NEXT to the architectural basis influence in design, and, indeed,
hardly separable from it, being another side of the constructive,
adaptive art, we may fitly take the Utility Basis and influence.
This may be considered in two ways:
(1) In its effect upon pattern design and architectural
ornament through primitive structural necessities.
(2) In its effect upon structural form and ornamental treatment
arising out of, or suggested by, functional use.
(1) It is a curious thing that we should find the primitive ornamental
motives bound up with the primitive structures and fabrics of pure
utility and necessity, but such would appear to be the case.
The plaiting of rushes to make a mat was probably one of the earliest
industrial occupations, and the chequer one of the most primitive
and universal of patterns. If we look at the surface effect of the
necessity of the construction, the crossing of one equal set of fibres
by another set at right angles, with the interlacement, a series of
squares are produced, which alternate in tint if the colour of one set
is darker than the sets which cross it (see illustration). Emphasize
this contrast and we get our chequer, or chessboard pattern, which,
either as a pattern complete in itself, as in plaids and tartans, or
as a plan, or effect motive in designing is, as I have said, perhaps
the most universal and imperishable of all patterns, being found in
association with the design of all periods, and still surviving in
constant use among designers.
[Illustration: MATTING.]
Let us follow the primitive rush mat a little further, however. As it
lay on the primitive tent or hut floor its edges would take the sort
of form shown on the following page. In ancient Assyrian, Egyptian,
Persian, and Greek architecture we constantly find carved patterns used
as borderings and figures, of the type given in the Assyrian example.
Now, comparing this with the primitive matting, the suggestion is very
strong of the probability of derivation of motive of patterns of this
type from the same constructive source originally. In some instances,
as on the enamelled tile from Assyria, the border reverses itself,
but with the Greeks it finally took the upright direction, as in the
Anthemion or honeysuckle border forms; but, however afterwards varied
and enriched by floral form, its structural origin in plaited work is
always to be traced, and it seems to gain from it a certain strength
and adaptability.
[Illustration: PRIMITIVE RUSH MAT AND ASSYRIAN BORDER.
ASSYRIAN INCISED BORDER.]
Another type of ornament may be traced to the constructive necessities
of wattle and wicker work, so much used by primitive man in the
structure of his dwellings, and in primitive objects of use and service.
[Illustration: ASSYRIAN ENAMELLED TILE.]
The various forms of volute, or spiral, and guilloche ornament, so much
used by the ancients--Assyrian, Egyptian, and Greek--may be compared,
in their structure and arrangement of line, with the form taken by the
withy, or cord twisted around the upright canes or staves of a wattled
fence, as seen in horizontal section. The primitive wattled structure
gives the plans of these patterns. It certainly appears to account for
their origin in a remarkably complete way.
[Illustration: GREEK ANTHEMION ORNAMENT.]
[Illustration: WATTLED FENCE.]
It is possible that another source which may have contributed to the
evolution of the Greek spiral or volute was metal in the form of the
thin beaten plates with which the primitive Greeks covered parts
of their interior walls; but these were later times, and it is also
possible that the primitive metal worker took his motive from the
wattling too.
[Illustration: ANCIENT VOLUTE ORNAMENT.
PATTERNS FROM BRONZE SHIELDS CYPRUS.
GREEK VOLUTE OR MEANDER PATTERN.]
[Illustration: TYPES OF DECORATION DERIVED FROM THONGING.
STONE AXE OF MONTEZUMA II.
BRONZE VESSEL, LAKE OF BOURGET.
EBONY COMB, ASSYRIA.
SCULPTURED STONE CORNICE EGYPT.
NORMAN CAP, PETERBOROUGH CATHEDRAL.
BACK OF BRONZE KNIFE ESTAVAYER.]
