slightest attention to the choice of form such a design can hardly be in bad taste, whilst great elegance and beauty often arises from such treatments. Next to these, graduated tints of the same coloiur produce a safe and quiet ornamentation for such fabrics ; or gold upon a coloured ground, where the gold is sparingly distributed and the colour not too strongly contrasted ; since in all cases a general tone of surface is to be sought for rather than pronounced individual forms. Further richness may be obtained by the judicious use of two or more colours, arranged either according to the ancient metliod of harmony, that is separated from each other by bands of black, white, or gold, or contrasted and enhanced by their comple- mentaries, and enriched by flock in either case ; in the latter case 8o A MANUAL 01' DESIGN. gold may be used with advantage. But we ever find that the combination of many colours, though it may increase expense from the number of blocks, is far from producing richness in a like degree, while it has often quite the contrary effect, and results only in poverty and meanness. It is necessary, however, to advert to a perfectly different treat- ment of these materials quite at variance with these rules, and boimd by no such principles, by which paper-hanging becomes a pseudo-decoration, the wall being di^dded into compartments often irrespective of architectural construction, with pilasters, friezes, and mouldings imitated in false relief on its surface, and having compositions of pictures, statues, hangings, flowers, fruits, &c., skilfully designed and well drawn, and, it may be, often most ably blocked for the purpose of printing. This is, however, at best but a sham decoration amenable to no laws, necessarily false in light and shade, often constructively inapplicable, and always impertinent and obtrusive, and should be left to those who, while desirous of display, are too much wanting in taste to be annoyed at its untruth and extravagance. Such a mode of decoration may perhaps be not quite out of place in the saloon of a theatre, in cafds, or in taverns, but it ought to . be confined to such localities, and should only be used there until the general taste is so far instructed that the pubUc wUl no longer tolerate gaudy shams and false magnificence. The same laws which ought to govern design for paper-hang- ings would, therefore, appear proper to regulate hangings of other fabrics, tapestries, &c. Although far firom regarding ornament in that exclusive spirit which would reject what is beautiful when it does not agree with the requisitions of a theory, it must be obvious that pictorial and picturesque treatments for such fabrics ai-e wrong whenever they intrude on the domain of another art. Thus, figures, landscapes, fruits, and flowers, when rendered as they would be in works of fine art, are almost of necessity inferior to the pictures they imitate, even when they are as skilfully and won- A MANUAL OF DESIGN. 8i derfuUy wrought as in the works produced by the national estab- lishment of the Gobelins, where every effort of skill and science has been most successfully used for their manufacture and embel- lishment. Indeed, it is a matter of doubt whether custom, and the authority of great names and of past times, are not the causes of the continued admiration of such decorations, which perhaps we rather persuade ourselves we like than are fully satisfied with. Our modern designs for hangings are too often florid and gaudy compositions, consisting of architectural ornament in relief, with imitative flowers and foliage. In some of the cleverest of them the flowers and foliage are perspectively rendered with the full force of their natural colours, and light and shade ; moreover, they are often three or four times as large as nature, whereby the size of a room would be apparently diminished. This florid style is mainly prevalent among French manufacturers, and from the extent to which this country is supplied with wall- papers and tapestries from France, these errors of style are liable to be imported into England with all the added influence of French taste. In all these florid and pictorial treatments of surface as con- trasted with the correct treatment for wall-papers, there is evidently no distinction in the minds of the designers between the principles applicable or permissible in the one class of works, and those ornamental principles which alone should govern the other. Thus pictorial imitation is the rule throughout; not only pictorial render- ings of flowers as ornament, but occasionally imitations of silk hangings with their plaited folds, of lace and muslin, of fringes, of stone and metal mouldings in high relief; but also (even in high- priced papers) imitations of landscapes, birds, trees, and archi- tecture, which would thus be multiplied interminably over the walls. Thus, notwithstanding the superior taste in the manage- ment of tints and the discrimination of colours, which is the result of the causes before alluded to, or of the better education 82 A MANUAL OF DESIGN. of the French workmen, it is difficult to find abroad a paper in really good taste. Having laid down certain principles upon which this class of manufactures and fabrics should be designed with a view to the true use of materials, and to the avoidance of unnecessary display, by the proper application of ornament, it is impossible to refrain from speaking in high terms of the influence upon our modem manu- factures of the elder Pugin. Some may object to the exclusive- ness of the style of his designs, and to its too purely ecclesiastical and traditional character, even in domestic works ; but for just principles of decoration, for beautiful details, and for correct use of materials, we cannot too highly praise tlie works he inspired. Thus, in his paper-hangings, for instance, there is no throwing away of many blocks to obtain richness, when one or two can be made sufficient : there is a perfect flatness and a subdued harmony of colour in all such works ; and if Tudor roses and heraldic lions are sometimes too pronounced, and there is occasionally a little excess of ornament, richness is generally obtained at the smallest sacrifice of means, and without any sacrifice of truth. It is diffi- cult to over-estimate the important effect for good brought about mainly by the writings and designs of Pugin, and to omit the mention of his name in any work on modem design would be a grievous oversight. The lately-introduced processes of printing paper-hangings by such machinery as is used for cotton goods, and of applying many colours from one block, are, we fear, likely to create a style of ornamentation for such fabrics of the most depraved kind. The largeness and flatness of details attainable by block-printing are less suited to cylinder-printing than more minute details, and the new processes offer ready means of applying several colours at a small expense — the reverse of what has hitherto been the case ; hence the effort has been to impress as many tints as possible on paper, and excellence is reckoned rather by the number of colours than by any other quality. Thus we are informed that works are A MANUAL OF DESIGN. 