MODERN FRENCH ARCHITECTURAL DECORATIONS. Nouveau Recueil de Menuiserie et des Decorations Interieures et Exterieures, &c. (New Collection of Internal and External Decorations.) By Thiollet and Roux. Paris. Folio. 72 plates. It is too much the practice with the architects of this country to neglect that branch of their profession which is chiefly concerned with internal embellishment, to such degree, in fact, that they seem hardly to recognize its title to be considered as belonging to their province, but willingly relinquish it to upholsterers and decorateurs, which latter class of artistes would not exist separately as an intermediate grade between architects and upholsterers, but for either the pride or the supineness of architects themselves, who leave others to find the taste, which, be it good or bad, must ultimately manifest itself within the buildings they have merely planned and constructed.

Whether it be that they regard such matters as too ephemeral, as what may be left to be regulated according to the variable fashion of the day, certain it is that very few architects apply themselves to the study of internal decoration, or know any thing of the effect of colours or other embellishment, beyond what is most usually adopted under similar circumstances. To say that decoration of this kind is altogether an affair of taste, and may, therefore, very well be trusted to individual fancies, is, at the best, an exceedingly nugatory argument, since it merely admits what no one disputes, leaving the question itself unanswered. No doubt it is but an affair of taste, after all; yet so is architecture itself, as far as it claims to rank as a fine art. Except it be the superior taste displayed in them, what is there that claims cur admiration in the edifices of ancient Greece? Apart from that quality, there is nothing more to deserve it than is in Stonehenge; or rather that amorphous assemblage of huge stones presents far more of the marvellous. What miracles of excellence should we possess, could we but catch some of those "nothing-buts," that people stumble against every now and then, yet so very few of those who try to grasp them can pick up!

Granting that it may, in some respects, be a subordinate part of their practice, we must be allowed to assert that decoration is a very important one of their art, and that the study of it, internal as well as external, ought to enter into every architect's education. Many may, perhaps, be of opinion, that it is one of those things which may very properly be deferred, until after the usual elementary course of training has been gone through; we, nevertheless, are disposed to hold that it is the safer course to cultivate a refined taste as early as possible, lest, in the interim, a bad taste, never afterwards, perhaps, to be eradicated, should spring up of its own accord. For want of duly cultivating an acquaintance with interior decoration, in all its manifold and complex ramifications, it seldom happens that, if accidentally called

upon to furnish ideas for any thing of the kind, our architects have any better resources than what they find in some analogous exterior parts. Undoubtedly it is not every one who, in the course of his professional employment, may have occasion to exercise his talent this way; but even then it would not be a whit more useless. to him than many things to which he directs his attention; and certainly the subject we are speaking of comes far more within the province of an architect, than some of the studies so fantastically insisted upon by Vitruvius as indispensable to the education of one.

How far a knowledge of it may be useful or not must, in a great degree, depend upon the peculiar walk in his profession, which an architect takes up; a man whose practice lies chiefly in building bridges, or prisons and poor-houses, can, of course, shift very well without it; while it is, on the contrary, of almost paramount importance to those who are called upon to erect or alter residences for the opulent and luxurious; at all events, if they, instead of applying to it themselves, choose to commit that department of design to decorators and others of that class, it is very unreasonable, on the part of the profession, to affect to hold a contemptuous opinion of such persons and their taste, when they might rescue their art from the baleful influence of such taste, by taking that department of it, as far as design is concerned, into their own hands. There is room, however, for suspecting that few of their own body would do very much better, for the simple reason that such branch of design forms no part either of their professional education or their after-studies of colours, as applicable to their art, on which so much depends in this comparatively trifling branch of it, if so they choose to consider it, they know scarcely any thing. Indeed, some seem to be of opinion that the effect so produced is incompatible with the dignity and decorum of architecture, and stigmatise it as puerile or meretricious; although what has come to our knowledge respecting the extensive use of polychromy among the Greeks, even in what has been regarded as their severest style, must now convince them that their objections are in direct opposition to classical precedent. Our climate, indeed, almost forbids even any experiments in the way of external polychromy; yet that is no reason wherefore we should also interdict ourselves the use of it, where it can be applied without inconvenience, and certainly with the greatest propriety. Nevertheless, except in the case of coloured marbles, or scagliola columns and pilasters, almost all the other architectural decorations of an apartment are white, unless when relieved by gilding. All colour is supplied by the paper-hanger, the upholsterer, and the cabinet-maker; consequently, wherever paper or other hangings are not applicable, as in vestibules, and even public rooms, a great monotony of character prevails; variety, as far as embellishment is concerned,