Before metal was used, or nails or joinery were known, the method of
fastening two things together, such as the blade of a stone axe or
hammer and its handle, was by thonging or tying them firmly together by
strips of leather or thongs, and to this source again we might trace
other types of pattern motives of very wide prevalence. In the first
instances the thonging was imitated in metal-work when no longer used
in the construction by way of ornament, as in various bronze implements
existing; but later, starting from the tying and thonging motive, we
get all sorts of variations, as in the zigzag of Norman arch mouldings,
and in the earlier Celtic knotted work, which seemed partly a re-echo
of some types of Eastern and classic ornament, unless we regard it as
independently derived, like them, from primitive structure. It seems
to make itself felt again in a new variety in the strap-work of our
Elizabethan period, in which the ornament apparently was a new blend
of Gothic with classical details, with an infusion of oriental or
Moorish feeling, filtered through Italy and Spain.
[Illustration: FRIEZE (TEMPLE OF THE SIBYL TIVOLI).]
[Illustration: YOKE OF OXEN, CARRARA.]
As an instance of architectural ornament, the motive of which seems
taken from a piece of common every-day usage, we may note the frieze
of the Roman circular Temple of the Sibyl at Tivoli, which is composed
of the heads of oxen, alternating with, and connected by, the curves
of pendent floral garlands. To this day in Italy almost anywhere one
may see this motive suggested by the appearance of the country ox wagon
as it approaches along the road--the front view of the two oxen heads,
with the level yoke across their necks, and the pendent connecting
ropes hanging between.
It is probable, however, that whatever its origin, its suggestion was
sacrificial, since the ox decked with garlands constantly figures
in classical sculpture led before the altar to be slain, and this
circumstance may equally have given rise to the sculptor's motive,
just as we saw that the custom of decking the cornice of the Greek
house with garlands suggested its perpetuation in stone carving by the
classical architects.
It will be noted that those primitive sources to which we may trace
motives in ornamental design, however, afterwards developed on purely
ornamental lines, and because of their ornamental value, all of them
have their beginnings in actual use and service, in physical and
constructive necessity, and that they are closely associated with the
form and character of the dwellings and temples of man.
(2) Turning now to the second division of our subject to consider "the
effects upon form and treatment of surface arising out of, or suggested
by, functional use," we shall still have to keep close to the dwelling,
and constantly to remember the ever present architectural influence
with the consideration of which we set out.
[Illustration: BARGE-BOARD, IGHTHAM MOTE HOUSE.]
[Illustration: TYPE OF GABLES:
NORTHERN.
SOUTHERN.]
The angle of the pitch of the roof in buildings, for instance, which
is so marked a characteristic in the different types of architecture,
was originally determined by the necessities of climate. One might say
broadly that the acute, high-pitched Gothic roof means snow or bad
weather, while the low-pitched classic roof means sunshine for the
most part; or we might say that the one typified winter and the other
summer. A house must still be built mainly for one or the other, though
by ingenuity and careful consideration of the points of the compass
in choosing the site and planning, in the rare instances where free
choice is still possible, something may be, and _has_ been attempted,
to fit all seasons; and it is this careful consideration of such points
in our ancient buildings--say the old English manor houses, built to
dwell in and to last--which gives that sense of homelike comfort and
pleasure to the eye, perhaps, quite as much as the interest of their
ornamental detail. A sunny garden terrace or arcaded front to the south
to catch the winter sun--cool and shady rooms to the north for the
summer--a sheltered porch to protect the guest against the weather.
Such contrivances as these show that thought has been spent and care
taken in the planning and building; that the builder or designer has
been influenced by considerations of true utility--not in the bald
and more modern sense of mere money or time saving appliance, but the
truer economy of making a house _livable_. Here is a sketch of one of
those old stone halls or manor houses of Derbyshire of the seventeenth
century (Hazelford Hall), charmingly placed upon a hillside, so as to
fit into or become part of the landscape, while it is really planned to
live comfortably in, with due regard to the variation of the seasons
and the winds. The living rooms face south and west.
