Stenciling can be very attractively used for curtains and portieres for country houses.  Cheesecloth, scrim, aurora cloth, pongee, linen, and velours, are a few of the materials that can be used.  The design and kind used in a room should be chosen with due regard to its suitability.  A Louis XVI room could not possibly have arras cloth used in it, while it would be charming and appropriate in a modern bungalow.  Arras cloth with an applique design of linen couched on it makes beautiful curtains and portieres to go with the Mission or Craftsman furniture.

There is an old farmhouse on Long Island that has been made over into a most delightful country house, and the furnishing throughout is consistent and charming.  The curtains are reproductions of old designs in chintz and cretonne.  The living-room, with its white paneling to the ceiling, its wide fireplace, old mahogany furniture, and curtains gay with parrots and flowers, hanging over cool white muslin, is a room to conjure with.

In town houses the curtains and hangings must also harmonize with the style of furnishing.  When the windows are hung with soft colored brocade, the portieres are usually beautiful tapestry or rich toned velvets, and care is always taken to have the balance of color kept and the color values correct.  There are silks and damasks and velvets, and many lesser stuffs, made for all the period styles, whether carried out simply or elaborately, and it is the art of getting the suitable ones for the different rooms which gives the air of harmony, beauty, and restfulness, for which the word home stands.

In hanging these more formal curtains the shaped valance is usually used with the curtains hanging straight at the sides of the window, so they can be drawn together at night.  The cords and pulleys should always be in perfect working order.  Another method is to have the curtains simply parted in the center, either with a valance or without, and drawn back at the sides with heavy cords and tassels, or bands of the stuff.  If a draped effect is desired great care must be taken not to have it too elaborate.

If the walls of a room are plain in color one may have either plain or figured hangings, but if the wall covering is figured it gives a feeling of unrest if the curtains are also figured.  Sometimes one sees bedrooms and small boudoirs where the walls and curtains show the same design, but it must be done with skill, or disaster is sure to follow.

Plain casement cloth or the different “Sunfast” fabrics are attractive with plain or figured papers, especially in bedrooms of country houses.

If one has to live in the town house through the summer do not make the fatal mistake of taking down the curtains and living in bare discomfort during the hot season.  If the curtains are too handsome to be kept up, buy a second set of inexpensive ones that can be washed without injury.  It is better that they should stop the dust, and then go into the tub, than that one’s lungs should collect it all.  Curtains are useful as well as ornamental, and a house without them is as dreary as breakfast without coffee.