ANTIQUE FURNITURE BUYING AND SELLING

COLLECTORS whose habit it is to look with suspicion on every dealer in old furniture with whom they may be tempted to do business would be better advised, on the whole, to transfer their misgivings from the tradesman to his wares.  Antique dealers are no more dishonest than any other class, but their business is a peculiar one, and the public almost begs to be deceived.   It is not satisfied with the ordinary article, the commonplace piece of furniture made for a definite purpose and for nothing eise.   It wants to show its cleverness in making a find,   i Whatever is the use,” apparently asks the well-informed collect or, ” of my having ail this knowledge of historie art at my finger-ends, if I cannot show it by adding to my collection valuable old curios unrecognised by the thoughtless and ignorant I   This represents the attitude of mind of hundreds of collectors of old furniture.   They seek and the dealer takes care they shall find.   A little incident one of many of similar kind occurred in the experience of the writer which illustrates this point. A dealer in Yorkshire had a nice, plain mahogany
wardrobe.   He had bought it at a sale in his neigh-
bourhood.   It dated from about the third quarter of the eighteenth centurv and was a well-made piece of furniture without applied decoration except the row of dentils under the cornice.   This piece of furniture would not sell.   Now the dealer had to get his living, and he adopted what he knew by experience would be the method most likely to result in business.  He simply took the doors off and inlaid in the middle of each fine plain mahogany panel one of those shell ornaments used so much by the brothers Adam and Sheraton.  The wardrobe was sold within a few days of this piece of vandalism, and the buyer was by no means a dupe.   He knew all about style.  He recognised the inlaid ornament as a bit of decoration frequently seen in furniture of the latter end of the eighteenth century.    He talked quite learnedly about it, discussed it, called to mind something he had at home where a similar ornament occurred in each of the four corners, not in the middle as in this most interesting specimen.   He even went so far as to doubt whether the inlay had not been put in at a ” later date,” wondered if after all it was not a ” transitional ” piece, then decided that it must be so, but finally bought it.
Now the experience the dealer had had with this piece of furniture was that no one ever took any notice of it at all before it had the inlay put in. He dare not call anyone’s attention to it because in the minds of so many timid buyers the rule appears to be that if a quiet, inoffensive looking salesman points out some particular article as being worth buying it is proof that the dealer wants to get rid of it, and if so then it cannot be any good. This dealer said that he never succeeded in selling an article if he introduced it first to the customer, unless indeed he was dealing with someone to whom he was very well known. Even then the chances of a sale were less than if the collector made the first advance. The psychology of the matter seems to be that the customer wanders into the dealer’s shop to see what he can find, and if he can find something he may buy it. But he does not want to have anything sold him.
This makes the dealer stock articles which are likely to be remarked upon, things which as he puts it sell themselves.
Most dealers do not consciously set out to deceive people, any more than their customers seek to over-reach them.   It is a much more difficult thing to carry on a business by fraud and deception than to live by honest trade.   It requires more executive skill in the first place, extraordinary effrontery, and a very pro-found knowledge of human nature.   Now it is absurd to credit dealers in old furniture with possessing these qualifies in a greater degree than other members of the Community.   Some do possess them, of course. On the other hand some collectors are not devoid of craft, by any means.   It should also be remembered that   many   collectors   are   themselves   amateur dealers.
A case came to the notice of the writer of a dealer who bought in France a carved oak wardrobe of the period of Louis XV.   It was not an extraordinary
piece of furniture, probably worth15 to20.   But the fact that it was not extraordinary was against it. There it stood for years in the shop utterly unremarked. It was in beautiful condition.   The wood had been regularly cleaned, no added polish had ever touched it, and a good colour and ” patina 1 was the result.  The dealer offered it over and over again.   He could induce no one seriously to consider it.  And if he adopted the policy of silence then no one ever appeared to see it.  So one day the bright idea occurred to him of making two wardrobes out of it.   He took off the two big doors and made each the front of a separate hanging cupboard, rejecting the original interior and substituting ” carcase work ” of his own.   Then he put one in the shop and kept the other out of sight. Both were quickly sold, one after the other, of course. Exactly the same thing happened as in the case of the inlaid piece already referred to.   A man came in and glancing round remarked that he had never seen a late eighteenth-century French wardrobe like that before. It should be explained that in the original piece the carving on each door was unsymmetrical, but the two doors together made a symmetrical front.   One was practically the reverse of the other.   That is quite common in French furniture.
One would have thought that the very slightest acquaintance with the style would have shown in an instant that something was wrong. The buyer, indeed, stumbled almost immediately on the fact, and said that it looked as if ” some time or other ” there had occurred to one door and the owner had no alternative but to use the piece which was intact for making a fresh piece of furniture. He thought it was very interesting, had never known such a thing to have been done before, and after a most instructive chat with the dealer he became the purchaser.
The two wardrobes were sold for 15 each instead of the 20 which might possibly have been realised by the original piece. Old furniture in a shop must advertise itself in some way, and the dealer must find out the best means to make it do so.
Still another case was that of an old oak ” refectory  table so called because the name is picturesque and suggests a time previous to the dissolution of the monasteries and for no other reason whateverwhich would not sell in the place where it was because it was too plain. The dealer took it out and introduced small perforated brackets in the angles between the upper parts of the legs and the top rails. The resuit in the eyes of the seller justified the proceeding. Someone I found   it.
The psychology of buying is full of the most extra-ordinary turns and twists. The writer bought from a gipsy fifteen years ago six country-made chairs of the Sheraton period. The price given was for the six. They may be worth to-day about double. While the owner of the caravan was busy bringing out the chairs his wife quietly cautioned him not to shew ” the one with the claw feet.” So it was not brought out. But the remark had the desired effect up to a point.
No one could possibly resist the temptation to insist upon seeing ” the one with the claw feet.” It proved to be a poor and most clumsy copy of a bad design of the time of Chippendale. But the loud upbraidings of his wife when she saw how her husband, notwith-standing the caution, had shown the precious chair, sounded most genuine. Hadn’t she told him not to bring it out He knew quite well it wasn’t for sale. Then why trouble the gentleman with it And a whole pantomime of mysterious nods, winks, and dark looks went on to induce the gipsy to put the wretched thing out of sight for fear it should be purchased under her very eyes. It is quite possible the woman believed it to be particularly good, and merely adopted this crafty but rather overrated diplomacy to stimulate desire for possession.
A well-known expert who was asked by a friend what course he would suggest to enable him to get a sound knowledge of old furniture replied briefly : ! Buy some.”  That was not altogether sarcasm. After a cabinet or table is purchased and brought home it has then to stand not only daily scrutinising from the owner, who likes to think he has got hold of some-thing really good, but frequent examination from friends who may or may not know anything about old furniture.   Whether they know much or little does not matter.   Out of politeness they must look at the precious find and make remarks.   And even fools have been known occasionally to say something very illuminating.   I can see in my mind’s eye now a set of chairs which once stood in a public museum where
they were on loan and catalogued as ” late Sheraton.” A lady who was exceedingly bored at the Exhibition
and knew nothing whatever about the subject remarked in an off-hand manner that they looked too small to be sat upon. She had unconsciously detected the fault which even experts had failed to see. Good old furniture never looks ” skimpy.” It never exhibits cheeseparing in the use of material. It does not look mean and small. Economy in the use of wood is for the most part a modem idea born of the factory system. When a man made an oak dresser in the seventeenth or eighteenth century his view was limited to the construction of that one piece of furniture. Of course there must have been a good deal of waste, and it is perfectly obvious to anyone that in many instances far more wood was used than the actual necessities of the case demanded. But a modem maker knows how to make two pieces of furniture out of material which in former times would have been regarded as no more than sufficient for one.
In factories, of course, economical manufacture is an important point, particularly where articles are tumed out by the score instead of one or two at a time.   The chairs alluded to had been made from Sheraton designs probably a few years prior to the 1851 exhibition.  They were old enough to look time-worn, and as the pattern was ail right they were regarded as genuinely of the eighteenth century.   Sheraton furniture was always light and elegant.   It was never thin and poor looking in proportion, though it seems some-times almost too light in construction.   But Sheraton was a great master of construction and succeeded in combining strength and grace better than any other designer of furniture.
A quaint sidelight upon the use of material is the very common explanation of a dealer who is questioned as to the use of deal inside drawers with solid mahogany fronts. I That is always a sign,” he will say, ” that the piece is old and that the mahogany has been specially selected, because the latter was rare and consequently very dear in the old days. They could not afford to put anything better inside the drawers when the fronts were of such exceptionally fine material as these.” The same dealer will, however, point in triumph to the oak linings of another chest and remark : ” They always did things well in those days. Never skimped a job. Always made it of good throughout, either mahogany or more usually good oak,” which as a matter of fact is true.
Old oak linings are very useful to the faker. They are of thin seasoned wood and can be used with safety almost anywhere without fear. But if a piece of thick English oak, even though it be hundreds of years old, is eut into two thin boards there is no guarantee whatever that it will not warp or split.