Houses nowadays seem more built to sell than to live in (at least
permanently), since I notice that often even when people build a
house for themselves they constantly want to let it to somebody
else. I should think that the gipsy van would suit modern habits
exceedingly well. It would be more picturesque than "a brick box with
a slate lid," to which most of us are committed, and probably much
less expensive in the long run. The only thing required to make it
practicable on any scale is a trifling alteration in the land laws.
The origin of mouldings in architecture, as their use in the capacity
of dripstones declares, was to serve a purely useful purpose--the
alternating concavity and convexity of the members which generally
characterize them affording escapement for the rain water, and keeping
it away from the windows and doors.
[Illustration: HAZELFORD HALL, DERBYSHIRE.]
To give a simple illustration of the principle. If the sill of a
window, for instance, be left rectangular and perfectly level, the
water would be likely to run inward through the window, or perhaps into
the wall, but if sloped on the upper surface and hollowed beneath,
the water would tend to drop from the under outer edge clear of both
window and wall.
[Illustration: SECTION TO SHOW ACTION OF RAIN ON WINDOW SILLS: (1)PLAIN
& MOULDED(2).
SECTION.
SQUARE-HEADED DRIPSTONE.]
This necessity led to motives in design and ornamental effect, and
mouldings became valuable parts of æsthetic expression in architecture,
affording means of emphasis, of giving the effect of receding planes,
and of using the important principle of recurring lines to which I
called attention in the first chapter.
The barge-board, too, so picturesque a feature in old timbered houses,
had the same useful purpose to subserve in keeping the weather from
injuring roof and wall.
Staircases with the necessary handrail, again, have led to beautiful
form in design, not only in the planning of the staircase itself, which
is so important a feature in every house, but in the interesting and
varied design in the balusters supporting the handrail, and in newel
heads, etc.
[Illustration: THE TOWERS OF SAN GIMIGNANO.]
Towers and church steeples, which form such important and picturesque
features in architectural (and, one might add, landscape) design, owed
their existence, in the first place, to the necessities of watch,
guard, and defence, and probably also means of communication by signals.
To the mediæval city, which, as it is now being realized, was a highly
organized arrangement for mutual aid and defence, towers were of great
importance both for watch and defence. They served as strong buttresses
and vantage posts placed at intervals along the inclosing city wall,
and flanking the gateways. The boldness and grace of design in some
mediæval towers is very notable. Those of Siena, for instance, and
that town of towers, San Gimignano, of which I give a rough sketch to
show the effect from a distance of the clustering towers, like a crown
upon the hill top; above all, perhaps, is the famous tower of the
Signoria or Palazzo Vecchio, the old city hall of Florence (thirteenth
century). The Belfry of Bruges (thirteenth century), too, is another
fine instance of boldness and grace of design. It had formerly a
spire, which is shown in a sixteenth century picture, the background
of a portrait by Pourbus, a Flemish painter, but the spire was twice
destroyed by fire, and was not renewed a third time. But even as it
stands the belfry is very striking, and, while it commands a vast
prospect of the country round, it is also conspicuous all over the
town, and a landmark to the flat country round about.
The towers of our own ancient village churches are generally
battlemented, and the square ones often have a corner turret to give
a more commanding view; and this again gives variety, and is a very
picturesque feature. The battlements themselves (though intended for
use in defence) are extremely ornamental features, and give relief and
lightness to the parapet. In later Gothic times they were frequently
fancifully pieced and filled with ornament, as on Magdalen Tower at
Oxford. Their decorative value was perceived by the wood carver of the
Gothic times, and they are constantly introduced in tabernacle work,
screens, and furniture, where their use is purely decorative.
[Illustration: TOWER OF PALAZZO VECCHIO, FLORENCE.]
Chimneys, again, afford an instance of a purely useful and serviceable
object lending itself to ornamental treatment and becoming important as
parts of the design of a building.
