Any of these materials used for chair covers will both look and wear better if expertly tailored. As well as getting a good' fit, this involves Piping wih materials of particular strength and fineness (for a piping must not be clumsy), arranging that seams lie one way inside, letting in accurately cut shaping panels on the arms and wings, and finishing the bottom either by tying under 30 as to imitate a tight cover, or by a decorative treatment of the bottom edge. Box-pleating should be very sharply pressed, and the pleats look best if they touch, particularly N they form only a 2-inch frill for a chair with short legs. For this sort of chair, however, there are many excellent braids and ruchings sold, which may be applied to a straight or scalloped edge, and may or may not carry a short fringe.
The more tightly a cover is fixed and the more rigid the structure to which it is attached the stronger it must be. Tailored divan covers are subjected to greater strain than throw-over bedcovers, for example, and the wear is localized because the divans are used to sit on. Frictional wear is, however, much less than on the arms of a chair, but the risk of their breaking away at the seams is much greater. Wools are therefore less suitable than linen or cotton, and artificial silk too fragile unless on a substantial cotton warp. Artificial silk is, however, good, and looks well as a throw-over Bet-cover, and lengths may be joined together decoratively in a number of
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.