The fact that a piece of furniture is in bad condition is, of course, no proof that it is old, though there still exist people who seem to be attracted by old oak which looks  knocked about.” They have the idea that it is in an untouched condition. A case came to the notice of the writer of two abominably made cabinets, the ends and backs of which never had been
neatly joined. ” You cannot possibly seil these as they are/’ the dealer was advised. ” I certainry could not seil them if I put the m into reasonably decent condition,” he replied. ” People would suspect them at once. As they are, anyone can see they are old with the naked eye ! ”
The word ” patina ” is worth a brief explanation, as it is used so glibly and seems to have so profound an effect upon collectors, who casually pass on the word to friends when shewing the most recent find. The dictionary will tell you that it is ” a green film forme on copper and bronze by long exposure to a moist atmosphere or by treatment with acids.” It is only by extension of the meaning that the word is used in describing the appearance of the surface of old wood, and tins extension is justified by the fact that patina on furniture does assume a distinctly metallic appearance. Collectors should realise that it is not produced by applied varnish or polish. Wood which had neither of these preparations applied to it will assume a patina in time. The desired effect comes by generations of careful cleaning and rubbing, and it will be found that as a rule the upper surfaces or those which catch the dust have the finest patina. A familiar example of the creation of patina on wood is the handle of a regularly used Walking stick. With constant swinging in the hand it will gradually assume a polish. N0 preparation has been applied, but the polish is there all the same. In Paris the patina of old Louis XV. carved and gilt chairs has been obtained on new furniture by  the employaient of army pensioners who are willing to sit for so many hours a day gently rubbing the arms of the chairs with their hands.
In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries in England some preparation for darkening oak was used, but the secret of its composition has been lost. As far as we can tell it was not of the nature of varnish, but more probably a stain afterwards polished with some simple preparation such as beeswax and turpen-tine, or wax alone. Mahogany in the eighteenth Century was undoubtedly stained and polished, but not French polished to produce the meretricious glittering effect seen on cheap modern furniture. Patina on old furniture, once recognised, cannot possibly be mistaken. It never looks sticky, and it cannot easily be removed, though of course it may be covered with paint or varnish. The writer is acquainted with a chimney piece carved by Grinling Gibbons which has been utterly ruined by a mistaken application of varnish. Whatever patina may have been on the wood has, of course, been hidden and would almost certainly be destroyed by any attempt to remove the varnish. In the days of the Restoration carvings by Gibbons and his followers were left un-touched in the soft white lime in which they were executed, and it is dimcult to see how they could have been cleaned thoroughly except by brushing, so delicate were the details. Unlike early Jacobean carving the elaborately executed birds, rlowers, and fruits were built up to the required relief and applied to the background.
Although tricks of fakers and dealers should be known to the collector they can only be regarded as
mere warnings.   Directly a dodge is discovered and talked about it is no longer of much use.   The artful dodger of the antique furniture trade must think of something eise, and to do him credit if credit it be he is usually just a trick or two ahead of the buyer. He is an inventor, an original mind, exploring regions of duplicity and guile into which the private collector can only penetrate by slow and uncertain steps, for ever losing his way and falling into unsuspected snares. Of course every time he is caught he is so much the wiser, but no complete knowledge is to be had of trickery.   It progresses and   develops like  other branches of human effort.   No one nowadays not -even the most foolish of fakers would stand in his shop and fire a blunderbuss full of shot into his collection of old oak in the hope of producing convincing worm-holes.   The dodge is played out, and the probability is it never was of very much use.   But it has been an entertaining thing to talk about and write about, and the method by which simple souls may detect the fraud has been so easily appreciated.  All one has to do, it appears, is to obtain a hat-pin, thrust it into the suspected worm-holes and draw out the little leaden pellets which lie at the bottom.
But in any case worm-eaten furniture is not at all desirable, even if it be genuinely old. The disease is likely to spread and is very hard to get rid of. Peroxide of hydrogen is employed and a fine spray used to inject it into the holes, after which beeswax coloured with analine dye is pressed in and smoothed down.
The dealer of to-day would much rather hide worm-holes that exist than create artificial ones, which is an illustration of the development in the arts of faking noted above. At one time there may have been people who, anxious as to the age of a piece of furniture, would look upon the worm-holes pointed out as evidence of great antiquity and would contentedly buy. But people do not like worm-holes nowadays. So instead of making any the faker fills up what there are.
The spectacle of an otherwise intellectual individual engaged in trying to plumb the depths of duplicity to which dealers can descend in faking old furniture is like that of the donkey pressing eagerly forward after the dangling carrot. It would indeed be very pleasant to possess the carrot of complete knowledge, but the conditions render it impossible.
Not so many years ago amateurs could not recognise and scarcely suspected fine carved wood under the many coats of paint with which it was frequently covered.  They would live in an old Jacobean or Georgian house and give orders time after time for the panelling to be repainted and made to look clean and cheerful, in complete ignorance of there being any-thing good on the walls.   A dealer might suggest a change of style altogether, buy the panelling for next to nothing, and replace by a pretty wall-paper. Thou-sands of square feet of fine panelling have been bought in this way from old houses.
The buyer would take the wood away, put it in pickle ” to get the paint off, finally revealing it in excellent condition, for the paint had often been a great protection.   Even if the wood had hidden blemishes and patches the dealer would be ready with bits of old material with which to make it perfect.   The panelling would then be very saleable.  After a time, however, the public became educated and refused to part with old painted woodwork, which began to be regarded as something worth keeping.  The donkey had moved up apparently nearer the carrot. Automatic-ally, however, painted wood became interesting. Recog-nising this, the dealer obtained new carved panelling, painted that and left it in his shop for the collector to find.   Proud of his knowledge the buyer would perceive possibilities in the ancient looking fittings, and he and the dealer would compare notes on the folly of early Victorian householders persisting in covering up fine carved panelling with layers of paint.   Of course it is a protection,” the collector would remark, “and the wood may possibly be in excellent condition underneath.”   And when the deal was effected his remark was justified, for the carving would appear in a marvellous state of preservation, so clean in its cutting, so crisp and fresh in the detail that it might really have left the bench only yesterday.  So the donkey was as far off the carrot as ever.
It may never have occurred to collects to carry a foot rule in their pockets. The simple appliance is quite useful in various ways.   Stools and chairs in the early seventeenth century and before were often higher in the seat than they are to-day, not because people were taller then, but on account of the fact that a convenient rail on which to put the feet was usually handy. For instance, at meals people put their feet on the stout rail which ran ail round the table from leg to leg an inch or two from the ground. If they were seated in a chair there might be a footstool handy, or if on a settle there would be a rail in the same position as those in the stools. There were no carpets on the floors of the houses in the sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries. Such fine textiles were used as covers for the tables and court cupboards. A stone flagged floor was cold and a boarded floor was not much better. So that people were well content to have their feet well off the ground. Hence the height of the seats. Another case in which the foot rule comes in useful is in measuring lengths. The English joiner measured his work in inches, and although in old furniture standard measurements do not occur as in modem work to-day, when the bed, for instance, increases in width by six inches at a time from two feet six inches up to five feet, the tendency was for the work to be planned without fractional divisions of inches.
Now some reproductions of old English furniture are made to-day in Holland and Belgium where the metrical system of measurement is in use. The tendency there is for the sizes to run in divisions of the metre, which is, to be exact, 39.37 inches. Taken in conjunction with other circumstances, the fact that an oak dresser, for instance, measured exactly two metres in length instead of six feet would be suspicious. A good reproduction made abroad is not necessarily intended for the dealer in old furniture here.   It may
be sold honestly through the ordinary retail furnishing trade as a copy, but once sold there is no telling what its subsequent history will be, and when it turns up in the dark corner of some antique dealer’s shop it may easily be regarded as old by very expert buyers. Continental reproductions of old English furniture are so often artistically copied, not merely reproduced as to style, but rubbed down, artificially patinated and coloured in a way which is almost too well done. The metrical system of measurement itself is not very old, for it only originated in France at the close of the eighteenth Century.