83 printed in " sixteen colours," in " fourteen colours," &c., the works themselves evidencing the absence of all knowledge of the effective arrangement of colour ; while violent, crude, and harsh tints are too often used to give greater impression of this excellence/ and the result is littleness and extreme meanness; in fact, such papers are, in point of design, much inferior to those printed in two colours by the same machinery. Well-considered design, thoroughly adapted for this process, would enable the manufac- turer to unite good taste with extreme cheapness; whereas the only present result is, by increased labour, to detract from the beauty of the ornamentation. EXTERIOR AND OTHER METAL WORK. The works, in metal, of this section with which we are mainly concerned consist of fountains, and ornamental iron-work in gates and balconies, and of castings for door-panels and lamp-pillars. The best of the metal fountains come so nearly within the limits of fine art, that their consideration is almost beyond our scope while dealing with simple decoration. Notwithstanding all that has been said about the incongruity of our climate with public foun- tains, there are undoubtedly long periods of the year, and those when London is most crowded as well with her own resident population as with visitors, when such works are not only extremely ornamental, but when an exhausting atmosphere would render them really useful and refreshing. The motion of water, at any season, has a great charm, and is peculiar in its power of giving pleasure even in the simplest jet or fall, agreeably and artistically disposed ; and ornamental arrangements for its full display would not only be picturesque additions to our city, which offers so many localities for their adoption, but would afford to our artists motives for combinations of figures with ornamental decoration. A means might thus, perhaps, be afforded of once more uniting fine and ornamental art, which, sadly to the deterioration of public G 2 84 A MANUAL OF DESIGN: taste, have for so long a time been almost wholly separated It may be doubted if the public would willingly part with even the tame and commonplace repetitions which adorn Trafalgar Square ; and those who have had the pleasure of enjoying the fountains of Italy and France will be quite prepared to judge of the effect which more skilfully-designed structures would have on the public mind here. Such works as gates, balconies, and panels, when made in iron, are for the greater part, in cast-metal, which of late years, from its capability of receiving cheap ornamentation, has almost wholly superseded wrought iron for these purposes. Where the object is intended to be fixed and immovable, as a balcony or panel, cast work is not unsuitable, and is capable of much beauty of orna- mental design. In these the ornament should add to the strength by its numerous articulations, yet be light and elegant in its forms. Works of this kind, too, are generally of a size to admit of being cast in one piece, ensuring thereby strength and lightness by continuity of parts. But in cast-iron constructions intended to be movable, as in the various kinds of gates, a very different character of design is necessary ; partly because entire casting is not always possible, both from the difficulty of running the metal into the numerous ramifications of the ornament in works of such increased size, and partly from the fear of warping in the cooling. The great expense of a mould is also saved by forming the ornament of a series of parts. This leads to the necessity of framing the work in wrought, and applying the ornamental details in cast-iron ; but hence results this evil, that the ornament has little constructive use, and is apt to look rather an addition than an integral part of the work.. Moreover, cast-iron ornament is necessarily far heavier than that composed of wrought iron, owing to the extreme brittleness of the cast-metal : this heaviness is sadly opposed to its real constructive strength in the manner usually adopted for putting together. The ornamental parts of such structures bemg pinned or screwed into the framing, there A MANUAL OF DESIGN. 85 are smaller points of attachment than in wrought iron ; the parts bed themselves less perfectly at the junction, since it is impossible to assist this union with the hammer, and the metal has small, tenacity, and easily breaks with any sudden jar. There is thus much less power to support, while there is of necessity much greater weight to bear; and without very careful and well- considered design, making the ornament as far as possible a brace to the work, the whole is apt to be an insecure aggregation of parts, without constructive unity or truth. In large objects, cast in one piece, such difficulties are readily surmounted, as weight can then be made to add strength, instead of detracting from it. In the old hammer-wrought gates, the ornament was not only a truly integral part of the work, but most materially assisted in the general support. Thus great lightness and elegance were, in this case, consistent with great strength, since the ornamental details supplied a means, not only of tying and bracing the work together, but also of preventing the front of the gate from drooping with its own weight, to the great hindrance of its use, and which defect in modern cast works of this kind has often to be over- come by the use of friction-rollers — a make-shift that the older workmen would have despised. When, therefore, we consider the varied beauty of which wrought iron is capable, its far greater durability, its tenacity and power of resisting accidents, the individuality of design which arises from its being wrought by the hand instead of cast in a mould (thereby leaving the fancy and the feeling of the workman untrammelled), it is satisfactory to find that a return to wrought iron for such uses is beginning to be evident We frequently come across garden-seats and chairs in cast- metal, which are principally to be noticed from the great want of due consideration of the material evidenced in their design : thus sometimes they are ornamentally constructed of branches and loliage naturally imitated, or of branches alone ; while, in others, carved and flowing lines are given to the back, arms, and legs of 86 A MANUAL OF DESIGN. the seat, adding nothing to the comfort of their use, and sadly de- tracting from the form properly belonging to such works. It must be confessed, indeed, that the tendency to consider the ornament before either the requirements of the material, or the use to which the work is to be applied, is but too evident in many of the works in metal in this class. The uses of iron for constructive purposes have ever been increasing since the Exhibition of 1851 pointed the way to a fit method of introducing this material. In America, in some of the principal cities, iron is made to do the work of almost every other building material, and often, where it is made to take the place of and to assume the characteristics of brick and stone, with the most unfortunate results. We learn that a Trans- Atlantic founder thinks nothing of turning out an entire house front in cast-iron to order. CHAPTER IX. ON DOMESTIC AND OTHER FURNITURE. Furniture and upholstery constitute, perhaps, the bulk of the manufactures which must receive our attention, and we shall find that many of the principles laid down in our first section will have a direct bearing upon works of this class. In endeavouring to state principles which may serve as general rules for the furniture designer, it will without difficulty be con- ceded that, having some specific purpose in view, his first con- sideration should be perfect adaptation to intended use ; this may appear so obvious a truism as to want no enforcement, but a visit to a modern drawing-room will speedily undeceive us, for there we see a multitude of objects offending against this rule : in some of them use is almost entirely overlooked, or has been evidently quite a secondary consideration, whilst in others it partially gives way either to effect or ornament. Thus we find a table of costly manufacture which has ornament in solid relief on its upper sur- face, and a fire-grate which evidently requires a glass case, since fire and smoke must be the worst enemies to such a polished marvel. We see, again, a pianoforte, surrounded by bristling bulrushes, which must always be catching in the dresses of those who approach it, and with hardly a right line in any part of it j and chairs so heavy that they must be fixtures instead of movables ; while of minor incongruities, the instances are too numerous to 88 A MANUAL OF DESIGN. specify. Manufacturers should aim at obtaining the greatest amount of convenience and accommodation in the least space, in order that the furniture may be as suitable as possible to the size and uses of the apartment in which it is placed. Another consideration to be attended to is stability of construc- tion, apparent as well as real ; the first being necessary to satisfy the eye, the last being indispensable to excellence and durability. Thus, as we have seen, the legs of articles of furniture, designed in the style of Louis XV., are often broken in the centre across the grain of the wood, or have their base of support far within the perpendicular line of the bearing ; a fault which, though it does not actually render them unstable, yet offends the eye as much as if they were really insecure. The constructive forms, moreover, should not be obscured by the ornament, but rather brought out by it; nor should all portions be equally decorated, but only such parts as friezes, pilasters, capitals, pillars, or panels ; herein simplicity is the safest guide to beauty. Over-enrichment, indeed, destroys itself, and it would not be difficult to point out works of the greatest pretension and the most costly workmanship, which are completely spoilt by this fault Cabinets entirely covered with carving, the very stiles and rails being as decorated as the panels and pilasters : metal chan- deliers, with leaves and flowers in as great profusion as in nature : papier-mache hidden under a surface of pearl and gold. It should be remembered that contrast is one of the first elements of plea- sure, and that rfjiose is one of the most valued excellencies of art ; thus simplicity serves as the background to ornament, as the setting to the gem, or the foil that enhances the beauty of the jewel ; and the good artist is as much shown in the economy of his labour as the bad one is by over-enrichment In following out our principle that ornament should arise out of construction, the work, abstractedly, should be constructed and then decorated ; not that it is meant that the ornament should be applied to the object, but (as in wood for instance) carved from A MANUAL OF DESIGN. 