Figure 1.--Beautifully lithographef cutouts called scraps were popular inclusions in Victorian and Edwardian scrapbooks.
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Figure 1.--Beautifully lithographef cutouts called scraps were popular inclusions in Victorian and Edwardian scrapbooks. |
The parlor was often at the center of the 19th century home. Families varied on how the palor was used. Some used it for company and the children often did not have free access to it. In other families it was used more of a family room. In such cases the children were more welcome--but on their best behavior. Interesting features of many Victorian parlors were screens where "scraps" (cutouts), greening cards, and postcards might be used to decorate. The Victorians, both children and mothers also loved to keep scrapbooks in their parlors. A variety of items might be included in these scrapbooks, including photographs, "scraps", lettters, postcards, clippings. ptrssed flowers, and much more.
The Victorian Era was a beautiful and enchanting period of history. Ladies were elegantly dressed in their best clothing...from their corsets and buttoned shoes to their hats and gloves and the bustles on their dresses. It was a decorating era of excess...each room being "over done"...everything of value placed in view of the guests. Decorative touches of roses, ribbons, tassels, pillows and fine lace.
Beautiful lamps, fine art, exquisite linens... every small detail taken into account. Far too indulgent? Perhaps... but nonetheless an absolutely beautiful period of history.
When we think of "Victorian", we think of elegant rooms....full of color...red, gold, burgundy, black...full of roses.. perhaps a crazy quilt tossed across a high backed chair...marble topped tables....vanities adorned with sterling silver dresser sets... lying alongside vintage hats, paintings across the walls... still life roses...perhaps Queen Victoria's coronation..parchment fans lying on the coffee tables...or the more elegant fans created with peacock feathers and fine silks. It's a beautiful vision..
Victorian interiors were filled with an assortment of family memorabilia, sentimental keepsakes from their suitors, knickknacks and finely decorative furnishings.
The parlor was often at the center of the 19th century home. Families varied on how the palor was used. Some used it for company and the children often did not have free access to it. In other families it was used more of a family room. In such cases the children were more welcome--but on their best behavior.
Interesting features of many Victorian parlors were screens where "scraps" (cutouts), greening cards, and postcards might be used to decorate.
The center piece of any Victorian parlor was the sofa and chairs. They were often referred to as a Victorian parlor set. A common arrangement was a sofa and 4 Chairs. They usually had matcjing upolstry fabric. They might include armchairs, often pairs of matching desisn but in the same fabric.
Parlor Domes and Shadowboxes
For the middle-class Victorian family, domes and shadowboxes were a common item in a well furnished parlor. These impressive display pieces could range from six inches in height to over four feet. The contents might include elaborate bouquets of flowers or abundant arrangements of fruit-all hand-crafted from materials such as wax, sea shells, wool, glass, feathers or even human hair. Nothing encapsulates the Victorian character better than the dome. The Victorians put the things they loved most under glass for all to see. By the 1860"s, the use of human hair as decoration took on a new dimension. Hair wreaths, or framed floral bouquets made from the locks of several members of the
family were enclosed in glass, framed, and hung in the best parlor. Hair was also used to create family trees. The hair of the oldest family member making up the trunk, with the rest of the family contributions adorning the branches as leaves.
An American magazine described the following decoration of a Victorian parlor:
"Now," says the housewife, "I must at least have a parlor-carpet. We must get that to begin with, and other things as we go on..." ...she buys the Brussels carpet, which, with all its reduction in price, is one third dearer than the ingrain would have been, an not half so pretty. Now let us see what eighty dollars could have done for that room...Thirteen rolls of good satin paper [buff]...A maroon bordering, made in imitation of the choicest French style...Cover the floor with, say, thirty yards of good matting. ......Select some one tint or color which shall be the prevailing one in the furniture of the room. Shall it be green? Shall it be blue? Shall it be crimson? To carry on our illustration, we will choose green, and and we proceed with it one side of the fireplace there be, as there is often, a recess with a rough frame with four stout legs, one foot high, and upon the top of the frame have an elastic rack of slats. Make a mattress...or ...get a nice mattress...made of cane-shavings or husks. Cover this with a green English furniture print [glazed English or glazed French, and French twill]. With any of these cover your lounge. Make two large, square pillows of the same substance as the mattress, and set up at the back...feather pillows...shake them down into a square shape and cover them with the same print... Cut out of the same material as your lounge, sets of lambrequins (or, as they are called, lamberkins,) a kind of pendent curtain-top, as shown in the illustration, to put over the windows, which are to be embellished with white muslin curtains. White curtains really create a room out of nothing. ...Let your men-folk knock up for you, out of rough, unplaned boards, some ottoman frames, stuff the tips with just the same material as the lounge, and cover them with the self-same chintz.... ...broken-down arm-chair, stuff and pad and stitch...and cover it with the chintz like your other furniture... Presto--you create an easy chair. If you want a centre-table...any kind of table, well concealed beneath the folds of handsome drapery, of a color corresponding to the general hue of the oom, will look well.
Wall-paper and border..............................................$5.50
Thirty yards matting.................................................$15.00
Centre-table and cloth.............................................$15.00
Muslin for three windows..........................................$6.75
Thirty yards green English chintz, at 25 cents.............$7.50
Six chairs, at $2 each..............................................$12.00
Total......................................................................$61.75Subtracted from eighty dollars, which we set down as the price of the cheap, ugly Brussels carpet, we have our whole room papered, carpeted, curtained, and furnished, and we have nearly twenty dollars remaining for pictures [varnished chromos in rustic frames].
....American Woman's Home, 1869, by Harriet Beecher Stowe and Catherine E. Beecher.
One of the most popular activities in the Vicvtorian parlor was having tea when friends and family visited. The almost required scrapbook was also kept in the parlor.
One of the most popular activities in the Vicvtorian parlor was having tea when friends and family visited. The children were usually not invited for such events. Rather they had their tea in the nursery.
The Victorians, both children and mothers also loved to keep scrapbooks in their parlors. In the Victorian and Edwardian era, wasn't unusual to find the family scrapbook sitting prominently on a table, in a Victorian parlor. Children also kept scrapbooks, but theirs were not kept in the parlor. A variety of items might be included in these scrapbooks, including photographs, "scraps", lettters, postcards, clippings. ptrssed flowers, and much more.
Some interesting theatrical productions have provided interesting insights furnishing and activities in the Victorian parlor.
This wonderful American film chronicles the activities in a large Victorian family. Several scenses were set in the parlor which was lcated in the front leading to the dining room. Important visitors were always led into the parlor.
This British TV program chronicled a modern family's experiences living in a Victorian home.
Here are some views of Victorian homes and floorplans. Often the parlor looked out on the front of the home. The bedrooms and nyrsery was commonly on an upsatirs floor. There were, however,
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