The first chimney in England is said to be the one existing in the
Norman house at Christchurch, Hampshire. The common practice was to
have the fireplace in the centre of the hall and let the smoke escape
by a louvre in the roof, as may still be seen in the hall at Penshurst
Place in Kent (fourteenth century); but in later times, especially
in the Tudor period, the chimneys of brick are often found full of
invention and variety in design, and extremely rich in effect. I give
sketches of some characteristic examples at Framlingham Castle and
Leigh's Priory.
[Illustration: TOWER WITH CORNER TURRET, AXMOUTH CHURCH, DEVON.]
The fine old brick chimney stacks one finds among the old farmsteads of
Essex it is supposed were built first and then the half-timbered house
built around the brick stack.
[Illustration: CUT BRICK CHIMNEYS, LEIGH'S PRIORY, ESSEX.]
[Illustration: BRICK CHIMNEY, FRAMLINGHAM CASTLE.]
Other useful things connected with the fireside and the chimney
corner, which are remarkable for their adaptability in ornamental
design, are the iron fire-dogs used to support the burning logs. We
find them in great variety of shape and treatment, while their main or
necessary lines remain the same. It is the standard or upright front
part which affords a field for the inventive craftsman and designer.
The fire-irons, too, are again purely useful in their object, but have
become highly graceful and elegant in some of their forms.
The iron grate back (notably those of old Sussex), placed at the back
of the fire against the chimney to protect the brick-work and radiate
the heat, had again a purely useful function, but it has been the
object of a great deal of fine and rich decorative design, chiefly of
a heraldic or emblematic character, and many old examples exist. Cast
iron has in modern times acquired a bad name (artistically speaking),
but this is owing to its misapplication, as in railings or grills,
where it endeavours to usurp the place of wrought iron. In a flat
panel or plain surface, such as a grate back affords, however, cast
iron has a singularly good effect, and renders bold designs well.
There are some fine heraldic grate backs in cast iron to be seen at
Cheetham's Hospital, perhaps the most interesting building in the City
of Manchester.
[Illustration: CAST-IRON FIRE-DOG, ST. NICHOLAS HOSPITAL, CANTERBURY.]
I give a sketch of a quaint cast-iron chimney back of Gothic design
from Bruges. At the Museum at the old Rath Haus there is a very
good collection of examples. Somehow, with the modern, or rather
mid-Victorian iron register fireplace all beauty and interest of design
is lost. Though it should be remembered that a really fine artist and
designer like Alfred Stevens spent his talent upon such things.
The conception of the thing, however, seems joyless and ugly, and in
most surviving examples the ornament in endeavouring to be elegant
becomes frittered and mean; and as to sheet-iron stoves they seem
to be under a ban of hideousness, which seems sad when one recalls
the charming and cheerful earthenware stoves of Germany of Gothic and
Renascence times, full of colour and invention. The revived use of
tiled chimney, and recessed and basket grates, has done much to restore
cheerfulness to our hearths.
[Illustration: CAST-IRON GRATE BACK.]
Before we leave the chimney corner I might mention another bit of
metal, important before the days of kitchen ranges as the chief cooking
apparatus, I mean the iron crane that is sometimes found still
suspended in the wide chimneys of old farmhouses, made of wrought iron,
twisted and curled, and with bright bosses of steel upon it, and great
in hooks and hinges. Here is a sketch of a typical example in an Essex
farmhouse.
[Illustration: FIREPLACE WITH WROUGHT IRON CRANE, CHURCH FARM,
HEMPSTEAD, ESSEX.]
Considerations of use, again, very evidently control design in lamps
and candlesticks. A lamp necessitates: (1) _a reservoir for the oil_,
and (2) _a neck and mouth_ to hold the wick, and (3) _a firm and steady
stand_. All these requisites are combined, with addition of handle, in
the oldest and simplest form of lamp--the portable antique lamp to be
carried in the hand. The reservoir is there, though small, and needing
re-filling from a larger vessel (as was the case in the parable of the
ten virgins).