89 it; thus the leg formed for support, the pilaster or column for bearing, may be lightened and enriched by cutting away from the block or slab, not by adding to it. In his natural state man is a true workman in this respect, and works on just principles without knowing it. The New Zealander or South-Sea Islander first forms his war-club or his paddle of the shape best adapted for use, and then carves the surface to ornament it. The Swiss peasant, or the .shepherd of our own hills, works in a similar way. Such also is the case in the works of Eastern nations, as is particularly exem- plified in their choice sandal-wood carvings. Here the natural iind the refined taste agree, for the best ornamental wood-carving of the Renaissance is on this principle, low in relief, seldom project- ing beyond the surface of the pilaster, or the framing of the panel. In wood-carving care should be taken not only to have the relief so managed as to guard the work as much as possible firom accidental injury, but the designer should seek to adapt the forms of the ornament to the direction of the grain when it is open or free, and the work should be framed with a view to this considera- tion ; moreover, ornamental carving should not be applied to wood of strongly-marked party-coloured grain, but that which is homo- geneous in colour should be selected for the purpose, in order that the ornamental forms may as little as possible be interfered with by being mixed up with the lines and colours of the grain. It is curious how much costly and skilful labour has been thrown away from inattention to such minor considerations as these. CABINET-WORK AND FURNITURE OF ALL KINDS. The furniture of a man's house should indeed be well designed, well constructed, and judiciously ornamented, for, as it is con- stantly under his hand and eye, defects overlooked at first, or dis- regarded for some showy excellence, grow into great grievances, when, after they have become an offence, the annoyance daily increases. Here at least utiUty should be the first object, and, as 90 A MANUAL OF DESIGN. simplicity rarely offends, that ornament which is the most simple in style will be likely to give the most lasting satisfaction. Yet how seldom is this consideration duly attended to ! The ornament too often consists largely of imitative carving ; bunches of fruit, flowers, game, and utensils of various kinds in swags and festoons of the most massive size and the boldest impost, attached indis- criminately and without meaning to bedsteads, sideboards, book- cases, pier-glasses, &c., rarely carved from the members of the work itself, but merely applied as so much putty-work or papier-mach^ might be. The laws of ornament are as completely set at defiance as those of use and convenience. Many of these works, instead of being useful, would require a rail to keep off the household. We see a sideboard, for instance, with garlands of imitative flowers projecting so far from the slab as to require a " long arm " to reach across them, and ever liable to be chipped and broken ; and cabinets and bookcases so bristling with walnut-wood flowers and oaken leaves, as to put use out of the question. Now, such treat- ments, while they are not only not ornamental, are also not beau- tiful, and only enter into competition with stamped leather and gutta-percha. There is great reason to doubt if this merely imita- tive carving is ever just in principle, when applied ornamentally to furniture ; for, although the masterly chisel of Grinling Gibbons has raised it to great favour in this country, and although it may be tolerated when executed skilfully, yet it becomes absolutely un- bearable under less skilful hands, and when it is lavished in such profusion as we used to find it. Happily this state of things is dying out under improved culture. In France there is far less of this false mode of decoration, and a better sense of ornament prevails; the works being more frequently designed in the tra- ditional styles. A modification of the Renaissance is principally used, and in this the ornament is in low relief, and does not interfere with use ; although false construction is a vice of that period, which has not been remedied in their modern works, but is sometimes even exaggerated. A MANUAL OF DESIGN. 91 The style of Louis XV. lingers in France ; its playfulness of line and surface, its varied treatment and mixture of materials, together with its showiness, still command favour with the multi- tude. The surfaces of works in this style are curved, when prac- ticable J they are veneered in party-coloured woods, and panels arei formed by or-molu mouldings, often in both instances com- pletely at variance with the true construction ; and occasionally the panels are filled with porcelain enamels, the whole having at least a gay and sparkling appearance. In English adaptations of the style, instead of the treatment above described, the bold scrolls and shell-forms used in the decoration of rooms at that period are carved in all their coarseness on furniture. Such works bear out the remark before made, that these forms were especially adapted for gilding, and, indeed, are hardly bearable except when so treated, or when made of metal. This becomes even more apparent when full-coloured woods are used, such as mahogany ; in this material the ornament is even more coarse and heavy than in lighter-coloured wood. Since, however, the vendors of cheap furniture have adopted this manner as a cheap and flashy decora- tion for their goods, it is to be hoped that it wUl soon be entirely proscribed, or retained only by such dealers. Those designers who unreservedly adopt the ornament of past times must, of course, apply it to their works without any peculiar significance or connected idea, but merely for its beautiful forms, elegance, grace, or richness. Where, however, any significant allusion, sentiment, or happy idea can be embodied in the orna- ment, uniting it with the use and intent of the work on which it is to be placed, it will have a charm which is otherwise wanting. Not that this want is peculiar to the application of traditional orna- ment, since the designer in the natural or imitative manner seldom attempts any connexion between his decoration and the work to which it is to be applied. There seems no fitness, for instance, in surrounding the frame of a pier-glass with dead birds, game, shell-fish, nets, &c., although they may be excellent specimens of 92 A MANUAL OF DESIGN. carving ; nor is it clear why eagles should support a sideboard, or dogs form the arms of an elbow-chair; nor, again, why swans should make their nests under a table, at the risk of having their necks broken by every one seated at it. Indeed, in most cases, as such imitative forms cannot in the strict sense be called ornament, they almost challenge inquiry as to why they have been adopted, and only disappoint us when we find that their application has been without motive : this is not the case with traditional ornament, which, like the current coin, is accepted at once without inquiry. When we turn from such imitative works to furniture designed strictly in accordance with the rules of a traditional style, we feel that there