One is bound to attach some importance, upon a piece of furniture in a shop, to the price asked for it. This quite apart from the question as to whether we can afford to buy it or not. It is common to see pieces of furniture, particularly of the latter end of the eighteenth Century when joinery and cabinet-making had arrived at such a high degree of executive perfection, marked at prices which could not possibly be approached under modem conditions for the same class of work. Old dressing tables, neatly fitted with mirrors, drawers, little cupboards, covered wells, and other receptacles are to be found priced at anything up to about 8 apiece, which if made to-day in the same quality of wood and workmanship would certainly cost a great deal more. Clever cabinet-makers earn more to-day than they did a hundred years ago, and although by the help of machinery some time is saved, this consideration is not so important in the case of the pieces of furniture referred to which must be put together
entirely by hand. It is the fitting which costs the money, not the cutting and planing of the parts. So the inference would seem to be that if a nicely designed, well-made piece of furniture having a good deal of detailed work about it is low in price it is probably old. Such an article would not be very exceptional in character. It would have been made in the first instance to fulfil a legitimate useful purpose, not to create a work of art. Many old bureaux and chests of drawers come into this category. One cannot, of course, rely upon price as a final determining factor, but it is worth bearing in mind. Well-made modem furniture will fall sometimes extraordinarily in price when it is sold second-hand. Fashion plays a part here. The writer knows of magnificent pieces of furniture, made towards the end of the Victorian period, which can be bought to-day at certainly half the price of making. These specimens are not the vulgar monstrosities commonly known as Victorian, but well-designed pieces of furniture in styles not now thought of much account, particularly work adapted from Italian sources, with classical detail, highly ornate, carved and inlaid with astonishing skill. Such pieces deserve more than passing attention from the collect or whenever they are discovered. The common work of this period was abominable and will never be worth anything, but the good late Victorian furniture will surely be valuable in time.
When the present fashion for furnishing houses with eighteenth-century reproductions comes to an end, and the thousands of copies of Chippendale, Heppelwhite, and Sheraton made in this generation begin gradually to slip into the second-hand market, it will be exceedingly hard to tell the new from the old. The weight of mahogany will help a little, for in the eighteenth Century fine chairs were made of fine wood. The best Cuban mahogany is double the weight of most of that used nowadays for cheap reproductions. It is also much harder and takes a finer surface and patina. But fine mahogany can be obtained to-day and the best reproductions are made of it.
Fashion in collecting furniture will undoubtedly change the period of its interest as knowledge spreads and  reproductions   multiply.    Already   the   late eighteenth-century styles are beginning to be left alone in favour of those of William and Mary and Queen Anne.  Old Stuart lacquered furniture is appearing more frequently in response to the demand for it. Silvered stands, rich in carving, with Chinese cabinets above are being brought out of old houses in numbers sufnciently adequate to cope with the demand. Exact copies are being made and sold the first instance as such.   After half a dozen changes of ownership have been made and the fashion for collecting old lacquer increases the copies will become so like the originals as to deceive even those who want to sell them at a profit.
No method of detecting new work passing as old is infallible.   The collector must increase his knowledge of the subject in as many directions as possible so that he may be able to pronounce judgment after taking all circumstances into consideration.   Old furniture shews no signatures of makers, and documentary evidence of its genuineness is very rare indeed.   Great experts rely almost entirely upon instinctive judgment, and it is undoubtedly true that some people are born with more innate perception than others.  But a more valuable quality even than instinct is interest.  Those who are continually interested are continually even unconsciously gaining  experience.    They  become familiarised in an astonishing degree with their subject. They can pronounce judgment instantly in cases where they can offer no easily understood reason for their views.   It has been remarked that Europeans unused to the facial characteristics of the Chinaman have a difficulty in distinguishing one Chinaman from another. They all look more or less alike.   Familiarity, of course, soon reveals as much variety in the Mongolian face as in the European.   Probably nine hundred and ninety-nine people out of a thousand in England to-day are utterly incapable of distinguishing a very bad Japanese print from a masterpiece, simply because they are unfamiliar with the art of the East.   The Japanese themselves are probably in the same case with regard to Western art.   Appreciation of all art is a matter of perception, which, apart from natural gifts, must come
by experience. No ignorant individual who wants to buy old furniture can commit to memory a number of characteristics, then walk into a dealer’s shop and separate the sheep from the goats. The best advice to anyone who aspires to become a connoisseur is to examine carefully ail specimens with which he is brought in contact, and to preserve as far as possible an open mind. Confidence will corner in time, and it is surprising how many qualities reveal themselves to the observer as soon as the A B C of the subject is no longer a stumbling-block. When all is said and done, the reason why an expert, in his own mind, will say a piece of furniture is not a genuine production is simply because to him it does not look like one. He uses his experience, his instinct, his judgment, and speaks accordingly.

ANTIQUE FURNITURE INTERIORS

From such an advertisement one may pretty clearly visualise the interior of the house, which would have been that of fairly well-to-do people.   But there is no evidence that the furniture was considered exceptional in any way, and apart from its age the same furniture now would not be much out of the common.  Judging from the date of the sale and the description of the different pieces it is probable that the bulk of the effects were notable that the only wood mentioned is mahogany, but considering the ingratiating ways of auctioneers, one concludes that in this case mahogany was merely selected for distinction as being more likdy to be appealing to prospective buyers than other woods.   The advertisement as a document has, of course, no special interest, for hundreds of others of like character are easily to be found. Taken together, they afford a peep into ordinary middle-class homes of the time, and help one to realise what an enormous quantity of furniture must have been made in the country by utterly unknown makers.
Three great names always occur to us as representatives of the art of the cabinet-maker, and as far as style is concerned they do represent certain fairly well defined characteristics.   But to credit furniture of the class under discussion with the authorship of Chippendale, Heppelwhite, or Sheraton is absurd.   If a visit be paid to the nearest second-hand dealer’s shop it is almost certain that bits of furniture will be found quite palpably of eighteenth Century make, which cannot be identified as belonging to any one of the three styles mentioned.   I have seen many pieces of furniture, particularly chairs, which possess features characteristic of ail three makers’ work.  They might have been made anywhere and by anyone.   Considered as fine specimens of Chippendale, Heppelwhite, or Sheraton they are, of course, worthless, but as genuine old examples of the craft of the cabinet-maker they are interesting and often in very sound condition.   One cannot date them, for their design affords no assistance whatever, being impure and sometimes very naive in treatment.   Attempts have been made to group and classify such furniture, but it is almost impossible, though occasionally a little local character will crop out enabling one to say in what part of the country the maker lived.
An earlier advertisement of similar character, this time from the London General Advertiser of 1751 (which contains, by the way, some publishers’ announce-ments of the issue of the well-known works on architecture by William Halfpenny) runs :
The foregoing was from a fashionable town house. The French elbow chairs mentioned were not imported examples, but were made in what was then called the French style. Another sale advertisement from the same journal later on in the year describes these chairs better :  six fine French chairs, carved knees, elbows and Lion claws, stuffed backs and seats.” Most dealers and collee tors would call them Chippen-dale nowadays, and no doubt the great maker must have produced numbers of them.   The word furniture in these advertisements, and in the trade catalogues of the time, is often used to denote curtains, metal handles, escutcheons and other applied details to woodwork, as well as the constructed articles them-selves. Thus we have 1 a mahogany Bedstead with check Furniture,” and in the sale of the effects of one John Thompion, ” window curtains in Mohair, printed cotton, check and other Furniture.” The same custom obtains with regard to some Uttings in the trade to-day.
It is usual and in fact correct to date the decay in English furniture-making from about 1800 or possibly a Kttle before, but as the country cabinet-maker had been slow in taking up new fashions as they appeared so was he slow to discard them when he had become familiar with their features.   The result is that a good deal of furniture was made well into the nineteenth Century, of the utilitarian kind, which had little about it of the debased Empire feeling characteristic of later Sheraton work.   As time went on it became worse through lack of good example from fashionable sources and through the increasing interest taken in mechanical means of production.   But the writer has seen chairs, tables, sideboards, settees, corner cupboards and other pieces of furniture in country places, of quite pleasing design and of Georgian character which most certainly were not made before the nineteenth Century. Country-made mahogany (or more probably beech), ladder-back chairs, and corner or lozenge shaped chairs, chests of drawers (the latter rather given away by the mechanical turning of the feet), tables with large rectangular flaps, wardrobes with trays in the upper part, bureau book-cases, sofas, and other pieces are quite commonly met with which have a good deal of late eighteenth century character yet were made probably in the reign of
George IV. or even later.
Sofas quickly responded to the Empire feeling, but some examples are quite pleasant to look upon and are nothing like so vulgar and ornate as they became nearer the 1851 Exhibition. There are many round centre tables and rectangular sofa tables, both having spreading feet on castors, and usually spoken of as Georgian, which were in ail probability made long after George III., at any rate, was dead and buried. In the sense that much of such furniture was made before the last of the Georges departed this life, it may be said to be Georgian, but usually implies the eighteenth century before French influence in the time of Napoleon had made itself felt.
The following from an auctioneer’s advertisement in Gore’s General Advertiser, Liverpool, 1823, illustrates furniture which is stated specifically to be ” recently new.”   After commencing with the conventional ” That ” and  enumerating various household articles of no particular interest, the advertisement refers to  a set of dining tables with elliptical ends  which would be put down as not a bit later than 1790 by most judges of furniture to-day.   There is a curious reference to “an excellent Pedal Harp ” by Erard, and an assortent of ” Loo, Pembroke, Card, Snap and Dressing Tables   Auctioneers’ phraseology then, as now, was conventional, and advertisements of  the contents of different houses resemble one another sometimes too closely to be of much value to the student of old furniture. It is only when the run of the wording is broken by obvious attempts to describe some particular thing that one can visualise the article.
