CHAPTER IX

LOCATION OF THE HOUSE

Besides the difference in treatment demanded by different use of rooms—­the character of the decoration of the whole house will be influenced by its situation.  A house in the country or a house in town; a house by the sea-shore or a house situated in woods and fields require stronger or less strong colour, and even different tints, according to situation.  The decoration itself may be much less conventional in one place than in another, and in country houses much and lasting charm is derived from design and colour in perfect harmony with nature’s surroundings.  Whatever decorative design is used in wall-coverings or in curtains or hangings will be far more effective if it bears some relation to the surroundings and position of the house.

If the house is by the sea the walls should repeat with many variations the tones of sea and sand and sky; the gray-greens of sand-grasses; the blues which change from blue to green with every cloud-shadow; the pearl tints which become rose in the morning or evening light, and the browns and olives of sea mosses and lichens.  This treatment of colour will make the interior of the house a part of the great out-of-doors and create a harmony between the artificial shelter and nature.

There is philosophy in following, as far as the limitations of simple colour will allow, the changeableness and fluidity of natural effects along the shore, and allowing the mood of the brief summer life to fall into entire harmony with the dominant expression of the sea.  Blues and greens and pinks and browns should all be kept on a level with out-of-door colour, that is, they should not be too deep and strong for harmony with the sea and sky, and if, when harmonious colour is once secured, most of the materials used in the furnishing of the house are chosen because their design is based upon, or suggested by, sea-forms, an impression is produced of having entered into complete and perfect harmony with the elements and aspects of nature.  The artificialities of life fall more and more into the background, and one is refreshed with a sense of having established entirely harmonious and satisfactory relations with the surroundings of nature.  I remember a doorway of a cottage by the sea, where the moulding which made a part of the frame was an orderly line of carved cockle-shells, used as a border, and this little touch of recognition of its sea-neighbours was not only decorative in itself, but gave even the chance visitor a sort of interpretation of the spirit of the interior life.

Suppose, on the other hand, that the summer house is placed in the neighbourhood of fields and trees and mountains; it will be found that strong and positive treatment of the interior is more in harmony with the outside landscape.  Even heavier furniture looks fitting where the house is surrounded with massive tree-growths; and deeper and purer colours can be used in hangings and draperies.  This is due to the more positive colouring of a landscape than of a sea-view.  The masses of strong and slightly varying green in foliage, the red, brown, or vivid greens of fields and crops, the dark lines of tree-trunks and branches, as well as the unchanging forms of rock and hillside, call for a corresponding strength of interior effect.