Mixing and matching furniture is a comfy and practical trend

Time was when furniture-and clothes, bed linens and table settings-were supposed to match. Black shoes and brown purse? No way!

But, like fashion, rigid rules about what goes with what in homefashions are increasingly obsolete. And now, it seems, the time hascome for an a la carte approach even to the once-uniform dining-roomchair.

"You don't have to have eight identical Hepplewhites around yourtable anymore," says Washington interior designer Steven J. Richards."With so many wonderful styles for dining-room chairs out there, it'spredictable and boring to limit yourself to only one."

Richards says some clients are so self-confident about shopping atflea markets …