The York Courant for 178g contains several para-graphs of local colour.  One John Jameson advertises that he has been conducting his business of ” cabinet, Turnery and Toy Manufactory ” for twenty years and has ” supplied the First Families in England and Scotland, particularly in the articles of German and other Spinning Wheels.”  This reference to eighteenth-century spinning wheelsand late ones at that should be carefully remembered by those who imagine that an oak one with plenty of picturesque turnery about it must of necessity be Jacobean at least.  There are hundreds of spinning wheels in the possession of people who would be horrified at the mere suggestion that they could be a bit later than Charles II.   Yet they mostly date from the third quarter of the eighteenth century, when more wheels were required than ever before, and when the spinning jenny invented in 1764 had not as yet driven out the occupation of the domestic spinster.   Spinning wheels were, of course,made by a turner, not a cabinet-maker.
The York Courant for the same year also contains an advertisement of a sale of furniture which the auctioneer in a footnote says ” has been little more than a year in use.” It may be quoted in full as a record of the contents of a Yorkshire house of about 1797.
” Ail the elegant and modem Household Furniture
of William Barnett, Esq., of Abberford, consisting of Bedsteads with Mahogany posts, beautiful chintz, Dimity, and other Hangings, and Window curtains ; excellent bordered Feather Beds, Mattresses, Blankets Quilts, and Counterpanes ; Mahogany chairs, Dining, Card, Tea and Pembroke Tables ; single and double chests of Drawers, Basin Stands, Dressing Tables, etc ; two sophas, cushions and covers ; neat painted and stained chairs, two mahogany side-Board Tables and cellaret ; Pier and Dressing glasses in gilt and other frames ;  Floor, Staircase and Bed carpets ; two Passage Lamps and Floor Cloth ; Handsome Fire Irons ; a mangle, cloths and tables ; Kitchen requisite, Brewing Vessels and other efiects.”
The term ” basin-stand ” is interesting, and in ail probability refers to those of mahogany with round holes eut out for the reception of the various pieces of toilet ware. There are three-legged or tripod basin-stands made of mahogany which are usually credited to Chippendale. In second-hand dealers* parlance they are often known as  wig-stands.” The ” side-board tables and cellaret  indicate the development of the sideboard, which was first a table to stand near the wall, being afterwards supplied with side drawers and a centre drawer, a form which has never since been improved upon.
Other phrases which occur in eighteenth century auctioneers’ advertisements are : ” Six neat cabriole Drawing Room chairs and two elbow ditto, two neat mahogany knife cases, with table and desert knives and forks complete, Black handles, hooped and tipped with silver ; and three Shagreen Knife cases.” The Bristol Gazette for 1786 refers to ” Fluted Four Post, Field and other Bedsteads ” and Gore’s General Advertiser also refers to ” Field ” bedsteads and a “Press” bedstead.The London General Advertiser, 1751, enumerates amongst the furniture of a Hackney gentleman,  a travelling Field Bed ” …” a Bureau Bedstead, and a neat Settee ditto.”
The term ” field-bed  refers to a folding bed, but subsequently its meaning became extended. Murray’s Oxford dictionary gives the meaning to be ” A portable or folding bed chiefly for use in the field,” and supports the interpretation by the following quotations among others. 1590 : “A fair field-bed with a canopy.” 1709 : ” The Spanyard made his brags that he had turned the English ensigns into Spanish field-beds.” A second meaning is given as “a camp or trestle bedstead,” the illustrations being, 1592 : ” This field-bed is to cold for me to sleepe.” 1645 : ” The night is fled, and Dayes best Chorister kickes his field-bed with Scorne.” A further illustration dated 1754 suggests that field-beds were then commonly used in houses.
Heppelwhite’s ” Cabinet-maker’s and Upholsterer’s Guide,” dated 1788, also shews that they were used for household purposes, being simply tent bedsteads, the principal feature of which were the ” sweep ” tops to carry the drapery forming the tent. Two drawings of them are given in the book. They had four turned posts of quite simple and unimportant
character to support a light framework above, which was variously shaped, sometimes hooped, sometimes like a roof with sloping sides and a fiat top.   It was the form of this framework, stretched over with dimity or other material, and the curtains suspended from it, which combined to give the bed its character. The author has frequently seen them in old farmhouse and cottage bedrooms, but the term neld-bed appears to have  now become obsolete.   No particular value attaches to these old-fashioned beds, which were made well into the nineteenth century, but they have the interest of old association and are getting rapidly scarcer.
An amusing reference to tent bedsteads which could readily be taken to pieces and transported with the higgage when visits were paid by important people to houses at a distance is to be found in a letter written in 1779 by Dr. Thomas Eyre to Lord Herbert (after-wards Earl of Pembroke) who was in Vienna. It describes the visit of the King and Queen to Wilton House.
To accommodate their majesties with a good bed,” he writes,  I made interest with Mr. Skill, Mr. Beck-ford’s steward, to lend us his superb state bed, which was brought to Wilton, slung on the carriage of a wagon, without the least damage, at no small ex-pense ; but what signifies money when we want to entertain the princes of the land ; . . . when we had bustled our hearts out of a week before the time, lo and behold, when they arrived they brought a snug double tent bed, had it put up in the Colonade room where the state bed was already placed, in a crack, (sic) and slept, for anything I know to the contrary,
extremely quiet and well directly under Lord and Lady Pembroke’s and your honour’s picture by Sir Joshua Reynolds.”
A very careful description is given of a field-bed in Thomas Sheraton’s ” Cabinet Dictionary ” (1803), in which its connection with the camp bedstead is made clear. The author also gives a drawing which is much more detailed than the one in Heppelwhite’s book and illustrates the exact construction of the bed. Sheraton’s interpretation is a four post bedstead built so that the parts are easily separated and folded up. The posts, rails, and tester laths are each hinged in two or three places and when ail are taken down will pack into a case three feet eight inches long and nfteen inches square. He says in his notes on neld-beds, however, that they  may be considered for domestic use, and suit for low rooms, either for servants or children to sleep upon ; and they receive this name on account of their being similar in size and shape to those really used in camps.” N0 doubt the name ” field-bed  was applied indiscriminately for long after Sheraton’s time to indicate tent-beds of ail sorts, even though they may not have been made to fold up.
The press-bed referred to in the foregoing advertise-ment was simply the eighteenth-century interpretation of that very unsatisfactory arrangement by which a bed folds up to look like a wardrobe in the daytime. Heppelwhite gives no drawing of them, explaining the omission by saying : ” Of these we have purposely omitted to give any designs, their generai appearance varying so little from Wardrobes, which piece of furniture they are intended to represent, that designs
for them are not necessary.” Attention is called to the engraving of a wardrobe in the book which is described as having ” ail the appearance of a Press-Bed ; in which case the Upper drawers would be only sham, and form part of the door which may be made to turn up all in one piece, and form a tester, or may open in the middle and swing on each side ; the under drawer is useful to hold parts of the bed furniture ; may be 5 feet 6 inches high and 4 feet
long.”
Georgian furniture of the merely useful type was made in considerable quantities in the American colonies and has distinct character, mostly arising, however, from lack of means to interpret very correctly the features of English styles already developed, or from no particular desire being shewn to do more than adapt the main lines of the designs in the construction of articles of Utility. There are chairs made in America on the Windsor chair principle, and the American development of the rocker from the ladder back English and Dutch chairs is an interesting phase of the history of furniture.
Plenty of furniture was exported, but apparently for private individuals. The shipping records shew instances, but they are the barest possible notes, and are very rarely illuminating.
the omission by saying : ” Of these we have purposely omitted to give any designs, their generai appearance varying so little from Wardrobes, which piece of furniture they are intended to represent, that designs for them are not necessary.” Attention is called to the engraving of a wardrobe in the book which is described as having g ail the appearance of a Press-Bed ; in which case the upper drawers would be only sham, and form part of the door which may be made to turn up all in one piece, and form a tester, or may open in the middle and swing on each side ; the under drawer is useful to hold parts of the bed furniture ; may be 5 feet 6 inches high and 4 feet long.”
Georgian furniture of the merely useful type was made in considerable quantities in the American colonies and has distinct character, mostly arising, however, from lack of means to interpret very correctly the features of English styles already developed, or from no particular desire being shewn to do more than adapt the main lines of the designs in the construction of articles of utility. There are chairs made in America on the Windsor chair principle, and the American development of the rocker from the ladder back English and Dutch chairs is an interesting phase of the history of furniture.
