eta and well planned color schemes.

Lacquered furniture is more formal than the average painted furniture,
and often one or two pieces are sufficient for a room. A beautiful
lacquered cabinet with its fascinating mounts and its soft, wonderful
red or black and gold tones is a thing to conjure with. Lacquered
furniture is lovely for some dining-rooms and morning-rooms. The tables
should always be protected with glass tops, which also applies to other
painted furniture.

One or two pieces of painted furniture may be used in a room with other
furniture if they happen to be just the thing needed to complete the
scheme. A console table, for instance, with a mirror over it and
sidelights, might be just the touch needed between two windows hung with
plain taffeta curtains. Like all good things there must be restraint in
using it, but there are few things that have greater possibilities than
painted furniture when properly used.

_Synopsis of Period Styles as an Aid in Buying Furniture._

When trying to select furniture for the home, people often become
bewildered by the amount and variety to be found in the shops, and, not
knowing exactly what to look for in the different styles, make an
inappropriate or bad selection. One does not have to be so very learned
to have things right, but there are certain anachronisms which cry to
heaven and a little knowledge in advance goes a long way. A purchaser
should also know something about the construction and grade of the
furniture he wishes to buy. There are good designs in all the grades,
which, for the sake of convenience, may be divided into the expensive,
the medium in price, and the cheap. The amount one wishes to spend will
decide the grade, and one naturally must not expect to find all the
beauties and virtues of the first in the last. The differences in these
grades lie chiefly in the matters of the fit and balance of doors and
drawers; the joining of corners where, in the better grade, the interior
blocks used to keep the sides from spreading are screwed as well as
glued; the selection of well seasoned wood of fine grain; careful
matching of figures made by the grain of the wood in veneer; panels
properly made and fitted so they will not shrink or split; careful
finish both inside and out, and the correct color of the stain used;
appropriate hardware; hand or machine or "applied" carving. In the cheap
grades it is best to leave carving out of the question entirely,