FLOWERS IN SITTING ROOMS.

One of the most definite conclusions which may be drawn from the visits paid in connection with our “London Homes” competition is the almost universal use of flowers and plants in the house. Their brightness and beauty is understood and valued in nearly every home. It was the rarest thing for those privileged to judge to be shown a flowerless room, and the commonest one for the hostess to refer to her flowers, to apologise for their scarcity perhaps, or their poorness of condition, to deplore their costliness, or to admire their beauty. Frequently a vase of blossoms was added or its position changed at the last minute, or one was implored to “wait just a moment while I finish the flowers.”

Well justified indeed is this general belief in the power of flowers to add much that is needed to a room, particularly in a London home. Certainly their uses and possibilities were so interesting and instructively valuable to the present writer that it is only fair to share the pleasure with any who care to read this attempt to collect the charming impressions gained from the homes of competitors.

Undoubtedly the contribution of fresh flowers is light and cheerfulness to the darkest and dullest atmosphere; they supply life to the scheme of decoration, and make.it to seem as fresh and well cared for as gleaming polished furniture or a wellswept hearth. They relieve the monotony of colour tones, and their very transience is airtue for it ensures variety. One sees them used to match a secondary colour in a curtain, cushion, or carpet, and so emphasise the harmony of the room’s colour-scheme, or chosen to contrast, and so draw attention to themselves as bright individual notes of colour. They are often placed that they may add light to dark corners, and hot infrequently soft shades of flowers are employed with restraint to draw the eye to some beautiful piece of pottery, glass, or china which is holding them.