is often a cold propriety about it which requires con- sideration before we can admire it. There is a strong movement at the present time in favour of a so-called medisval treatment. It may perhaps be objected that the general forms of furniture in this style want variety, and this is rendered more apparent by the florid lines of works of the ordinary type ; but the principal reason will be found to arise from a due consideration of the true con- structive treatment of wood, which is iU adapted to curved forms on account of its grain, and requires horizontal and perpendicular lines as the basis of framing. Some credit is due to this revival of a better and purer state of things, to the return to the old paths, and to the avoidance of the present mere sensualism of ornament. Yet it is not on this account, but as examples of careful and strict adhesion to tXMt priticiples of construction and ornamentation, that the works in this style deserve commendation. Some of the greatest faults in our furniture are unsuitableness to uses and false construction : it will often be found to be as skUfiil in execution as it is deficient in adaptation to its intended purposes. In cabinets large spaces are thrown away, and therefore, though occupying much room, there is little that is available for use ; the centre space, with its canopy (though pretty), has no apparent purpose, and it is quite disproportioned to the size of the wings, while it is also deficient in the appeaiance of support The book- A MANUAL OF DESIGN. 93 cases have often the same fault of room thrown away and of unsuitableness to use, besides displaying a false adaptation of Gothic stone forms to wood-carving. This latter fault is elsewhere also largely prevalent ; it will be found to be a common error in foreign furniture. Thus we have a wardrobe which would be more characteristic as an oratory, and a bookcase with arches that support nothing, and buttresses which have no thrusts to resist. Indeed it should be remembered that the arch is not a wooden, but essentially a stone construction ; it will be evident, on a moment's consideration, that it is a means of obtaining support by a number of separate small parts, the reverse of timber con- struction. It ought, therefore, to be well considered before being used in wood, wherein it should arise rather from coupled knees or brackets introduced to strengthen horizontal beams, than as an independent form. Sham construction is another error to which we have already alluded, not only of the kind before spoken ot, — the suppression of the true constructive forms, as panels, framing, &c., and the giving of undue prominence to others, — but also that where those portions which are intended for support (as, for instance, columns in cabinets, legs in sideboards, &c.) are made to move from under the parts intended to be supported when opening the doors of the furniture. This is a common case in cabinets designed in the Renaissance style, and has the authority of some of the best early specimens ; nevertheless, it is a constructive fault, and is instanced because it is the source of many like errors of a more glaring kind, as where legs are made to remove, or where the whole front of a cabinet or wardrobe is made into doors hang- ing to the sides without a framed facia and hanging style, and where both the side and centre columns (when such are so used as decorations) are made to move with the doors. The great defect in all our more ambitious furniture is the want of art-power in the workman. In this respect we are still sadly behind continental nations. Whenever the human figure is 94 A MANUAL OF DESIGN. used as ornament in English works it is pretty sure to be faulty. The figure may be well composed, may be evidently designed in good taste, since that is often the work of a superior artist ; but in the execution it is almost always misunderstood and spoiled. The extremities are finished without knowledge of the internal structure, the fingers, toes, and joints have no bones within the skin, but that "gummy" undecided treatment which evidences the ignorance of the workman. In wood-carving this is equally apparent, even when it consists only df ornamental forms. Very often in such work the " design " of the ornament would seem to be by the same unskilled hand that carved it, since it is mostly out of place, coarse, and merely " natural " in style, and rarely reaches beyond the expression of the most commonplace thought, or the imitation of the commonest fruits and flowers. Success in rendering either the human figure or animals, when in hfe and motion, can only be the result of knowledge attained by a careful study of the structure of the bony frame-work and of the moving muscles ; and thus it is the want of such anatomical knowledge and of a proper training in art that causes the deficiency we are obliged to notice in our furniture, and which compels the carver to confine himself to mere works of imitation, knowing that higher flights are beyond his powers. This deficiency of power and skill in the human figure is only an additional evidence of the want of better education for our art-workmen. They need to have proper treatises prepared for them, laying down the principles of ornament, and giving them a thorough foundation in practical geometry, form, proportion, and, above all, in anatomy, together with a careful education of the hand and eye. Unless the manufacturers of this country are soon awakened to our deficiencies, and prepared to make great sacrifices to support the government art schools, and to enable and induce their workmen to study in them, we must be content to lag still further behind as the world advances, and for the future to be manufacturers of cheap goods, leaving excellence and beauty to our continental neighbours. A MANUAL OF DESIGN: 95 HARDWARE. Under this head are comprised grates, fenders, fire-irons, stoves, gas-fittings, lamps, and various miscellaneous applications ; the whole being largely connected with ornamental design. The works in this section, however, are not more miscellaneous in their use than they are in their style of ornamentation : thus we see in our shops Greek candelabra adapted to many uses, Gothic chan- deliers and Renaissance IsCmps, with a pretty large sprinkling of the forms and ornament of Louis XIV. and XV., to which is to be added the natural style before alluded to, which, adopting foliage or flowers as its leading idea, presents them as they grow, without any constructive or architectural arrangement whatever. Yet even this is encouraging, since it indicates a desire for some- thing more than mere reproductions of the antique, or that viM'ee of ornament which the ignorant gather from many works, and re- assemble without taste or appropriateness. In a great portion of the works in metal French taste is found largely to prevail ; nor is this to be wondered at, since, for a long time, the lively fancy and invention of many excellent French artists have been ■directed to designing and modelling for these goods ; ably seconded, also, by trained and educated workmen capable of appreciating their labours, and completing them by skilful casting, <;hasing, and fitting. But the tendency of the French mind towards display has resulted in over-ornamentation, and it is un- fortunate that this fault is rather a merit in the eyes of the world, and has been eagerly adopted by the manufacturers of other nations, more especially by our own ; that which is meretricious being retained, whilst what is really excellent in French design, and especially in French workmanship, is overlooked by them, or is found unattainable. Moreover, whilst the most able French artists in metal, eschewing the gaudy style of Louis XV., have returned to a modified form of the Renaissance, and have given it somewhat of 96 A MANUAL OF DESIGN. newness of character, the English designers for hardware too often still adhere either to the contorted style first named, or they produce works composed of ornaments pirated from all times and all nations, put together without any sense of construc- tion, without selection and without fitness. Such works are a thorough chance-medley, disgraceful to our manufacturers, and FIG. 7. they make us look back to the simpler forms of the Middle-ages with respect and regret. Let anyone examine the characteristic simplicity of the candle- stick here engraved (Fig. 7), made from a design by Mr. W. Pugin, adapted as it is for use, standing firmly, capable of being handled, light yet strong, and compare it with the showy works of this class we commonly see, so ragged and tangled with ornament that A MANUAL OF DESIGN. 