Category: Architecture of the Gilded Age

The Background

This is the second in a series of five articles on home decoration written by L.B. Wheeler (1854-1899), an architect who practiced in Atlanta from 1883 to 1891. The articles were published in The Atlanta Constitution in December 1885 and January 1886.

Here, Wheeler charted the origin of residential halls to Anglo-Saxon living rooms and criticized their “modern offspring” of the 19th century: “long, narrow, uncomfortable stair choked strips of passage,” which he characterized as “depressing.”

His description of a well-arranged central hall with a fireplace, stairs, and seating surrounded by a cluster of smaller rooms was the “living hall” concept introduced by McKim, Mead & White of New York in the 1870s. A fine example is their stair hall from the Metcalfe House (pictured below), on view at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Having previously practiced in New York, Wheeler would have been very familiar with the living hall, as indicated by an 1882 illustration of a similar “staircase hall” he designed (pictured at top).

The idea was still quite new in Atlanta, however, and was likely introduced to the city with G.L. Norrman‘s design for the Edward C. Peters House in 1883. By the end of the 1880s, nearly every home of consequence in Atlanta had a roomy hall at its nucleus.

In this article, Wheeler also took the opportunity to argue for the judicious use of stained glass windows, and admonished people who furnished their halls with uncomfortable seats for “errand boys and servants… suited to their condition in life…”

Wheeler described such accommodations as “giving a stone when no bread was asked for…”

Spoken like a true New York radical.

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Home Decoration.

Halls.

By L.B. Wheeler, Architect of the Kimball House.

December 13, 1885

The germ of our modern hall probably found its origin in the hall or living room of the Anglo Saxon. This hall was a large room with wooden walls and earthen floor in which lived, dined and caroused lord, lady, guest and serf alike, and where at night they lay down upon their straw filled sacks to sleep, arranged according to their rank. The only decorations of this room were the variously dyed and figured cloths hung upon the walls and against which, when not required for purposes of war and pillage, were frequently hung the arms and armor of its occupants.

The only furniture besides the chairs, which were for the exclusive convenience of those high in rank, were the benches, in which during the day were stored the beds used at night. The fireplace was the center of the room and the fire of logs, around which the shivering occupants gathered as the winds rattled the osier shutters and the rain beat upon the thatched roof and clay covered walls, poured forth constantly its curling wreaths of smoke which lingered loitering among the guests before ascending to the roof and taking a final leave of the dried meats and other stores, as it passed out at the gables.

Although not what would now be considered habitable the old saxon hall had an air of homeliness and hospitality about it which is seldom possessed by its modern offspring.

The hall, like the host, should greet you hospitably. What is more depressing than an introduction into one of the long, narrow, uncomfortable stair choked strips of passage, with rooms arranged in a row on either side, which, through modern courtesy is sometimes called hall, and which, whatever its width, is but a passage still? A well arranged hall is a great source of ventilation and heat, it should be a bond uniting the rooms in a complete and harmonious suite. The rooms so connected may be made much smaller than would otherwise be necessary, could not their dimensions, when occasion requires, be increased by uniting one with the other.

Halls are frequently used as sitting and reception rooms and when the floors are of hardwood are very serviceable for dancing. The furniture usually consists of a table, chairs, umbrella stand and hat rack, etc., all of which should be suited to their purposes, and not used for show. If you have no use for a piece of furniture, you may feel perfectly safe in rejecting it. Furniture is not made like pictures and statuary, to be looked at, but for use.

