The Emily Posts of domestic art and decoration are two white-haired, spinster sisters, Harriet and Vetta Goldstein. They have spent their lives teaching in the home economics department of the University of Minnesota, have written a book together (Art in Everyday Life) which has long been a bible to home economics classes from Maine to the Middle West and has been translated into Chinese. Their book tells how to choose colors in rugs and draperies, how to arrange furniture in a room, how to balance knick-knacks on a mantelpiece and food on a plate, how to dress tastefully, how to fix flowers, frame pictures, choose men's clothes, how to spot a good thing, from a well-designed fly swatter to a well-planned city. Its pages fairly bulge with pictures of good v. bad taste (see cut).
Last fortnight, Harriet and Vetta Goldstein got out a new trade edition (the first in nine years) of Art in Everyday Life (Macmillan; $5). Largely rewritten, and with its chapters on women's dress cut down to generalizations on form and color (the previous edition's fashions too specific, were left lurching), the new Art in Everyday Life aims to be as modern as Picasso, as fashionably up-to-the-minute as Swedish glassware and Frank Lloyd Wright housing.
Harriet and Vetta Goldstein, who even lecture jointly, live quietly with their mother, Mrs. Hannah Goldstein, in a neat, red brick apartment building overlooking St. Paul's Langford Park. Their small apartment is carefully decorated according to the rules in Art in Everyday Life. Even their hobbies are collaborative: taking pictures with Leica cameras, making pewter plates and hand-printed draperies. To University of Minnesota home economists their prim, judicious maxims are cultured pearls of wisdom. Samples:
"Be sincere with yourself first of all, and then use judgment and common sense " "If you want a fur coat and can't afford one, don't get an imitation. A good cloth coat will be more attractive and more serviceable." "If you can't afford expensive tapestries or draperies, don't get cheap imitations. Get prints or simple cloths." "Don't try to keep up with the Joneses. It's not only bad taste, but brings unhappiness."