being confined to a comparatively few architectural members and details, which seldom exhibit any novelty in themselves, and are, besides, for the most part, very similar to the details met with in external design, almost the only peculiar ones being the coffering or lacunaria of ceilings. Rarely do we meet with any attempt at originality of detail, at effect of plan, or of striking disposition of light; or, if there be any thing of the kind, it seldom emanates from the architect himself, but has rather been forced upon him by circumstances. How much depends upon colour alone is obvious enough from the fact, that the same design will appear altogether different, according as it happens to be differently coloured. Nevertheless, the choice of colours, and the arrangement of them, are generally left to the chapter of accidents. The architect's eye is not trained to colouring, as connected with embellishment; on the contrary, his attention is exclusively confined to models that afford scarcely any thing that is immediately applicable to interior embellishment, unless it be in a few particular cases. His books furnish him with no ideas on the subject; since what they offer, connected with it, rarely amounts to more than an occasional section, exhibiting only one wall of each apartment, while even that little is exhibited without colour, and without any of those accessories which there must be in the rooms themselves. As mere sections, we do not blame drawings of that class; all that we mean to observe is, that their deficiencies ought to be supplied by others. Yet even works, which are professedly intended to be studies of decoration, generally leave us quite in the dark as to one very material point, for very seldom, indeed, does it happen that they are illuminated; in regard to colour, therefore, they afford no information. It is considered quite sufficient, if the ornaments or pieces of furniture, so shown, be of elegant form and pattern, while colouring is disregarded as altogether optional and arbitrary. Optional it undoubtedly is, and on that very account is it all the more desirable to have, at the same time, some directions as to the choice of colours. The best excuse that can be offered for the omission of colouring is, that the class of specimens and studies here referred to consist, for the most part, of detached ornaments and separate pieces of furniture, consequently could afford no instruction in regard to the combination of colours, and the various kinds of contrasts and harmonies to be obtained by means of them, when applied to an entire design.

Form unquestionably demands our first consideration, and is the more important, if only because, when once fixed, it admits of no further change or correction, whereas the other does; still that is no argument wherefore colouring should be neglected; because, by a skilful management of it, a faulty design may be greatly remedied, while, if bad taste be shown in it, a good one may be materially impaired; consequently, it is to little purpose

that the architect studies those finishings of an apartment which he considers to belong to him, if another is to come, and, perhaps, quite destroy the effect contemplated by him. Nor is this, by any means, of unfrequent occurrence; we have seen rooms where a uniform surface of deep crimson, or other powerful colour, has produced an offensively crude contrast with the uniform dead white of the entablature, ceiling, and architectural finishings.

It is futile to decry colouring, as evincing a frivolous, corrupt taste in architecture; certainly an interior may be beautiful, although every part be of one hue; and so, in fact, may an unfurnished apartment satisfy as beautiful in itself: nevertheless, to stint ourselves to that degree of aesthetic beauty is advisable, when it may be so greatly heightened and so infinitely varied; neither does it follow that, because inferior taste is more generally than not displayed in the selection and arrangement of colours, it must of necessity be so. It is for the artist-architect to devise how gaiety of colouring may be produced without any paltry glare or gaudiness; how richness may be combined with soberness, and how soberness may be rescued from monotonous insipidity or dullness. Did the system we uphold, and are anxious to see adopted, tend in any degree to interfere with, or abridge, the practice of the profession, architects might have some cause for opposing it; but surely they will hardly be displeased with us for recommending what would so greatly enlarge their present field of study; unless it be on account of the reproach by implication we thus bring forward against them.