97 all characteristic form is lost, branched arms, bristling with foliage which weighs down rather than braces and supports them, with perhaps a bunch of flimsy chains dangling in the way of those who would touch or lift them, or, two or three Parian Cupids basking at the foot, or bearing up the candles ; and having, where the hand should grasp the stem to lift the candelabrum, the ornament so sharp and thorny that to touch it would be impossible. In making such a comparison can we do otherwise than feel that the one is honest, useful, characteristic, and therefore beautiful, whilst the others are flashy and grotesque, full of little prettinesses, which some misname " ideas," put together without any leading motive, and, having no definite character or true construction ? The faults of English design for hardware are obvious to every one ; the error of the French designers is equally open to the most superficial observer. In the great mass of their works there is no rest for the eye — the whole surface is nothing but ornament. Thus, for instance, the French art-bronzes have justly obtained a wide reputation, and the works of Denibre, Pradier, Mfee, and other French artists, are sought for all over Europe; but when such become a part of manufacture, and liable to be classed as hard- ware, art is overlaid with ornament, and the skill of the workman is directed to that which degrades the work, and sadly militates against good taste. Thus, figures designed with much fancy, and modelled with ability and vigour, are vulgarised from the imitation of fur and of the texture of the garments, of buckles, buttons, and ties of the dress, of chain or plate armour or weapons, whilst the homogeneity of the bronze is.no longer retained, but various parts of dress are treated in various tints of the metal ; and all the different qualities of surface, such as tooling, frosting, and burnish- ing, in which it is but just to say the workmen are most skilful, are brought into play to enrich the effect ; while sometimes vre have, in addition, combinations of many materials, such as marble, porcelain, ivory, and bronze, united in a single work. Another class of works are those anomalous candelabra com- 98 A MANUAL OF DESIGN. posed of porcelain vases filled with a bunch of flowers in or-molu, a few bearing candles amongst a number of barren branches, the whole being a bush of glitter and burnish. This is the direction which naturalism in ornament takes in France. Such works have a total absence of constructive feeling, and an equal want of proper treatment of metal ; to add to their finery, an ^pergne of artificial flowers is often mixed up with metallic ones, as a centre- piece for the dinner-table. The error, however, does not wholly rest with the designer, since it will be long before he has a public sufficiently educated to relish the amount of plainness which is absolutely necessary to give the true value to each part enriched. Grates rank among the principal works in hardware to which ornamental design is applied, and it is gratifying also to find that the design and decoration of these goods has greatly improved in the last few years. There is, however, an evident tendency to do too much, and it is incumbent on designers for such goods carefully to avoid this, and to endeavour to restrain manufacturers from such treatments of the metals as lead to gaudiness and glare, and by which, at the same time, the grate itself is rendered less useful. The great secret, after constructive use has been considered, consists in the proper and judicious treatment of the materials, which offer great advan- tages for contrast, either with or without the introduction of bronze or or-molu. True excellence will be found here also to be closely allied with simpUcity, a moderate use of ornament and of the burnisher, and the contrast of broad flat m.asses of plain metal with ornamented or burnished mouldings, with inlays of brass, or with bronze and or-molu ornaments. The arched form which has generally been adopted for grate-fronts is architecturally suitable as supporting the chimney breast, and agreeable in outline, giving ample opportunity for ornament in the mouldings of the arch, as well as in the spandrels, besides having sufficient surface of metal to serve as a contrast to the ornament ; moreover, it is not likely to interfere with the architectural arrangement of the mantel-piece to A MANUAL OF DESIGN. 99 which it may have to be fitted. Several grates designed by the late Mr. A. Stevens, decorative in character, and of great general merit, will be found in the Museum. The one engraved (Fig. 8) is con- structively simple, and sufficiently ornamented for its office as an article of furniture, while it displays most judicious use of materials. The face is of ground, cast metal, the ornamented moulding of pale bronze, with the leafage of brass, and the figure FIG. 8. bronzed, while some semi-burnished lines about the fire give a very chaste and tasteful effect ; the fender is also of bronze and brass, with the leading lines burnished. Much more ornament than this would raise the grate out of its right place in the scale of furniture, and draw undue attention to it ; its sober simplicity is more to be commended than many more highly ornamented. It can never be too much insisted on, that ornament loses its value when it overloads a work, and that large unoma- mented spaces are required to enhance and give zest to the H 2 lOo A MANUAL OF DESIGN. decorated parts. As we descend to grates designed by inferior artists, we find excess substituted for excellence, and works of such brilliant gaudiness of surface as to be quite unfitted for their intended use j indeed, the process of keeping them in order would seem lo require that a whitesmith should form part of our estab- lishment, or that the housemaid should have a practical education to enable her to take to pieces the elaborate constructions which would come under her care, independently of the skill required to clean them. It is tiresome to repeat what has so often before been said, that use ought to be considered before ornament ; yet no section of furniture suffers more from neglect of this rule than that com- prised under hardware. In some cases this shows itself in apply- ing a form or construction suited for one use, to another for which it is quite inapplicable. Thus we find some French chandeliers, which at first sight seem cleverly designed and show a skilful treatment of the metal, but which, on examination, are seen to consist of a large central lamp, which alone is intended to give light, surrounded by a circle of branches bearing sham candles, not intended or prepared in any way for illumination, but intro- duced merely to allow of a little extra ornament. From the same cause results the impertinent application of figures, in bronze or in Parian ; a fertile source of bad taste. These are too often merely added to the work, and not constructively treated, and thus seem to have no real relation to the forms they are connected with. Hence the manufacturer is enabled to adapt the same figure to many purposes, and to the most opposite uses ; sometimes at the base of a chandelier, sometimes at the top, and sometimes perched upon the branches. Profitable to the manufacturer this may be, but it is as completely opposed to every just principle of design as to every hope of progress or good taste. In the treatment of metal the rendering of the surface demands the most careful study, since much of the beauty of a work results from this being properly understood. No doubt the true lustre of Missing Page 102 A MANUAL OF DESIGN. akeady been adverted to. It is to be hoped that in view of these facilities manufacturers will see their own interest, and seek the best designs at any cost, since these will frequently be found to combine cheapness of production and simplicity with good taste. CARPETS. The use of these fabrics suggests the true principle of design for their ornamentation ; which is governed by the laws before given for flat surfaces, where the object is rather to treat the whole as a background than to call particular attention to the ornamenta- tion. Flatness