Hall chairs and seats should be comfortable. The necessity for this caution was suggested upon hearing a dealer in furniture explaining to one of his customers who had objected to a hall seat because it was uncomfortable. That it was for the service of errand boys and servants to whom we should offer in courtesy while awaiting our convenience a seat and temporary shelter from the inclemency of the weather and that such a seat should be suited to their condition in life and did not need to be comfortable. What kindness, what rare courtesy, that offers to the unfortunate under the guise of hospitality, aesthetic uncomfortableness, this is giving a stone when no bread was asked for. All that is necessary to make furniture comfortable and useful is a little thought expended upon its design. The staircase should be broad and ample with spacious landings, having short and easy flights leading in agreeable directions to the stories above. Upon this general arrangement of the staircase depends its effect, be it either of elegance, grandeur or inviting hospitality and no amount of unnatural twisting or torturing of rail or balusters or ludicrous imitation of massiveness or lavish display of cheap ornamentation can rectify a mistake originally made in this respect. Swans are not hatched from goose eggs; nor do lace and ribbons make an ugly form beautiful, although lace and ribbons may in their place be very attractive ornaments. The hall should be well lighted, not necessarily by stained glass windows. Nature seen through transparent plate or even crystal sheet is sometimes nearly as beautiful as stained glass. That this is not generally comprehended, is to be judged from the frequency with which we see really beautiful, natural scenery blotted out with much care and great cost by the use of those crude and violent contrasts of color so abundantly produced by some of our manufacturers. Stained glass, like jewels, should be used very sparingly, and unless, as with a picture, it is genuine art work, it had better not be used at all.

Its effects are so powerful that they challenge attention before everything else and if on inspection they fail to support their pretentions to consideration, the impression is very disappointing and likely to mold our opinion in regard to the remainder of the room and its contents. Of course it is unnecessary to state that a piece of coloring, which must necessarily be so powerful as that of stained glass, if used in any quantity, must become the key or point of cumulation of any composition in which it may be placed and should be suited to its position. It is well to assure ourselves before accepting our own judgment on these matters that we are not color blind. Many persons, who little suspect it are deficient in their perception of color and to produce an impression on them it is necessary to use some very striking combinations. The delicate and harmonies of one of Tiffany’s masterpieces, would not be perceptible to them. The eye usually requires considerable education before it is able to distinguish and appreciate delicate, refined and subtle combinations of color. The selection of stained glass should be left to a competent artist. As to the story or sentiment expressed and its fitness for its place, we may possibly be judges, but unless we have some special knowledge we had better suspend further judgment. The small sketches displayed by the agents of manufacturers are commonly no indication of the finished work. They are often made by parties who have nothing what ever to do with their execution. Stained glass, like any other art work, requires in its execution the application of the artist’s own powers.

Where it is desired in the arrangement of a suite of rooms that each should produced its proper effect upon the beholder, it is of importance that the best should be reserved for the last. The proof of the wisdom of this course may be drawn from our own personal experience.

After eating honey, sugar seems less sweet. One picture will destroy the effect of another. The skillful tradesman shows his best goods last, and after the loud rolling of thunder, even the lion’s roar seems mild.

Many people get too much thunder in their halls. Their principal idea of artistic composition being to arrange everything so that the beholder will be perfectly overcome upon his entrance into the hall; the result being that the hall overpowers and destroys the effect of every other room in the house and leaves none of those pleasant little surprises, which in a carefully studied design unfold themselves gradually to the interest and delight of the beholder.

If possible, a hall should have a fireplace—a good, generous and serviceable one—and in a pleasant and suitable position; not one of the little, narrow, useless things caged and squeezed into some remote place or corner, simply because its species are fashionable. Hall, home and fireplaces seem to be inseparable. How the very names kindle the imagination and sets memory wandering among her long forgotten stores, awakening pleasant reminiscences of long ago. An old house, moss-covered and gray, a sweep or road suddenly appearing beneath the hoary maples, guarding the decrepit gate, and as suddenly disappearing at the foot of the hill, only to be seen again in sudden flashes from behind mounds of green meadow and red and white farms, as it passes on to mingle in the gray confusion of distant meadow, farm and forest. And with it and a part of all the wind, which, sweet with the odor of the new fallen hay, flows gently up the hill and over the tangled grass of the lawn, enclosing the old house in its tender robe or coolness, penetrating every crevice, stealing in at the windows, and whispering to the lilacs and gooseberry bushes as it passes away, rustling secrets of the old hall within.