How little attention is now bestowed by them on this department of their art is evident enough from the circumstance that, for hundreds of designs for the exteriors of buildings, scarcely one is to be met with for the interior of an apartment. The annual exhibitions at the Royal Academy testify this most strongly; for, although there is generally an abundance, or even superabundance of designs for the most "out-of-the-way" things imaginable; palaces and senate-houses enow for all the monarchies and republics on the face of the globe; a design for an interior is an absolute rarity the drawings of interiors being almost limited to those of executed subjects, comparatively exceedingly few in number, and those few generally of churches, or else of other subjects equally distinct from the class we are now considering. And we may here remark, en passant, that, however averse they may be to polychromy, in their own practice, many of our architects appear to have a decided relish for it, when passed off as the natural local colouring of stone. Some of them, at least, exhibit in their drawings all the colours of the rainbow, in what, if erected, would have no violet and orange hues, but be of a tolerably uniform whitish tint.

As a reason for the extreme infrequency of such subjects as the interiors of apartments, hardly can it be alleged that it is VOL. I.—NO. 11.-JUNE, 1839.

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because they do not admit of sufficient variety, or do not afford adequate scope for invention, fancy, taste: on the contrary, there are few which admit of them in an equal degree; or where talent may display itself unchecked by those conventions which elsewhere proscribe whatever assumes the air of direct innovation. Neither can it be said that subjects of this class are not wanted, or are too remote from practical application; since the very reverse is the case; they being precisely those for which opportunities are of every-day occurrence. For one individual who builds himself a residence, there are scores, perhaps hundreds, who alter or fit up a fresh one or more rooms in their's. We are, therefore, warranted in supposing either that our architects have such magnificent and enlarged ideas that they cannot contract them sufficiently to bring them within the narrow compass of a few square feet instead of acres; or else that they are furnished with no other ideas than what may be obtained from almost any handsomely furnished room. Another reason, indeed, remains, which is, they may apprehend that such extra study on their part would require an increased number of drawings for their designs, without a corresponding increase of remu

neration.

Exceptions of course there are to what we complain of as the general practice-apartments fitted up with more study, even to the minutest details of furniture, than is usually bestowed upon an entire mansion. Such, however, are not only exceedingly rare, but, for the most part, quite inaccessible to those who might consult them beneficially as examples. We have no publications which elucidate any specimens of the kind satisfactorily indeed we have scarcely any thing at all upon the subject in books, for it is one that is left almost entirely to routine and empirical practice. In one respect, this is not to be regretted, because it has prevented our being pestered with a number of formally dull and stupid rules, drawn up like the recipes in a cookery-book; for nothing can be more mischievous than such puny dogmatism, which, instead of discussing principles, leaves them out of view altogether.

Let the cause for it be what it may, certain it is that our own architects contribute nothing to the stock of our studies in regard to interior decoration and embellishment. It is to the continent exclusively that we must look for works of this class for such publications as those of Zahn, Bötticher, and Hessemer,* or as that

We ought to make an exception in favour of Mr. Owen Jones's splendid work on the Alhamra, which, although not exactly belonging to the class alluded to by us, is not less valuable than splendid, were it only on account of studies of colours which it supplies. How it will fare as a speculation, in these railroad and steamengine times, we dare not surmise. Besides this we hardly know of another English publication approaching any of the foreign ones above-mentioned, unless it be Shaw's Ancient Furniture, and his Encyclopædia of Ornament, in both of which the plates are coloured, and some of them splendid in their subjects.