These lamps were often placed upon the top of slender fluted tripod
stands, to give light in the house, or hung in clusters by chains
from a branched stand like a tree. A combination of many of the
characteristics of the antique lamp is found in the comparatively
modern brass Roman lamp (now called antique, but till within a few
years, and I believe still, commonly used by the people): we have the
small reservoir, with four necks for the wicks, closely resembling in
form the antique hand lamps. This is pierced by the shaft of the stand,
which finishes in a ring handle at the top and terminates in a broad
moulded stand, so that the lamp can be used for carrying or standing
with equal facility. The little implements for trimming, snuffing,
and extinguishing are suspended by small chains from the neck of the
standard and add to the ornamental effect. Each part is made separately
and screws together.
With the modern powerful lamps of mineral oil and circular wicks, much
larger reservoirs are required, and modern lamps have tended to take
the urn shape owing to this necessity, and they lose in beauty of line
generally as they gain in body (much like people). A satisfactory type
has been introduced by Mr. W. A. S. Benson, of copper, with a copper
fan-like shade, which is generally a difficulty with a modern lamp; and
the glasses also, while necessary, complicate the design and cannot be
said to add to the beauty, as a rule. (See Illustration, p. 77.)
However, a lamp design can never get away from the primitive triple
conditions of lamp structure with which we saw in its earliest form
_reservoir_, _neck for the wick_, and _stand_--possibly handle--but
within these demands of utility there is scope for very great
variations, and unlimited taste and invention.
[Illustration: CANDLESTICKS.]
The candlestick, with which the hand lamp has something in common,
is, however, quite distinct in character, seeing that it is formed to
hold the combustible part in a solid, instead of a liquid form. Its
requirements, therefore, are a firm stand (like the lamp), a reasonable
height, on which to raise the light, another to hold the candle, and
something to catch the melting grease.
These conditions are satisfied in the form of the antique brass
candlestick, but still better in the older Gothic form, or the church
candlestick, which has a spike on which to hold the candle, instead
of a hollow. A candlestick, therefore, should be true to its name
and remain a stick, or moulded tubular column, though capable of
development into the candelabrum, throwing out branches for extra
lights from the central stem; a suggestive form, if sufficiently
restrained, designed with taste.
The ancient hanging brass candelabra of the sixteenth, seventeenth,
and eighteenth centuries, or earlier, are very good in form as well
as practical. There is a fine Gothic one in Van Eyck's picture in the
National Gallery, "Jan Arnolfini and his Wife."
I have a good example of the later type--a German one. The stem
is surrounded by the double eagle, and there are several tiers of
mouldings, the larger ones being flat, and cut into notches at the edge
to serve as sockets to receive the corresponding part of the branch,
which fits on to them and supports the candles. These are arranged
in two tiers of six lights each, and between each light occurs a
little ornamental branch or finial, the whole being detachable from the
hanging stem terminating in a brass sphere which keeps it straight and
steady. It is a fine example of good, simple, and practicable design,
which should always unite necessity and utility with beauty.
[Illustration: CHANDELIER OF BRASS, GERMAN 17th CENTURY.]
[Illustration: DETAILS OF CHANDELIER:
PLAN OF LIGHTS.
METHOD OF FIXING BRANCH.
CANDLE SOCKET.
SECTION OF STEM,
BRANCHES & ORNAMENTS.]
For carrying about, a candlestick needs the addition of a broad
dish-like stand and handle, while the stick itself is kept low; hardly
so attractive a form as the stationary columnar table candlestick, and
yet having decided character and purpose of its own.
Those old-fashioned and most picturesque companions of candlesticks,
the snuffers, are often very beautiful in design, and it seems to me
that, however "improved," the wicks of modern candles still require
some attention from them.
The necessity of protecting light affords in lanterns opportunities for
the inventive adaptability of the designer in glass and metal.