The old hall with its quaint mahogany staircase peeping out from behind the figured curtains, and leading away into the unfathomable mystery of tottling childhood. The oaken-timbered ceiling grown dark with age. The wainscoted walls, the generous fireplace, with its andirons of brass always so bright, and which in the long winter evenings were so serviceable, retaining in place the blazing forelog. The high shelf above the fireplace, and its brass candelabra, awakening with their prismatic reflectors strange fancies in the mind of imaginative youth, and over all the hospitable red chimney, which on Christmas day poured forth far above the misty gray trees its curling wreaths of welcome.³

References

1. Tuthill, William B. Interiors and Interior Details. New York: William T. Comstock (1882), Plate 8. ↩︎
2. McKim, Mead and White Stair Hall | The Metropolitan Museum of Art ↩︎
3. Wheeler, L.B. “Home Decoration. Halls.” The Atlanta Constitution, December 13, 1885, p. 18. ↩︎

The Background

This is the first in a series of five articles on home decoration written by L.B. Wheeler (1854-1899), an architect who practiced in Atlanta from 1883 to 1891. The articles were published in The Atlanta Constitution in December 1885 and January 1886.

Here, Wheeler introduced the series and pontificated in a somewhat circuitous manner on the origins and meaning of taste, the fickle nature of fashion, and ill-proportioned rooms, among other things.

However, it appears his main objective for the article was to rant about that most contentious of topics: wallpaper. Wheeler offered choice words on the subject and invoked the name of William Morris, an influential British textile designer, to argue against the “cheap, flashy appearance” of gold in wallpaper.

It truly was the Gilded Age.

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Home Decoration.

The First of a Series of Interesting Papers.

By L.B. Wheeler, Architect of the New H.I. Kimball House.

It seems to me that if a knowledge of the truths and principles, the observance of which are essential to the production of all good decorative to other art work, could become general, it would greatly raise the standard of excellence in those productions. It is my purpose, from time to time, to offer through The Constitution suggestions for thought upon the following subjects: Halls, fireplaces, yards and fences, convenience and arrangement of rooms, carpets, tapestries, bricabrac, furniture, style, fashion, etc. If any interest is thereby awakened in those subjects, and a desire for their further investigation created, my object will have been accomplished.

L.B. WHEELER

Decoration and Furniture.

It is essential that the arrangement, decoration and furniture of a room should be suitable for its purposes. However beautiful a room or an object may be in itself, if it fails to accomplish the purpose for which it was intended, it is a failure.

It would seem that practical application of truth so plain must be universal, but when we look around us, we find chairs which are uncomfortable to sit upon; rooms without suitable places for furniture, fireplaces so arranged that the back of the shivering applicant for warmth, receives a constant draught; sitting rooms, where the colors should be quiet and unobtrusive, the walls, forming a harmonious background for the occupants, and for the objects of interest and beauty that accumulate in such a place, having walls covered with paper, ablaze with Dutch gold, glaring red and black, thus forcing itself upon our notice, to the exclusion of all that is truly beautiful, refined and modest in the room.

Gold is very seldom used in the best designed papers. It is not introduced by William Morris into more than half a dozen of all the beautiful papers designed by him, and in these in such a manner that you are scarcely conscious of its presence. Gold, when it becomes too conspicuous in a design, gives it a cheap, flashy appearance, very objectionable in most of the papers used in house decoration; the figure is so strong that it destroys the effect of whatever is brought into contact with it or relieved against it: the colors are too bright and too many, and they are seldom harmonious; the general effects obtained, unless large quantities of Dutch gold are used, being some dirty gray. The tones, with a few exceptions, are never good and positive. The patterns are still worse, made without any regard to fitness of effect or the nature of the materials and processes at command. Attempts are frequently made to imitate nature, where the representation of some vine, flower or leaf is attempted you will probably find most of the laws which govern the direction of growth in nature and ornament violated.

Where figure subjects are aspired to, the results compare very favorably with the chromo-lithographic work on the bills heralding the approach of traveling shows. With such material at command, without any knowledge training, study or experience, their only stock in trade being their supposed inheritance of what is called good taste; “something with which, by the way, every true American is abundantly provided, and in which his neighbor is sadly deficient” it is not surprising that so many fail in the attempt to make their homes attractive and beautiful.

Many persons have selected beautiful papers for the walls, a lovely pattern for the frieze, but somehow when they were sent home and put up, the effect was not just what was expected, in fact it was disappointing, and their attempt at decoration proved a failure. They have yet to learn that colors, forms and objects are of as much importance, and require as great skill in their introduction and arrangement in a room as they do in a picture. Very few would think themselves capable of creating a work of art or making a change for the better in an existing one, yet they would not hesitate to destroy the effect of a beautiful room by the introduction of some inharmonious object or color.