Plenty of furniture was exported, but apparently for private individuals. The shipping records shew in-stances, but they are the barest possible notes, and are very rarely illuminating. From the V Liverpool Trade List” for 1798 one sees at a glance tliat woven and printed goods were the principal exports to the lately formed United States.   Thousands of yards of dimity, Irish linen, checked linen, printed calico, muslin, blankets, gingham, quilting and other materials for household purposes used to go out every week, but the furniture which would be an indispensable corollary of ail these fabrics must in the main have been con-structed in America, where wood was plentiful and cheap, for it only occasionally figures in the returns. To Jamaica, for instance, on one occasion, ” cabinet ware of the value of 50 ” was sent, to Virginia10 worth, to Maryland 80, to South Carolina 50, and Martinique 27.   Sometimes this is given as ” household furniture I and only in the cases of clocks, watches, and looking-glasses are the items separately enum-erated.   To Martinique by one boat from Liverpool in 1798 went forty-eight looking-glasses, to Jamaica two pier glasses, and to Tortola on one occasion six dozen time-glasses.   It is interesting to note in these lists of exports constantly recurring items such as I 20 carnage guns, 30 swivels, 4 carronades, 50 sword blades, 174 fowling pieces, and 14 pairs of pistols,M going for the most part to the Southern States, where Royalist sympathies in the War of Independence were strongest.
Windsor chairs are among these humble pieces of furniture of mere utility, and have been considered sufhciently interesting to justify a chapter to them-selves. But there are dressing tables, small corner washstands, with holes to take basin and dishes, little cupboards, sometimes inlaid with stringing or band appreciate to some extent. The small collector to whom the search for old things is as interesting as possession will still find local types if he applies himself with patience and assiduity in parts of the country which remained longest in rural simplicity after the Coming of the railway.  Parts of Yorkshire, Derbyshire, Lancashire, Wales and East Anglia, are still not denuded of old furniture, though the finest pieces have in most cases already found their way into big private collections.   There is a kind of round table with three legs used in farmhouses and cottages all over England which sometimes shows features of unusual interest. It may be made of ash or oak and is known in the home cou nties as a ” cricket ” table, some say because of the three legs suggesting the three stumps of the wicket. This is a very doubt reason for the name, and the writer has seen little wooden fireside stools in Derby-sbire, localy termed crickets, which had four legs and so met i mes only two ends connected by a tenoned rail somewhat after the fashion of Jacobean joined stools. So me ti mes these three-legged tables are connected by an underframing  shaped fashion im-mediately beneath the circular top, and many of them have no lower rails whatever and no arrangement for letting. They are simply tables made on the prindple of three-legged stools, are usually ex-ceedingly strong and very suitable for inclusion in the rurnisbing of a country cottage.  The legs are mostly square and tapering from top to bottom, splaying out to give stability. Some of these tables are more nearly related to the seventeenth-century gate-leg variety, though they have no gate. One picturesque form has a circular top which turns on a central pivot to permit of three flaps falling down, thus Converting the shape of the top into a triangle at will. There are lower rails to this table and the legs are often very neatly turned.
The country-made dresser is an attractive piece of furniture to the collector of modest means.  Nearly always the backing to the upper part has been added though the shelves may be original.  A quaint reference to the eighteenth Century dresser is found in the 1744 edition of Thomas Tusser’s  Five Hundred Points of Husbandry,” where, in commenting upon the author’s conclusions on hair being found in the cheese, the Editor says :   ” Wenches when they can get a Looking Glass, will be running into Places where they are least suspected and be combing and tricking themselves up ; and therefore it is not without reason, some neat House wifes cannot endure a Looking Glass to hang over a Dresser.”   This clearly pictures the old dresser as a necessary piece of household furniture at which domestic work was done, the shelves being used as convenient places on which to stand pots and pans needed while operations were in progress.  The dresser was not used principally in the eighteenth Century as a sideboard, and whatever decorative character the upper shelves had must have come from the pride of neat arrangement exhibited by house mistresses who liked to have the crockery with which they worked clean, tidy, and handy on hooks. An eighteenth-century dresser will have come from a kitchen, not from a parlour, which as we have seen was furnished with side tables and sideboards.

ANTIQUE 18TH CENTURY FURNITURE CABINET MAKERS AND ANTIQUE CABBET MAKERS AND FURNITURE BOOKS AND DRAWINGS

There are several references to painted furniture at Strawberry Hill which must, however, have met with the approval of the owner. In the inventory one reads of Welsh armed chairs, painted blue and white “… ” chairs, settees, and long stools on black and gold frames ” . . . ” chairs of Aubusson tapestry, the frames green and gold ” . . . ” six elbow chairs with white and gold frames,” and so on.
Many books were published about this time with the object of giving instructions for lacquering, and it may be mentioned that the craft is described also as ” vernishing ” and japanning. But the recrudescence of enterest in a pleasant and agreeable occupation for ladies had little in common with the painted furniture like that at Strawberry Hill, which was a distinct development of classic taste inaugurated by the Adam brothers.
In the main, collectors will find that the most useful point to remember in distinguishing this work is the character of the ornament, which was not Oriental but distinctly Western. Robert Adam brought from abroad Italian artists to paint the interior decorations of his buildings and to decorate the furniture he designed. The best known of these artists were Angelica Kaufrmann, Cipriani, Columbani, Zuchhi, and Pergolesi. A familiar form in which they exercised their most delightful art was in the decoration of painted plaques where classical figure subjects, groups of cupids, and pastoral scenes gave an intimate touch which had not hitherto been seen in furniture. Such medallions are usually oval or round and are seen on semi-circular satinwood commodes and cabinets designed by the Adam brothers or their imitators. Perhaps the finest existing specimen of this class of work is in the Victoria and Albert Museum. It is a toilet table of beautiful proportions designed by Sheraton and painted by Angelica Kaufrmann.
It is very unlikely, however, that the collector will find an unknown piece of this class of work, for it was not executed in the ordinary way of business, but specially commissioned for wealthy patrons. What is far more likely is that chairs, settees, Pembroke tables, card tables, bookcases, toilet glasses, bureaux and other pieces of furniture of the Heppelwhite or Sheraton school will be found here and probably in a damaged condition painted by journeymen in response to the fashion created by the brothers Adam and their Italian assistants. But the designs in all probability will not reflect the Italian taste of the day as much as the French, and instead of the figure plaques it will be found that the decoration consists more frequently of prettily executed wreaths of roses, festoons, twisted ribbon work, baskets of flowers, and attenuated acanthus ornament.
I Satinwood was the favourite material for pieces of furniture so decorated, but in many cases the wood does not show at all, being enamelled white all over, the painted decoration being applied over that. Coverings to chairs and settees of this kind were also painted, and those who have an opportunity of securing an example in which time and ill treatment have not destroyed the delicacy of the work may congratulate themselves on a very lucky find. Frequent cases are to be met with where a chair or settee, formerly enamelled and painted, has been cleaned entirely of its decoration, and renovated as a plain piece of furniture. Although this is, of course, regrettable, it is difficult to see what can be done with badly chipped enamel and half obliterated painted detail. They simply make the piece look a wreck, and no amount of restoration will ever bring it back to its original condition.
One must expect, however, ail old painted furniture to show signs of wear. It should also look mellow and soft. There should be no sharp edges and crudely contrasting colours. If the satinwood shows, there should be a distinct relationship between pattern and
background, difficult to describe but easily recognised after a few pieces have been examined. The patina should run right over the surface and the ornamentation
should suggest a sunken appearance. Old wood, particularly mahogany and satinwood, looks dull but transparent and deep in quality, like water in the shadows of a rocky pool. It was Sheraton whose painted furniture was executed with the satinwood shewing as a background, but Pergolesi resorted principally to treating the whole surface with enamel first.
In a chapter on English painted furniture reference should be made to the inventors of the varnish known as Vernis-Martin,” the most celebrated preparation of the eighteenth century for the execution of this class of work. It was a French discovery, and was known before 1730 when Simon Etienne Martin obtained from the French Government a monopoly of its use for twenty years. About 1750 there were several factories in Paris turning out Vernis-Martin. After that time the designs, which had at first followed Oriental models, became more purely French, and as English designers at this time were so largely influenced by Louis XV. decoration, it was natural that painted furniture should reflect the common source of inspiration.
Vernis-Martin, indeed, was a method which had its imitators ail over Europe. The King of Prussia had one of the Martin family to work for him, and an immense amount of work was done for Versailles, particularly in the redecoration of the apartments of the Dauphin. Madame de Pompadour was also a considerable employer of the factories of the Martin family, paying in one year (1752) as much as 58,000 livres for work done.   Much English painted furniture
recalls far more vividly this extraordinarily popular French taste than the purely classical work of the brothers Adam and their Italian assistants, which had very little floral detail, being composed mostly of vases, husk swags, the anthemion, and attenuated scroll work after the manner of Pompeian decoration. It had its base on architecture, whereas the designs of Martin and his English imitators were evolved from a fanciful treatment of flowers and foliage.
It is evident that the interest of painted furniture depends entirely upon the quality of its execution. Painted furniture has no particular value as such, for after all it was a very easy Substitute for carving, and could be rapidly executed in a slipshod manner by a comparative novice. To some extent this is a safe-guard to the collector, for poor painted furniture by which no particular store was set in the first instance has had no chance to live. Most of that which comes into the auction room now is well preserved and worth buying.
