I know of nothing more significant than the awakening of men and women throughout our country to the desire to improve their houses. Call it what you will-awakening, development, American Renaissance-it is a most startling and promising condition of affairs. It is no longer possible, even to people of only faintly aesthetic tastes, to buy chairs merely to sit upon or a clock merely that it should tell the time. Home-makers are determined to have their houses, outside and in, correct according to the best standards. What do we mean by the best standards? Certainly not those of the useless,...

"Good taste can be developed in anyone, just as surely as good manners are possible to anyone. And good taste is as necessary as good manners," declared Elsie de Wolfe, the "first lady" of American interior design. Although de Wolfe decorated the homes of wealthy, socially prominent clients, she always maintained that her vision of elegant but comfortable living is attainable to all. This timeless 1913 book -- a well-organized compilation of newspaper and magazine articles, written in a friendly, conversational tone -- explains how to design, furnish, and decorate a house in order to make it...