should be one of the principles in decorating a surface continually under the feet ; therefore all architectural relief ornaments, and all imitations of finit, shells, and other solid or hard substances, or even of flowers, strictly speaking, are the more improper the more imitatively they are rendered. As a field or ground for other objects, the attention should hardly be called to carpets by strongly-marked forms or compartments, or by violent contrasts of light and dark, or colour j but graduated shades of the same colour, or a distribution of colours nearly equal in scale of light and dark, should be adopted ; secondaries- and tertiaries, or neutralised primaries being used rather than purer tints, and lights introduced merely to give expression to the forms. Under such regulations as to flatness and contrast, either geome- trical forms, or scrolls clothed with foUation in any style, leaves,, flowers, or other ornament, may be used, which, with borders and compartment arrangements, and the use of diaper treatments, leave ample room for variety and for the inventive skill of the artist It may be thought impossible or unnecessary to confine the designer too strictly by such laws, and they are, indeed, rather stated firom a sense of their truth than with an immediate hope of their thorough acceptance, but at any rate they may serve as curbs ta extravagance of design, and as guide-marks to lead back the errant designer to the paths of consistency. In speaking of A MANUAL OF DESIGN. 103 designs for carpets we turn first to France, because the import- ance of her national manufacture of these fabrics must claim our first consideration. The estabhshments under royal or national aid have carried these fabrics to the highest pitch of excellence in all that relates to skill of manufacture, brilliancy of colour, and magnificence of design. In the face of the many and rare excel- lences exhibited by them, both of handicraft and scientific know- ledge, the chemist and the botanist having united their sciences with the invention and taste of the painter, it may seem daring to reprobate the ornamentation of such costly works ; but their very excellence has so largely contributed to the spread of bad taste and false principles in such fabrics, that it becomes a positive duty, in the face even of the highest authorities, to object to the principles on which they are ornamented, if we would place carpet designs on the right footing for the future. There can be little doubt that we owe most of these faults to the false taste of the designers in these royal establishments, who have vitiated the judgment of the public. Carpets issued from them are fovmd which combine a mixture of ornament with natural or imitative flowers, designed with the greatest skill, coloured with the tints Oi nature, and gracefully and tastefully disposed. The ornament, how- ever, is purely architectural, and in shaded relief, without any sense of flatness ; and consists largely of the broken curves, the coarse scrolls, and the shell forms of the Louis Quinze period. The contrasts of colour, both as to tints and light and dark, are, how- ever, sometimes of the most violent kind, distressing the eye, and distracting the attention from any works which might be in juxta- position with them. It may be said that these carpets, designed for the gorgeous magnificence of palaces, can hardly come under sober rules ; that they are essentially intended for display. Even allow- ing this to be the case, such specimens may well serve as warnings of the danger of adopting the like style for more general uses j and even in a palace, the chaste simplicity of its statues, and the sub- dued hues of the works of high art which should adorn it, could 104 A MANUAL OF DESIGN. stand little chance of vying with the richness and lustre of fabrics so over-decorated ; and fiie princeiy inhabitant would certainly share the attention of the spectator with the gaudy carpet which covered the floor. The manufactured goods of this class too often consist of such a confused mixture of styles, and exhibit such a total want of con- sistency, that it is at once evident that the designers, both at home and abroad, are amen- able to none of those principles which have been explained as governing the decora- tion of carpets ; the flowers are often far be- yond the natural size, the colours are bright and gaudy, flatness is not attempted : in short, imitation and not orna- mentation has been the rule which has guided them. A work of much excellence is copied in the accompanying impression (Fig. 9). In the carpet itself the border is about half its width too narrow or the centre, but this is not seen in the woodcut ; the colour of the centre consists of gradations of a neutral red, the forms of the border are red on a dull white ground. Though meritorious in other respects it will serve to illustrate the error of indiscriminately applying the ornamentation of one material to that of another. Thus thedesign, taken from, the excellent work on the Alhambra by FIG. 9. A MANUAL OF DESIGN. 105 the late Mr. Owen Jones, and there used as a wall decoration, where its " up and down " treatment was characteristic and proper, is no longer so when applied to a carpet, since this requires an " all-over " treatment, or an arrangement towards the centre, a consideration which does not seem to have entered into the mind of the designer. The justness and truth of the Eastern style in carpet decoration and in the application of colour to such fabrics, and the inherent tradition of fitness in both, is well known. Turkish carpets are generally designed with 3, flat border of flowers of the natural size, and with a centre of larger forms conventionalized, in some cases even to the extent of obscuring the forms ; a fault to be avoided. The colours are negative shades of a medium or half-tint as regards light and dark, tending rather to dark, with scarcely any contrast, and therefore a little sombre in character. Three hues are prin- cipally prevalent and largely pervade the surface, namely, green, red, and blue ; these are not pure but negative, so that the general effect is cool, yet rich and full in colour. The colours, instead of cutting upon each other, are mostly bordered with black, the blue has a slight tendency to purple, and a few orange spots enhance and enliven the effect. The distribution of colour in these fabrics is far simpler than in those from India, which latter have sometimes a tendency to foxiness, in consequence of a larger admission of warm neutrals, as brown and brown-purple ; they also admit of a much greater variety of colours than the Turkish. The colour of the Indian carpets, however, is so evenly distributed, and each ■tint isso well balanced with its complementary and harmonizing hue, that the general effect is rich and agreeable ; the hues all tend to a dark middle tint in scale, and white and yellow are sparingly introduced to define the geometrical arrangement of the forms, such arrangement being the sound basis of all Eastern ornament The carpets and mats of Persia and the Levant are coming into great favour at the present time, and most justly deserve the high estimation in which they are held. Both in design and colour they are often everything that could be wished. One io6 A MANUAL OF DESIGN. thing is certainly to be learned from the works referred.to, namely, that bright colours are not necessarily rich or beautiful, but that tone is a great source of richness, and has at the same time the further merit of keeping such goods in their true place in the scale of furniture. No nations exhibit greater richness of what may be called upholstery, or more gorgeous costumes, than those of India and Persia, and the wisdom displayed in the negative tone and subdued colour of their carpets is worthy of consideration, afford- ing, as it does, a means of enhancing and supporting the richness and costliness of their other fabrics and their personal decorations. Almost all that has been said of carpets is applicable to druggets and felted goods for the same uses, and the principles of their ornamentation, under certain modifications, may be applied to floor-cloths and painted cloth for furniture covers, as well as to printed, felted, and woven fabrics, in various materials, for table- covers. Floor-cloths are not so much used in this country for dwelling rooms as in halls, staircases, lobbies, and