On the other hand what was easy to the professional or amateur in the third quarter of the eighteenth Century is equally easy to the faker of to-day, who does not scruple to take a Sheraton or Heppelwhite chair or table and transform its appearance by lavish brush work. The only reliable way of detecting such frauds is by cultivating a close acquaintance with genuine specimens which will reveal subtle qualities of grace and dexterity never to be seen in new work.
Late Heppelwhite and Sheraton sideboards, chairs, settees, and tables decorated with painted enrichment will be the most likely articles to come the way of the collector in out-of-the-way places. Heppelwhite’s productions or those of the many cabinet-makers working from about 1785 to the end of the century were specially designed and ornamented in response to the fashion. a Miss Constance Simon refers in her book on ” English Furniture Designers of the Eighteenth Century ” to the following recipe culled from Knight’s Penny Cyclopaedia, which may well have described the simple means taken for painting furniture at this period. I A good deal of common wood painting is called japanning which differs from the more ordinary painters’ work, by using turps instead of oil to mix the colours with, bedsteads, wash-handstands, bedroom chairs and similar articles of furniture are done in this way.” The ground upon which the designs were painted was principally black or white, the details being put in afterwards in gold or colours. Heppel-white furniture was frequently used in Adam houses, and it is very likely that in some instances the Italian artists employed by architects were resorted to for the decoration of cabinet-makers’ productions turned out in the ordinary course of business.
The practice commenced by the Adam brothers of painting furniture to tone with the decoration of rooms was followed by their less famous contemporaries in cases where the work was commissioned for
special purposes. The Heppelwhites themselves make the following reference to this branch of their business: ” For chairs a new and very elegant fashion has arisen within these few years of finishing them with painted or japanned work, which gives a hch and splendid appearance to the minute parts of the ornaments which are generally thrown in by the painter.” White woods of quality very inferior to satinwood were often used for this treatment, but on the other hand there are mahogany pieces in existence which were so treated.
Three-back and four-back settees were often black japanned and decorated with gold, and as the fashion for this class of work lasted for a generation many pieces will be found reminiscent of the debased Sheraton work, tinged by Empire, which developed itself at the beginning of the nineteenth century. Some fine examples of Sheraton chairs, dated about 1800, are in the Victoria and Albert Museum.   They indicate very clearly this tendency towards the Empire style, but are not as yet debased.   Made of beech, they are painted and gilt, have the delicate open backs of the period, and cane seats, one of them having an oval cane panel in the back.   A feature typical of many late eighteenth century lacquered and painted chairs  and settees  are  the  round legs curved and splaying out at the bottom.   These legs are ringed in places and are often seen with touches of gold on their black japanned surfaces suggesting the coachmakers’ work.   The best period of English painted furniture is
from 1770 to 1780, but by far the greater number of examples which come the way of the collector will have been made after 1790, when Heppelwhite’s and Sheraton’s books had been published, and the work of the brothers Adam had time to influence not only fashionable furnishing but the work of ordinary cabinet-makers and upholsterers |throughout the country.
A photograph is given of a beautiful knife box of painted satinwood, an example whose vase-like form should be recollected by the collector, for plain specimens are occasionally to be met with. As a rule, however, these satinwood boxes, which flanked late eighteenth century sideboards, have a sloping hinged lid and moulded front. They are often veneered on oak. Examination of the painted detail on this box will shew the ribbons, roses, swags of drapery, and pictorial plaques characteristic of the style.
As time goes on it may appreciate a little in value if the present interest in old furniture persists, but it can never compete with the fine specimens which at the date of their making were exceptional.   Eighteenth-century chairs, perfectly genuine, are to be bought quite easily every day at comparatively small prices. Oak and mahogany tables, chests of drawers, long case clocks, bureaux, bookcases, secretaires, dressers, corner cupboards, settles, settees and sofas, they are ail to be had in the simple forms ordinary household furnishing of the Georgian era.  They are worth buying because they have old associations and are pleasant and comfortable in use. In the eighteenth Century such furniture was made for middle-class houses by the cabinet-maker in the ordinary way of business.  It was not thought in its day of more exceptional interest than we should think the commercial products of the modern furniture shop.   It had qualifies which were appreciated, the principal one   undoubtedly  being   its  soundness   of   construction, for people bought their possessions then with a view to durability, and makers had not yet learnt all those clever ways of producing the cheap and shoddy which have resulted in so much showy furniture of our own time.   Advertisements of sales of household effects in the eighteenth Century help to give a picture of the kind of furniture.
‘ All the genuine Household Furniture, comprising bedsteads with marine and other furniture, fine goose feather beds, blankets, etc., mahogany wardrobes, chest of drawers, ditto dressing tables, mahogany press, bedsteads with green check furniture ; mahogany escritoire ; ditto writing table with drawers ; ditto dining and Pembroke tables ;   library table with steps ; mahogany and other chairs ; pier glasses and girondoles, in carved and gilt frames ; a neat sofa ; an exceeding good eight day clock ; Wilton and other carpets ; register and bath Stoves ; kitchen range ; smoke-jack and other useful kitchen furniture ; two large brewing coppers, exceeding good brewing Utensils, and other effects.”

HEPPELWHITE FURNITURE. HEPPELWHITE CHAIRS, TABLES, BOOK-SHELVES, CABINETS, CUPBOARDS, SIDEBOARD and BEDS

Line is the principal characteristic of later eighteenth-century furniture to which the name of Heppelwhite is given. The style suggests a pleasant compromise between the virility of Chippendale and the formal reticence of Sheraton. Heppelwhite furniture indicates no violent change. It would seem as though the strongest conviction of the designer had been that dogmatic views were on the whole undesirable and that a medium course was the best to steer in catering for a fickle public.
Heppelwhite furniture has the quiet charm of reticence, and never fills one with astonishment. An exceptional piece of carving by Grinling Gibbons is in itself a very remarkable achievement of craftsmanship. It is a tour de force. The same may be said of the more elaborate pieces by Chippendale and Sheraton, and the French schools of the eighteenth Century are renowned for masterpieces of surprising workmanship. But Heppelwhite catered, it would seem, for a more middle-class public than Chippendale, and he was more of a tactful tradesman than Sheraton. He desired to conduct a prosperous cabinet-making business for a
good and apparentry succeeded in doing so.
His furniture reflects this in some subUe way. There is no gorgeousness about it. There is no suggestion that be was patronised by the extremely wealthy. Even the finest examples of Heppelwhite s furniture are models of grace rather than grandeur.
A. Heppelwhite & Co. published a book in the 1788 which is commonly taken as illustrating the principal characteristics of Heppelwhite furniture. But, we found with Chippendale, the year of publication did not exemplify the best period. George Heppelwhite, the founder of the business, had been dead two years when the ” Cabinet Maker and Upholsterer’t Guide,” as it was called, came out. Miss Constance Simons researches at Somerset House revealed the administration of the goods and chattels of George Heppelwhite of the Parish of St. Giles, Cripplegate, London, to have been granted on the 27th June, and that afterwards the widow of the cabinet-maker carried on the business under the style of A. Heppelwhite & Co.
As an advertisement for the firm, the “Guide” was brought out later on, and it certainly had a great sale.   It was bought largely by the trade even more largely than Chippendale’s bookand this accounts in great measure for the enormous amount of Heppelwhite furniture produced ail over the country.  It should be remembered that the craft was still a tradi-tional one.   Cabinet-makers learnt their trade at the bench and not from books, though other publications about furniture had been brought out notably those of Ince and Mayhew (1762), Robert Manwaring (1765), Matthias Lock and H. Copland (176S), and John
Crunden  (1770).   Sheraton’s book,   The Cabinet Maker’s and Upholsterer’s Drawing Book’ did not appear until 1791. But these publications, as far as technical instruction goes, are almost childishly inadequate. In the sense in which we understand the term they give scarcely any detailed information. It is, indeed, very instructive to note the complete confidence which Chippendale has in the intelligence of the joiner and cabinet-maker who may be disposed to copy his designs. There is nothing elementary about the directions. The workman is supposed to be able to set out the job from a sketch and two or three main dimensions. N0 doubt a skilled cabinet-maker could do the same to-day, but he would have had, probably, the advan-tage of considerable technical instruction, and access to hosts of elementary works on carpentry and joinery.
In the eighteenth century books on the simpler operations of cabinet-making were almost unknown, though a large number of books on architecture and building were published. The apprentice learnt from his master, who used the quality known as ” nous”  in adapting designs from publications such as those of Chippendale and Heppelwhite. He had to think for himself very largely. He was not spoon-fed but had to contrive his own methods of interpretation.
Sheraton, who is more particular about detailed instructions than many writers, simply says in reference to an elaborate bed in his book : ” The manu-facturing part may easily be understood by any workman.” Many joiners and cabinet-makers of the time must have had very slight acquaintance with printed matter and may have been in some cases. Popular journalism as we understand it to-day was non-existent. The craftsman trusted to his observation and the skill of his hand rather than to printed instructions, and it is to this method of going to work that we owe the interesting character of English furniture made in different parts of the country.