I met with a very pretty and original motive in a German museum (at
Lindau) which was hexagonal in form, pieces of glass fitted together
by leads forming a globe-like body to hold the light, and terminating
above in a neck, from which it hung to a bracket by a ring. It was
furnished with a tripod stand in iron, so that it could be taken down
and made to stand if needed.
There is plenty of room for invention in lanterns, and it seems a
pity that our street lamp, which is practically a standard lantern,
should remain so extremely prosaic, when it is a design so constantly
repeated. It is not so much the plainness, since one needs no
extraneous ornament if the purpose is well served by a structure
of good lines. The necessity of cleaning the glass is probably a
hindrance to much variety of form in the present state of things, and
then, too, the electric light is coming into general use, bringing
with it an entirely fresh set of conditions, so that before we get our
ideal gas-lamp the necessity for it will probably have disappeared
altogether, so to speak.
[Illustration: LAMPS, CANDLESTICK, AND SNUFFERS.
MODERN (BENSON) LAMP.
GERMAN LANTERN (LINDAU).
ROMAN LAMP.
ANTIQUE CANDELABRUM & LAMP (HERCULANEUM).
PRIMITIVE BRASS LAMP (HOLLAND).
BRASS SNUFFERS (VENICE).
BRASS CANDLESTICK (BRUGES).]
The idea of suspension and absence of rigidity or weight associated
with electric lighting ought, one would think, to be suggestive
to designers, but we don't seem yet to have quite shaken off the
conditions of gas tubing on the one hand, or to have got much beyond
the somewhat well-worn idea of bell-flowers bursting into incandescence
on the other. One almost prefers the naked simplicity of the little
pear-shaped glasses, with their incandescent twist of thread suspended
at the end of the covered wires, to the flamboyant excesses in brass
and copper electric fitting sometimes seen.
One might go on through the whole range of objects of domestic use,
and multiply instances of beauty and designing invention applied to
the humblest utensil, implement, or accessory, and suggested by the
characteristic features stamped upon its form by the necessities and
demands of daily use, which must never be lost sight of by the artist.
Not a single thing that we touch or use but has had an enormous amount
of human thought and ingenuity brought to bear upon it, which has
determined its form as we see it, and which is constantly modifying
form and material and character.
The present modifying influences, the direction in which human
ingenuity mostly seems to work is in the time-saving, cost-saving,
labour-saving direction, or would-be so, and under this influence
designs of articles or objects of pure utility have a tendency to
become very prosaic--or, perhaps, vulgarly assertive. It is the
commercial instinct, no doubt, which is satisfied if a knife _is_ a
knife and will cut, or at any rate will sell, and puts no romance
into either blade or handle. The old curved blades have disappeared,
and only the silver knife receives any ornament, and that generally
of a very uninteresting type. This prosaic tendency represents the
mechanical side of the utility influence, which only reaches beauty, if
beauty of line merely, by necessity of use; though under what I should
term _the short-cut inspiration_ beauty is generally entirely out of
the question. This is to be deplored, since the simplest thing of use
may be just as well made pleasing and good in form and line, though
that may be the only kind of beauty possible to it.
When we come to pottery the utility and adaptation to service influence
is very obvious. Look at the form of a water-vessel, a pitcher we will
say, as a typical form. It must have a large hollow body to hold as
much water as can be conveniently carried by a single person, but not
more than its handle or handles will lift. It must have a neck for
pouring out. A rounded form is found to be more convenient for carrying
than a square, and is easier to balance in the hand or on the head.
The soft clay, too, readily takes the circular form on the wheel when
the pitcher is formed under the hands of the potter; and the rounded
form may be diminished towards the base, which saves weight, and at
the same time gives opportunity for grace of line. Its form at once
expresses its purpose of carrying and pouring. A nobler form is seen
in the Greek hydria--a large three-handed water-vessel, adapted for
carrying and pouring. It was carried on the head or the shoulders, the
two side horizontal handles enabled it to be lifted up and down, while
its vertical handle served the function of pouring.