other approaches, and richness and fulness of colour are, therefore, in general less needed. The laws which regulate mosaics and inlays for floors will, in some degree, rule these works also, except that wood inlays, especially when large, require a design capable of being framed in its construction, and due regard must also be paid to the shoulderings of mortices and tenons, a construction obviously unnecessary in floor-cloths. It is, therefore, requisite to guard carefully against mere imitations of such designs, and more espe- cially to avoid all imitations of carpet patterns. CURTAINS AND HANGINGS. The ornamentation of textile hangings follows the same laws, and is amenable to the same general principles, as that of other wall decorations, flatness of treatment and subdued contrasts of colour being the only sure guides. A MANUAL OF DESIGN: 107 The richest, and at the same time the most sober effects in silk, are produced as we have ahready noticed merely by the processes of weaving, as of satin figures on a tabby ground, in a self-colour; and ornament properly suited for this treatment of the silk is generally in good taste, and shows the full splendour of the rich material. Next to this, graduated tints of a self-colour, as gold on straw colour, or even ornaments in one colour, on a ground formed of the natural golden tint of the silk, where the contrast is not too violent, have a good effect, and show to advantage beside those over-decorated works which are covered with natural flowers in many colours. In such treatments as these the lustre and gloss of the silk, and the richness of colour conse- quent on these qualities, are seen to the greatest advantage in the flat masses of such ornament, heightened as they are by the duller ground ; while smaller parts and varied tints interfere with these inherent qualities of the material. The natural treatment of flowers as the ornament of textile fabrics is nowhere seen to greater disadvantage than in the rich altar-cloths in gold brocade of French, Austrian, and Russian manufacture. The coloured and shaded flowers instantly vulgarise and give a commonness to this essentially rich material ; while diapers of colour, or a different texture produced by weaving, or silver threads woven with the gold, as in some of the Russian fabrics, have a rich and true effect The consideration of chintzes comes under the head of hang- ings ; and upon these fabrics it is quite necessary to make a few remarks, since their decoration seems at present to be of the most extravagant kind. Overlooking the fact that the lightness and thinness of the material wiU not carry a heavy treatment, and that, in addition to all the principles which have been shown to regulate designs for hangings, the use of imitative floral ornament is peculiarly unsuitable on account of the folds in which it hangs, the taste is to cover the surface almost entirely with large and coarse flowers — dahlias, hollyhocks, roses, hydrangeas — or others which ic8 A MANUAL . OF DESIGN. give scope for strong and vivid colouring, and which are often magnified by the designer much beyond the scale of nature. These flowers are not only arranged in large groups, but often cover the whole surface, in the manner of a rich brocade. Nothing can be more erroneous, or more essentially vulgar, and this would at once be evident did not fashion blind us for a time, and a feeling for costly labour and difficult execution prevail over truth and good taste. Moreover, it is scarcely possible in such distributions of colours, whether printed or woven, to arrange them according to just or scientific laws. For although this may be attainable when colour is in simple flat tints, and subordinated to geometrical groupings, we find that when the tints are broken up and graduated into shades, and distributed with regard to flowing and naturally-dispersed forms alone, the due quantities for harmony, the juxtaposition of complementary and harmonizing tints, and the true balance of parts, becomes difficult or im- possible. The present mode of ornamenting these fabrics seems to have arisen from the false spirit of imitation — a desire to rival the richness of silk ,• but the fact is overlooked that the texture, naturally light, requires lightness and elegance of form and colour ; and that, as a summer fabric, richness and fulness of hue, which tend Bather to a sense of warmth, are out of place. The true principles for the decoration of chintzes, on the contrary, require fresh and cool light grounds, with flat ornamental forms, either "all over" or in "up and down" bands, or diapers of floral ornament, on a simple textural ground. In conclusion we may say a few words on muslin curtains which properly belong to this section. These fabrics should, of course, have a perfectly flat treatment, whether purely ornamental forms or flowers are used for their decoration. The best eifect for borders is obtained by a symmetrical arrangement of flowing lines, which may be large in pattern, from the lightness of the material ; while a diaper treatment, or small sprigs arranged with A MANUAL OF DESIGN. 109 large and regular spaces over the central field, complete the simple rules for their decoration. It would seem hardly possible to err much in designing for a fabric which admits of such small varia- tion, the contrast of the thick work with the more filmy ground being the source of the ornamental form, and colour being rarely used j yet, perhaps, in the whole range of manufactured goods, there are few more glaring mistakes to be seen than are made in the decoration of these fabrics. In the Swiss muslins, the effort seems to be directed rather to curious skill in workmanship than to taste in design, and some of the most costly goods are in the worst conceivable taste — immense cornucopias, pouring out fruit and flowers, palm-trees, and even buildings and landscapes being used as ornament. Even when this only consists of flowers, they are used imitatively and perspectively, foldings of the leaves, and in some cases the actual relief of fruits, being attempted. Although the same faults occur in English manufactures, these, on the whole, have been greatly improved in taste. Except that curtains allow of an " up and down " treatment, which table-cloths do not, most of the same rules apply to damask table-linen as to white muslin curtains. The ornament of damask linen, arising, as it does, merely from the gloss obtained by various distributions of the warp and woof in weaving, ought to be ex- tremely simple in form ; yet even in these goods we find buildings, landscapes, vases, baskets, fruits in relief, and flowers perspectively treated as the details of decoration, while we have seen a centre- piece of precious metal wrought in the table-cloth where the real one is meant to be placed. A border of flat ornament, consisting of flowing lines or a flat floral trea,tment, carefully studied as to the distribution of quantities ; a diaper geometrically arranged over the inner field, composed either of floral or ornamental forms, with a judicious interspace (the diaper being rather dispersed than crowded), and a central form, give the best general distribution for the surface of table-linen. Proper attention should be paid, in designing the border, to the quantity allowed for turning down no A MANUAL OF DESIGN. over the edge of the table; and care should be taken, when heraldry and heraldic devices are introduced, to have them strictly flat. Landscapes, solid and shaded forms, perspectives, and architectural relief ornament, should be carefully avoided. Although the principles which govern the decoration of these fabrics appear to be simple and self-evident, there are few manufactures where a greater amount of error prevails, the nearest approach to purity of style being floral treatments, imitatively rendered. In concluding our remarks upon this section of design, we may again invite attention to the different relative importance, in an ornamental point of view, of the various articles which are com- prised under the head of the furniture of an apartment. These are produced by various manufacturers, each endeavouring to give the greatest amount of decoration to his own works, without duly considering their relation to other fabrics. Thus the carpet manu- facturer ornaments his articles so showily that they outvie the hangings — the wall-decorator, or paper-stainer, his