There are scores of little tricks and dodges in the craft of cabinet-making which are taught at the bench, yet even to-day have scarcely figured at ail in text books. The writer had an opportunity at one time of going over the tool chest of an old cabinet-maker who had inherited the implements of his trade from his father, who must have been at work in the late eighteenth century. Some of the tools were inexplicable, and their use could only be guessed at. Many of them were obviously self made, probably for special occasions, so that Heppelwhite furniture, in common with that of his contemporaries, was not mechanicaly reproduced by cabinet-makers who had access to the designs in the book. It was copied and adapted, skilfully or unskilfully, according to the ability and circumstances of the worker. Heppelwhite’s book was a good guide to fashion in furniture. It showed what style of work was being done in London, and opened the eyes of the country craftsman to novelties.
Fashion had changed considerably since the issue of Chippendale’s ” Director.” In France the frivolity of Louis Quinze had developed into the comparative soberness of Louis Seize.   English furniture-makers still looked to the French for leadership in artistic taste, and Heppelwhite followed the fashion like every-one interested in the arts. The brothers Adam  were still very influential and George Heppelwhite was employed by them. Indeed, he must have owed much to their direction in design. Some pieces of furniture of the Heppelwhite school have almost more Adam than Heppelwhite about them. In his rendering of the late French Renaissance, Heppelwhite seems to have been more English than Chippendale, possibly because his work had to be carried out at a reasonable cost, a condition of things Chippendale did not always have to put up with. There was a gentle graciousness about Heppelwhite’s furniture which was never achieved by French work of the same period. In this softness of expression he undoubtedly surpassed the brothers Adam, who were inclined to stifmess and angularity.
As in the case of Chippendale, collectors will be wise to regard the name of Heppelwhite as merely a convenient label on style.   They will in ail probability never discover a piece of furniture which can be cer-tainly identified as having been made by Heppelwhite himself, or even turned out of the Workshops of Heppelwhite & Co.   The greater part of the furniture which can fairly enough be ascribed to this successful designer was made subsequent to the publication of the ” Guide’ and as Sheraton published his book so soon afterwards, the influence of the two great makers was experienced together  in   many  a Workshop.   The   ” Guide ” indicated the character of George Heppelwhite’s furniture as translate into a fashionable development, and is not exactly a reflection of that which he made
long before the Company came into existence.
To start with the chair, which will reveal more of significance to the average observer than many other pieces, the principal feature is the form of the back, usually shield shape. It is possible that Heppelwhite himself turned out in the aggregate more chair-backs of other forais than the shield, but the latter was popular and was recognised then and now as on the whole the best thing he did in this direction.
The finest shield shape backs represent a type. They are pure Heppelwhite, and are one of the most important contributions made to the story of eighteenth Century English furniture. No doubt they were evolved, but the steps of the evolution are not apparent. In some cases it is possible to see the influence of Chippendale in early Heppelwhite work, but the pure shield-back chair eludes anything but the most imaginative connection with the former style. It is carved and nearly always in mahogany, but unlike Chippen-dale chairs, the carved ornament is applied for the most part within the outline of the structure. It does not flow out to vary the boundary line. The shield is uninterrupted all the way round, the grooves or boundary beading being nearly always continuous. Reference to the Chippendale chairs should make this point clear.
It will be seen that in these two examples the crest rails have their carved decoration clothing the form on the outside and thus varying the outline.   But the Heppelwhite chairs show these shield-shaped and oval backs in a continuons uninterrupted sweep. Occasionally an instance will be found in which a Heppelwhite chair has a small carved rosette or knot on each side of the trame of the back, from which a detail of festooned drapery will be sus-pended, but in the majority of cases such details will be found only with in the shield or oval.
Sheraton also used the shield shape, but his rendering of it gave a short horizontal line on the crest rail. Tins feature is never seen in a Heppelwhite chair with shield back, the outline of the top being always bow-shaped. Reference to the examples illustrated will reveal another characteristic feature. The two supports of the back run down in a gentle wave and dis-appear behind the seat to join the legs. Sometimes a tiny scroll is seen on the outer side at the junction with the shield frame. In most Sheraton chairs the curve of the support will be stopped well above the seat level, the continuation down being square and plinth like. From this square shaping in Sheraton work a rail frequently passed across to strengthen the frame. Heppelwhite did without this extra rail. His back supports combined with the sinuous arms make a piece of constructive framework which for strength has never been surpassed.
It is due to the f act that Heppelwhite’s work and that of Sheraton have so much in common that frequent comparison between the two must be made. Some examples of late eighteenth-century cabinet-making, indeed, are so constructed as to defy ail attempts at authentication. They may partake of the characteristics of both Heppelwhite and Sheraton. As a general rule such pieces are not so valuable as those which express purity of style, but they are often
extremely interesting.
Heppelwhite’s arm work was superior to that of Sheraton in contour, and its approach to the front part of the chair. There is a better realisation, too, of the value of concave surfaces arranged to be complementary to one another in the construction of the back and arms. A Heppelwhite back is often concave, but not always. The arms sweep out laterally and the elbow dips toward the seat before it reaches a point immediately above the front legs. Sheraton’s chairs give a sense of more sympathetic relationship between front legs and arms. Heppelwhite’s establish a more convincing connection between arms and back. The front legs of Sheraton’s arm-chairs may be looked upon roughly as vertical posts, running up well above the seat level to the elbow. Heppelwhite front legs stopped at the seat, at which point the arms sometimes joined them. In the case of the shield-shaped back shown, the lower sweep of the arms joins the seat frame well back from the front legs.
The serpentine line is typical of a great deal of cabinet-making by the Heppelwhite school. It is found in side tables, sideboards, chests of drawers, Pembroke tables, bed testers, wardrobes, chairs, and many other pieces of furniture. The chair with oval back shows it in the shape of the front rail, and the one with shield back at page 210 is also slightly  serpentine.   Ail  fashionable chair-making from about 1760 began to show more spring and liveliness than it had done hitherto.   There was less weight
and a better sense of the value of spread about the legs, which were placed so as to obtain a stability which would otherwise have to be obtained by stoutness of material. Heppelwhite chairs more certainly than those of Sheraton touched the point of perfection between lightness of appearance and constructive rigidity. It is quite possible for chairs to be strong enough for their purpose but to look weak. This is a fault in design more frequently seen in Sheraton than in Heppelwhite.
In decoration the furniture under consideration illustrated the employment of more varied methods than that of Chippendale. It was carved, inlaid, painted, or lacquered. But there was rarely a case in which the opportunity for elaborate enrichment was abused. Familiar carved details are the Prince of Wales’ feathers, wheat ear, wheel form, ribbon and bow, and anthemion, with festoons of conventionalised drapery suspended from rosettes.
Sometimes chair-backs were filled within the en-circling frame by designs having little suggestion of the old-time plain or pierced splat, and on the whole such examples are more characteristic of pure Heppelwhite. The splat, however, as seen in Queen Anne furniture and in elaborated form that of Chippendale, was used to suggest a vertical centre ornament. Classical details reminding one of Adam enrichment were employed, the pendant row of husks, the vase, and the lyre being instances. The last mentioned, indeed, was probably in the first instance an idea suggested by Adam.
Collectors may find Heppelwhite chairs with padded or upholstered backs probably oval or shield-shaped, They were called cabriole chairs. Accompanying the padding in the back is a small arm pad and to correspond the seat will be upholstered. The drop-in seat is not a characteristic of Heppelwhite.
Upholstered chairs were commoner after 1750 than is often supposed.  But as the Covers wore out and exposed the stuffing they became relegated to inferior rooms in the house and subsequently broken up. Caricatures of social life at the time frequently show these stuffed chairs and they suggest Heppelwhite more than any other maker.  Skirts of ladies’ dresses were ample, so the arms of chairs were well thrown out, and their supports curved backward.   It is a curious thing that the ” Guide  gives no illustration of what we regard as a very typical Heppelwhite chairthe wheel back, a design which was also found in settees. A curious caricature by Collings  of  1786, called ” The Disinherited Heir,” shows the wheel back in use, though the draughtsmanshipfrom the point of view of a designer of furniture exceedingly poor.
Attention should be paid to the feet of chairs. The thimble shape is seen and also the spade or ” term.” On the whole, Heppelwhite did more with the feet than Sheraton, sometimes carving them with leaf forms.   Fluting with carved husks diminishing in size downward is often to be found on the legs.   In plain examples there will be stretcher work Connecting
the legs, as in the chair at page 210. Round, fluted, or grooved legs are common, also square ones, delievered by beading and finishing at the bottom without feet.
At the close of the eighteenth Century the number of pieces of furniture in use in ordinary houses had increased enormously. Heppelwhite’s list in his book comprises no fewer than three hundred different designs on a hundred and twenty-six plates. Such a work must have been invaluable to the country cabinet-maker. But of course these plates do not correspond in number to the pieces of furniture. Many designs were given for each piece. An analysis of the plates reveals, however, over forty different articles which might well have been used in furnishing a house.
