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Pratt-Campbell Mansion - Interior View; Wichita, KS
A rare view of the interior of the Pratt-Campbell Mansion (first-floor parlor) in Wichita, KS. This photo was taken c. 1890. This grand home still stands today. It was designed and built by William Henry Sternberg (1832 - 1906). High-style plant stands at every window, swagging curtains with pull-down shades, a large oriental rugs and elegant furniture including a piano. Obviously swagging fabrics were in high style at the time. The ceiling was likely wall papered as an elegant backdrop to the ornate gas-electric chandelier. The ceilings in this room at 13 feet high are the tallest ceilings of any Victorian home in Wichita, KS.
Portieres (heavy draping curtains at the doorway of a room) were quite common in the late 1800s. A portiére is a heavy fabric hanging or placed either over a door or in the doorless entry to a room. Its name comes from the French word for door, “porte”. Common in wealthier households during the Victorian era, it is still occasionally used either as an ornament or as a means of mitigating drafts. It is usually of some heavy material, such as velvet, brocade, or plush. In addition to helping keep drafts out, portieres offered a stylish way to instantly add privacy to a social house call. In Margaret Mitchell's novel, Gone with the Wind, the protagonist Scarlett O'Hara makes a new dress from her mother's green velvet portieres (the scene was famously parodied on The Carol Burnett Show when Carol Burnett, playing the role of Scarlett, wore not only the fabric but the curtain rod as well).
Sometimes instead of a solid fabric portiere, Victorians decorated with rope portieres which were made from elaborately hand-tied ropes or cords, sometimes with beads or other ornamental niceties. Because portieres are almost always fabric and were touched and handled so much over the years, they are somewhat rarer to find today than some other items. Originally portieres were a concept and development from France, circa 200 – 400 A.D. The idea spread and made its way over to England a century or two after France. After the Civil War in the US, manufacturing plants of all types began springing up (including thread and weaving mills) and the Industrial Age was in full swing. Mechanized mills had replaced virtually all hand weaving by the early 1800s (1820s – 1830s). Mills, colors and techniques expanded as technology improved and these portieres seen in this photo were likely made in a large mechanized American factory in the New England or Chicago area sometime in the 1880s.
Your thoughts, ideas, comments and/or additional information is greatly appeciated and welcome!
This photo is courtesy of the Wichita-Sedgwick County Historic Museum (www.WichitaHistory.org).
Pratt-Campbell Mansion - Interior View; Wichita, KS
A rare view of the interior of the Pratt-Campbell Mansion (first-floor parlor) in Wichita, KS. This photo was taken c. 1890. This grand home still stands today. It was designed and built by William Henry Sternberg (1832 - 1906). High-style plant stands at every window, swagging curtains with pull-down shades, a large oriental rugs and elegant furniture including a piano. Obviously swagging fabrics were in high style at the time. The ceiling was likely wall papered as an elegant backdrop to the ornate gas-electric chandelier. The ceilings in this room at 13 feet high are the tallest ceilings of any Victorian home in Wichita, KS.
Portieres (heavy draping curtains at the doorway of a room) were quite common in the late 1800s. A portiére is a heavy fabric hanging or placed either over a door or in the doorless entry to a room. Its name comes from the French word for door, “porte”. Common in wealthier households during the Victorian era, it is still occasionally used either as an ornament or as a means of mitigating drafts. It is usually of some heavy material, such as velvet, brocade, or plush. In addition to helping keep drafts out, portieres offered a stylish way to instantly add privacy to a social house call. In Margaret Mitchell's novel, Gone with the Wind, the protagonist Scarlett O'Hara makes a new dress from her mother's green velvet portieres (the scene was famously parodied on The Carol Burnett Show when Carol Burnett, playing the role of Scarlett, wore not only the fabric but the curtain rod as well).
Sometimes instead of a solid fabric portiere, Victorians decorated with rope portieres which were made from elaborately hand-tied ropes or cords, sometimes with beads or other ornamental niceties. Because portieres are almost always fabric and were touched and handled so much over the years, they are somewhat rarer to find today than some other items. Originally portieres were a concept and development from France, circa 200 – 400 A.D. The idea spread and made its way over to England a century or two after France. After the Civil War in the US, manufacturing plants of all types began springing up (including thread and weaving mills) and the Industrial Age was in full swing. Mechanized mills had replaced virtually all hand weaving by the early 1800s (1820s – 1830s). Mills, colors and techniques expanded as technology improved and these portieres seen in this photo were likely made in a large mechanized American factory in the New England or Chicago area sometime in the 1880s.
Your thoughts, ideas, comments and/or additional information is greatly appeciated and welcome!
This photo is courtesy of the Wichita-Sedgwick County Historic Museum (www.WichitaHistory.org).