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Very soon he has gathered about himself a little establishment not unlike the architect's, with a drafting room containing one or more men, a little office with a stenographer and boy, perhaps a library of volumes on decoration, and a conference room surrounded with excellent chairs and tables and commodes which he has picked up now and again in weak moments. He still has nothing but his personal services to offer, together with the services of the men who make his drawings, and he generally finds, I think it is safe to say, that his schemes, no matter how perfect in the beginning, are somewhat less than perfection after they have been more or less inadequately executed by
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16INTERIOR DECORATING
the craftsmen that the general market affords. Besides this, he finds his work unduly delayed in execution and his clientele dissatisfied. He is forced to employ an upholsterer who is also doing work for a great many other decorators and who will not push his work forward ahead of that of his other customers. He has the same experience with the men who manufacture his furniture. He finds that the painter that he has been employing is doing slipshod work and not getting his jobs executed on time. The sewing of his lamp-shades and curtains is inadequate and his designs are not satisfactorily carried out.
I am trying to show, through all this, the difficulty today that the decorator experiences in resisting the creation of an establishment. The artist in him no doubt frequently rebels against such an enterprise, but if he is successful he is confronted by problems which must become extremely difficult to solve without a large corps of employees. He cannot handle all the work himself, even all the conferences with his clients, much less all the superintendence required by the execution and placing of the work.
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