The contents of our homes are usually chosen because we like them, but when we think of the effect fashion has upon our likes and dislikes, that the thing we thought perfectly beautiful last year, is perfectly hideous this year, how our so-called good taste is constantly changing, it is simply a matter of different influences brought to bear upon an immature education.

When we think of this, would it not be wise to use a little more judgment and less taste in the selection of things of so much importance to our welfare and happiness as the furniture and decoration of our homes? A form or color that is beautiful once is beautiful forever.

Who ever tires of the masterpieces of art, Beethoven‘s symphonies, or the scenes and beauties of nature familiar from childhood? Rather does not the pleasure derived from these things increase with continued acquaintance? That some people are more susceptible to the influence of the beautiful than others, and that they acquire more readily, though, perhaps unconsciously, an education from the objects by which they are surrounded, is true, but the value of this education depends upon their opportunities for observation. The definition of taste, according to the common conception, is this:

Taste is an inherited faculty to judge of the right and wrong a thing, about which we know nothing. The reputation of having this faculty, is often very cheaply obtained. The frequent and persistent assertion of your opinion upon matters of art, a month’s trip to to Europe, the ability to copy a few flowers indifferently well with the assistance of a teacher, or the having been connected in some distant way with art, perhaps a dealer in art materials, giving one a clear title to judge of the masterpieces in architecture, sculpture, painting, music and poetry.

Among a few of the mistakes made by amatures [sic] is the common one of failing to pay proper regard to the proportions of a room. Owing to the almost universal custom of making the ceilings of our homes a uniform height, regardless of the dimensions of the rooms, it happens that very few rooms only are of agreeable proportions. As it is of the first importance to the effect of a room that its proportions should be pleasing, this opportunity should be taken to correct any errors originally made in this respect by a proper arrangement of the decorations.

If we look around us we shall find this very seldom done. Rooms already too small are made to appear still smaller, by using too large and strong a pattern upon the walls, and by the introduction of clumsy excrescences in the finish and furniture. Ceilings, which are too high, are made to look still higher, and when too low to appear still lower, and many other mistakes are made by the failure to use the numerous expedients available for correcting such faults in the arrangement of decorations.

The walls are often so light in color that objects hung upon or relieved against them have a spotty appearance, destroying all repose and breadth of effect. Sometimes the effect produced is gloomy and cheerless, owing to the absence of a principal light where the general tone is dark.

In selecting wall papers those patterns which are pronounced or peculiar should be avoided. When we go into our neighbors’ houses and find the walls covered with a novel and striking paper, we come away with the impression that the paper in Mrs. So-and-So’s house is beautiful. Our admiration is somewhat dampened when on the day following we find the same paper at another friend’s, and by the time we have seen it in several different houses, it affects us as being very commonplace. This feeling is in direct proportion to the power with which the paper first challenged our attention.

As manufacturers produce large quantities of each design, and frequently dispose of them to the same dealers, we take considerable risk in using those of a striking and novel design.

L.B. WHEELER⁸

References

1. Lyon, Elizabeth A. Atlanta Architecture: The Victorian Heritage, 1837-1918. The Atlanta Historical Society (1976). ↩︎
2. “Holding Her Own.” The Atlanta Constitution, August 8, 1886, p. 9. ↩︎
3. “Handsome Church for Ponce de Leon”. The Atlanta Constitution, January 4, 1914, p. 1. ↩︎
4. “The Real Estate Field”. The Atlanta Journal, January 4, 1915, p. 13. ↩︎
5. “The Real Estate Field”. The Atlanta Journal, January 17, 1915, p. H5. ↩︎
6. “Wanted Boarders” (advertisement). The Atlanta Journal, May 8, 1933, p. 17. ↩︎
7. Photo credit: Atlanta in 1890: The Gate City. The Atlanta Historical Society, Inc. Macon, Georgia: Mercer University Press, 1986. ↩︎
8. Wheeler, L.B. “Home Decoration.” The Atlanta Constitution, December 6, 1885, p. 13. ↩︎