goods, till they emulate the cabinet furniture — whilst the upholsterer overlays his share of the furniture with florid carving, with or-molu and inlays, or with rich broideries of silk or velvet, so as far to outshine the rare workmanship of the jeweller or the goldsmith, or the art of the bronzist, the sciilptor, or the painter, with which they are mingled. AH this arises out of error ; each article of furniture has a due share of importance — a relative value as decoration— beyond which it should never be forced ; and the designer for each should have this truth strongly impressed upon him in all his labours. We may suppose it will readily be conceded that the carpet, bear- ing, as we have pointed out, the relation of the groundwork for objects, should have a quiet richness of surface and texture, intruding in the least possible degree on the eye or the observation ; the wall decorations, the next in importance, being entirely of the nature of a background, should be subordinate to the cabinet work ; which, in its turn, should hardly be forced into undue A MANUAL OF DESIGN. iii competition with the skilful works in glass, porcelain, metal, or the fine arts, for which it serves merely as a means of display or arrangement. Yet how often is this order entirely reversed, and the simplicity of fine art outshone by the gorgeousness of mere furniture ! Where the educated taste of a decorative artist is not sought for, this too often arises from want of taste in the purchaser, who selects each object for itself, and not on full consideration of this principle of subordination ; but were the designer really alive to the truth of the principle, such gaudy and false ornamentation would hardly be appHed to inferior fabrics. Jewellers are careful that the setting may be a proper foil to the more valuable stone, but those who have the means of richly decorating their dwellings often make such a show of the setting that it overpowers the gem. CHAPTER X. ON DOMESTIC UTENSILS AND OBJECTS OF PERSONAL USE. Our third group brings us to the examination of design applied to domestic utensils and objects of more immediate personal use. Although there is not an exact line of demarcation between such works and those more properly ranging with domestic furniture, the division is sufficiently accurate, and is convenient as permitting classification under the separate heads of : — 1. Porcelain and pottery. 2. Table and ornamental glass. 3. Works in the precious metals, &c 4. Bookbinding. It will at once be evident, that whatever is comprehended in this section ought to display the greatest purity of form and the rarest excellence of ornament ; such objects should be cha- racterized by the utmost refinement and finish, since they are daily imder our hands, and continually subject to minute personal inspection. Their utility, moreover, should have special attention, and convenience and usefulness should be carefully studied. Here the omamentist will have full scope for the highest efforts of his ingenuity and taste j and when working on the most precious materials, he may add by his labour even to tfidr value and richness. A MANUAL OF DESIGN. 113 Moreover, in those classes in which use is a first requisite, as is largely the case in china, pottery, and glass, the purest forms should be sought, allied to the greatest convenience and capacious- ness J and the requisite means of lifting, holding, supporting, — of filling, emptying, and cleansing, should engage the attention of the designer, before the subject of their ornamentation is at all considered. PORCELAIN AND POTTERS' WARE. There is hardly any nation, however primitive its state, with whose works we have become acquainted, that has not numbered among its manufactures some kind of potters' ware ; rudely made, perhaps barbarously decorated and imperfectly fired, but sufficient for the simple domestic purposes of people in an early stage of society and civilization. As nations advanced in culture, their pottery improved also, both in elegance of form, in beauty of decoration, and in manu- facturing excellence ; so that their fictile fabrics alone will often mark the standard of national civilization, and indicate the progress of a people in the arts of life. This has been the case not only with the Greeks and the Eastern nations, but with the modern Europeans also, both of Italy, Germany, France, and England. It is unimportant that in Europe the improvement of these manufactures has, until of late years, been dependent on the patronage and assistance of princes, since, at the period of the first impulse to excellence, this was largely the case with all works of costly production. It is sufficient to notice that the pottery faithfully reflects the taste of the time ; that its improved manufacture and decoration has been coincident with general culture ; and that the style and progress of art, its motive and object, are as vividly depicted on the pottery as in the pictures and statues of the age. Thus, when pagan subjects began to be treated among the artists of Italy, from the revival of learn- ing and the spread of a knowledge of the literature of Greece and 114 -^ MANUAL OF DESIGN Rome, this change was immediately stamped as indelibly on the pottery of Urbino as upon the pictures of Raphael and his galaxy of pupils. In the same way, when the luxurious court of Louis XV. became interested in the manufacture of porcelain, and encouraged it with royal munificence in the workshops of Sfevres, all the glare and glitter of that pleasure-loving court," its debased art and theatrical prettiness, were at onc<> impress-ed upon the works of that manufactory. In this view of the ceramic arts there is much that is hopeful in their present position, since not only is there a manifest pro- gress in the last few yeats in the general manufacture of porcelain and pottery, both at hbme and abroad, but there is also a decided improvement in their decoration. We seem to have nearly passed through the stage of inere irriitaition ; the antique has been care- fully studied, not so much with a view to the mere reproduction of the elegant forms of its utensils and of their decoration (too much the custom during the latter end of the last and the com- menceinent of the present century), as, from the examination of the vases and tazzas of antiquity, to obtain the geometrical basis of their construction, and the principles on which the Greeks applied ornament to their surface. Hence has resulted an im- proved elegance and refinement in modem porcelain ; and the beautiful details of Moresque ornament, or the riclmess and elegance of the Renaissance, have been adapted to its decoration' on the same just principles that guided 'the artists of Greece and Etruria in ornamenting with their own national and sigriificant ornaments the beautiful works which time has spared for our admiration. The works of this class may, for facility of consideration, be examined under two heads, generally broadly distinguishable, without, however, having special reference to peculiarities of manufacture or of material, whether as hard or soft paste, as earthenware and porcelain. They' may fairly be divided into! ornaments and works of utility. It has elsewhere beeh said that A MANUAL VF- DESIGN. 115 ' manufacture^ may be so over-decorated 'y to be degradeS into ■sntr& ornaments -j'fst when works are"^ pro(iu2e5 simply with tMt object, they may'notonlybe' admired ks' addressed to "the purpose of .giving pleasure by their beauty, but by their production th^ often sensibly, exercise a' useful' influencd on the 'general taste of the manufacture. ~ ' This is nowhere 'more evident than in ffle beautiful and valuable porcelain, the present product of the Sfevre's factory. . , Pere'we find the taste of the first artists assisted by the science of able ck^misfs, and, under a judicious direction, united to the most skilful workmanship and maftufacture, and the result is that the fabrication 'of porcelain is carried to the highest degr^fe of excellence. The cJiefs-i' ceuvre of this 'factoVy, however, are works whicli'must'be classed' as ornaments, such as vases, caskets, chalices, tazzas, &c. The forms adopted, heretofore so rococo, are pure, arid t&ps'e "'pure' forms are' rarely inteirfered i^fth by the reliefs. The" details' of 'the 'decoration, the mddellirig of the relieffe . and .the painting,; — whether these consist of figures, " flowers,