We may note the similarity in contour and proportion of the Greek
amphora or wine-vessel, to the lines of a woman's figure. It is,
perhaps, the most graceful of the antique forms of vessels, and it
seems dimly reflected even in the purely prosaic form of the modern
bottle.
We might trace through all the various forms of vessels the clue of
utility, and note how it determines their typical form as they are
adapted, like the hydria or pitcher, for carrying and _pouring_: the
amphora or ancient wine-bottle for keeping wine cool in the earth in
portable quantities: the bucket type for _dipping_ and carrying: the
funnel type for _filling_.
The copper water-vessel of the Roman people seems to combine the
functions of bucket and pitcher in a highly picturesque way, and its
form enables a quantity to be carried on the head.
The _drinking_ vessel again shows quite a different type of form, and
in all its varieties declares its function--the cup, the glass, the
tumbler, the mug, and the tankard.
In the bottle we approach again the type of the pitcher, the holding
and pouring functions being again emphatic, throughout all its many
shapes. The illustration shows a selection of the typical forms I have
mentioned.
[Illustration: DRINKING VESSELS, ETC.
COMPARISON OF THE LINES OF A FEMALE FIGURE & THOSE OF AN AMPHORA.
CYLIX.
ANCIENT GREEK DRINKING VESSEL.
HYDRIA ANCIENT GREEK WATER VESSEL.
MODE OF CARRYING THE HYDRIA PARTHENON FRIEZE.
AMPHORA APPROACHING PITCHER FORM.
PITCHER.
ENGLISH BROWN JUG.
GERMAN BEER MUGS.
GLASS PITCHER.
BOTTLES.
DRINKING GLASSES.
ROMANO BRITISH THUMBER.
DISTILLERS COPPER FILLER.
CAN.
ROMAN PEASANT WOMAN WITH COPPER WATER VESSEL.
BUCKET.
BASIN.
WATERING CAN.]
The subject of the typical forms of vessels is very clearly
illustrated in Meyer's "Handbook of Ornament," to which I may refer the
student who wishes to pursue the subject further.
[Illustration: GERMAN BEER MUGS.]
On the subject of bottles, however, I will just refer to a curious
correspondence in design motive in two different materials.
[Illustration: ITALIAN FLASKS & BOTTLE.]
The ordinary Italian oil or wine flask is one of the most charming
of modern useful vessels. It is simply a piece of blown glass of the
form first assumed by the molten glass when blown at the end of the
glass-worker's tube. To make this primitive but elegant bottle
portable and enable it to stand, it is bound around by a twist of
rushes, or cane leaves twisted into a circular stand, and braced by
vertical broader bands of the untwisted leaf at intervals, and a loop
of the twist is twined around the neck, and left free to hang up or
carry the vessel in. The whole is both highly practical and picturesque.
This is a type of Venetian glass bottle or decanter highly ornamented,
in which the fundamental motive or idea of the protecting binding
of rushes seems to be followed in glass. The melon-like divisions
are defined by strings of raised glass laid on the surface, while
the panels between are engraved in arabesques of leaves and birds,
and the whole forms a very pretty piece of ornate glass design. (See
illustration, p. 83.)
Here we have another instance of decorative motive derived from useful
function, and of the adaptation in one material of a suggestion derived
from another, though applied to the same type of form.
I have not mentioned the plate or dish type of vessel, which has on
the whole, perhaps, received the most attention from the decorator
of surfaces, perhaps on account of the more pictorial conditions its
functional form presents.
There is a circular flat or concave surface in the centre of the dish,
plate, or plaque to hold the food; and there is a circular space or rim
for the hand, a border which will serve both as a frame to the central
subject, and also to emphasize the edge. The Greek cylix, though really
a shallow drinking cup, presents similar conditions to the designer,
though more of the shallow boat or saucer type, and in the filling of
these spaces the Greek vase-painter, as far as regards composition of
line, dramatic action of figure, simplicity, and the necessary flatness
and reserve, sets us the best models in this kind of design.
The Italian Renascence majolica and lustre ware give more sumptuous
effect and more pictorial treatment, but are not nearly so safe a guide
in taste as the Greek.
In pure ornament we cannot do better than study oriental models for the
treatment of border and centre, and in the blue and white ware of China
and Persia we shall find as satisfactory examples of decorative fitness
as need be. The Chinese influence is freely and often very happily
rendered in the blue and white ware of Delft, and in some of the works
of the old English potteries, as Worcester and Derby for instance.
In textile design the functions of border, of field or filling,
of wearing apparel, or furniture hangings and materials and
their necessary adaptation to vertical or horizontal positions,
differentiates the various types and classes of design in woven or
printed stuffs. Here use again influences and decides decorative motive.
We recognize at once the essential differences of expression in
different pattern plans and systems of line in horizontal extension,
which mark them off as suitable for borders demanding linear, or
meandering, or running patterns to fulfil their function of defining
the edge, as in a garment or hanging, or in pottery, or forming a
setting for the centre, as in a carpet.
[Illustration: PITCHER FROM ROTHENBURG. (SEE CHAP. III)
THE HANDLE OF THE PLATE.]
[Illustration: PLATE & DISH DECORATION.
DELFT DISH.
CHINESE PLATE PATTERNS.]
For these reasons, bearing in mind the constructive suggestion of their
origin, the typical examples given of border systems have held their
own from the earliest times as fundamentally adaptable to horizontal
extension, while they also adapt themselves to endless variation in
design and treatment.
Just as, for the same reasons, the systems of pattern adapted for
indefinite extension over a surface (both vertically and horizontally),
and represented by the plans I have termed persistent, have held, and
still hold, their place in the world of design. These latter, too, it
will be noticed, are all constructed upon, or controlled by, the same
basis--the rectangular diaper.
There seems something fixed and fundamental about these linear
constructive bases of pattern design from the point of view of what
might be termed decorative or linear logic, and apart from their origin
in actual constructive necessity before spoken of, and, as far as
soundness of principle can guide us in designing, we cannot go wrong in
obeying them, however various the superstructure of floral fancy we may
build upon them. The acknowledgment of the principle alone, of course,
will not make us successful designers, any more than the skeleton makes
a living figure. We cannot do without thought, fancy, and vivifying
imagination, guided by the sense of beauty, as well as of use, to
produce design worth having in any direction.
To trace out this clue of utility fully and adequately through all the
varieties of the vast province of artistic design would need, not a
single chapter, but a large and amply illustrated volume. I have only
attempted to call your attention to certain typical forms and instances
where the bearings of the necessities of use and service have decided
those forms, and must always influence the decorative designer, who
should never forget them for a moment.
[Illustration: I. TYPICAL BORDER SYSTEMS.]
[Illustration: 2. PERSISTENT PATTERN PLANS, RECTANGULAR BASIS.]
Nothing has degraded the form of common things so much as a mistaken
love of ornament. The production of things of beauty for ordinary use
has declined with the gradual separation of artist and craftsman.
Decoration, or ornament, we have been too much accustomed to consider
as accidental and unrelated addition to an object, not as _an essential
expression and organic part of it_; not as a _beauty which may satisfy
us in simple line, form, or proportion, combined with fitness to
purpose, even without any surface ornament at all_. The more we are
able to keep before our minds the place and purpose of any design we
have to make, the more we realize the conditions of use and service of
which it must be a part, as well as the capacities of the material of
which it is to be made; and the more we understand its constructive
necessities, the more successful our design is likely to be, and the
nearer we shall approach to bridging the unfortunate gulf which too
often exists between the designer and the craftsman.