The Heppelwhite sideboard included very often a cellaret on one side and a drawer on the other, thus Coming nearer to the sideboard which reached its completed but debased form in the middle of the nineteenth Century.   Heppelwhite Sheraton too also included a small secret cupboard at one end of the sideboard at the back of the drawer, which was con-sequently made shorter.   It will be found that the front line of the sideboard is often serpentine.  The cupboards are never convex on plan, always concave, and there is usually a drawer between them. Side tables without drawer or cupboard accommodation continued to be made with pedestal cupboards to stand at each and surmounted by knife boxes. These side tables are straight fronted and suggests in their carved detail the Adam influence.  Heppelwhite makes no distinction in his book between the fitted piece of furniture and the simple table, calli both of them sideboards.   The right-hand drawer, if there was one, was fitted with partitions for nine bottles behind which was a place for cloths or napkins.  In the left-hand drawer were two divisions, the back on lined with green cloth to hold plate under a Cover the front one lined with lead for holding water to was glasses.   It is explained in the ” Guide ” that ” must be a valve cock or plug at the bottom, to let o the dirty water ; and also in the other drawer, to change the water necessary to keep the wine, etc., cool ; or they may be made to take out.”
Heppelwhite gives a rule as to the dimensions oi sideboards, saying that the generai custom was to make them from five and a half to seven feet long, three feet high and from twenty-eight to thirty-two inches wide. He also says that they were often made to fit into recesses, so that in cases where the collector comes across a sideboard of uncommon proportions it may indicate a special commission and possibly special features introduced.
The pedestals which, as already noted, stood flanking the united sideboards, were provided with racks and a stand for a heater, so that plates might be kept warm in the dining-room. Knife cases were made by Heppelwhite, but collectors may discover that the inside cuttings are different” from those shown in the photograph, for the vase was frequently used for water to keep the butter cool or for ice. Japanned copper was found a convenient material for making vases for holding water.
Under the sideboard was placed the cellaret, made of mahogany and hooped with lacquered brass hoops, the inner part being divided into partitions and lined with lead for bottles. Common shapes were circular or octagonal in plan and standing on four legs slightly splayed out. They had handles at the sides and a lid. Knife cases with serpentine fronts and sloping lids are frequently to be found in second-hand dealers shops ; but their value depends entirely upon the quality of the wood used and the execution of the inlaid or painted decoration, for they are not in them-selves rarities.
The bureau bookcase, or, as Heppelwhite calls it, the desk bookcase, was a piece of furniture very popular with the country cabinet-maker. It was straight-forward in design and presented few dfficulties of execution. It had no curved surfaces, and the lower part, although demanding neatness and skill in its making, could be treated in the traditional way.
It was rather different with the secretary and bookcase, the lower part of which was made to look like a shest of drawers when closed. It was more complicated and must have been new to many cabinet- makers. Collectors will find examples of the secretary bookcase rarer than the bureau bookcase.   It was not, of course, peculiar to Heppelwhite, for Sheraton made many examples, and those he gives in his book, although more elaborate in appearance than those of the ” Guide,” must have tempted many a cabinet-maker to copy them.
The feet of such pieces as chests of drawers, ward-robes, and bookcases were mostly made by Heppelwhite square with bracketed ogee shaping. Sometimes there was a wave sweep between them and the feet were splayed out. A pair of cupboard doors sometimes took the place of the drawers in the lower part.
Other examples in the ” Guide ” which were largely copied were the wardrobe, and single and double chests of drawers.  The former had two long drawers and two short ones below, and a cupboard above with sliding shelves.  Probably no piece of furniture so simple and suitable for its purpose was ever invented, and even to-day, with the competition from the modem hanging wardrobe fitted with dress suspenders and hooks, it holds its own uncommonly well.  Chests of drawers followed the form adopted by ail makers towards the close of the eighteenth century.   They were either single or double, the latter usually being about six feet high and known to us as tall-boys or high-boys.
Frequently in country sale rooms one can find those delightfully fitted dressing tables which close up by means of folding doors on the top. They were made both by Sheraton and Heppelwhite, but most of those
which are of the plain utilitarian order originated from the ” Guide.” The various partitions into which the well under the folding lids was divided were in-tended for combs, powders, essences, patches, pins, and other articles for the toilet. The glass, which is also fitted into the well, in front and is supported by a foot fixed in the back. These dainty bits of furniture are not particularly rare and their value depends entirely upon their condition, and the character of their decoration, if they have any. Inferior wood was often employed in their make, but mahogany was common enough.
Perhaps the most comprehensive article of this and attributed to Heppelwhite was what was known as Rudd’s Table. Heppelwhite says : ” This is the most complete dressing table made, possessing every convenience which can be wanted, or mechanism, or ingenuity supply. It derives its name from a once popular character for whom it is reported it was once invented.” Rudd’s table is one with three drawers side by side in front, the middle one of which slips in and out in the ordinary way. The two side ones slip out and swing to right and left on pins. They contain mirrors on frames which turn up on metal quadrants. Ail the drawers are most elaborately fitted and there is a slide covered in green cloth for writing.
Most of these mechanically perfect little pieces look when closed like nicely made boxes on stands, but some of them appear like chests of drawers. Heppelwhite made a number of these and called them dressing drawers.   The principle of construction in ail of them was much the same, the fitted part being in the recess
behind the top drawer, which either ran on a slide or was exposed from above by opening a folding lid.
In his settees Heppelwhite reached almost as great a success as in his chairs. Wheel back settees, made of satinwood and painted, are very scarce and realise if in good condition big prices at auction. In the ” Guide g the settee is spoken of as a sofa, and the dimensions given show them to have been rather long. The author says : I The following is the proportion in general use : length between six and seven feet, depth about thirty inches, height of the seat frame fourteen inches : total height in the back three feet one inch.” Five examples of fully upholstered settees are give in the ” Guide,” but only one with a bar or banister back. This last example is what we should call a four-chair back settee. In design it is obviously adapted from a row of four shield-backed chairs, and is very characteristic of the maker.
Heppelwhite settees have the crest rail in the form of a wave which gently flows into the arms at each end. The fully upholstered ones have in some cases no wood showing on back and seat, but in others a neatly moulded frame is visible ail round. The legs are often round and straight, though the French cabriole was sometimes used.
In acknowledging his indebtedness to the French I for the idea of the ” confidante,” a kind of settee with single chair seats fitted at the ends, the English cabinet-maker says :  ” This piece of furniture is of French origin, and is in pretty general request for large and spacious suites of apartments.  An elegant drawing-room with modem furniture is scarce complete with-out a confidante ; the extent of which may be about nine feet, subject to the same regulations as sofas. This piece of furniture is sometimes so constructed that the ends take away and leave a regular sofa ; the ends may be used as Barjier (sic) chairs’
Another piece of furniture Heppelwhite adapted from Louis XV. sources was the ” duchesse.” Two ” Barjier ” chairs with a stool between them form a sort of long couch, the chairs facing one another. Settees of the Heppelwhite type were frequently made with serpentine fronts, the seats finished with cane upon which a loose cushion was used. Inlay was occasionally introduced in tiny ovals or circular panels, but for the most part the characteristic carved flutings comprised the decorative enrichment.
A chair which has been much copied in recent years is the Heppelwhite easy chair with side wings above the scroll arms.  The legs are square in section and finished with spade-shaped feet, straight stretchers being fitted to stiffen the frame.   Heppelwhite refers to these chairs as ” saddle checks ” and says they may be covered with leather, horsehair, or have a linen case to fit over the canvas stuffing.   It is the rarest thing to discover one of these easy chairs with the original covering, certainly not the original horsehair, which wore badly in patches.   But if the chair had formerly a fine needlework covering, and care had been taken of
it, there would be some probability of its still being good.  A Heppelwhite easy chair of this kind is quite a possible find.
Library cases were made of the finest mahogany procurable as a rule. These were commissioned, of course, by well-to-do people and were highly finished, the sash bars being often of metal, gilt, or painted.
Heppelwhite bed pillars are among the most graceful ever made, and simple examples are common enough. They are usually fluted or reeded, the urn shape being frequently used at the greatest thickness. Carved enrichment of wheat ears, the anthemion, husks and leaves is usual, and the long part of the pillar may be relieved by a twisted ribbon. ” Term feet are found on those posts which in use were in-tended to be exposed. In some Heppelwhite beds the lower valance went round the feet of the posts, but in others it simply ran from post to post, leaving the latter fully exposed at the corners, the curtains being looped up high.
The following bits of Heppelwhite furniture may be picked up from time to time in ail sorts of odd places. They were made very largely, being fairly simple in construction, and in price were well within the means of people in moderate circumstances.
Tea Trays.Either inlaid or painted and varnished. Usually oval or scalloped, the ornamentation shewing attenuated acanthus scrolls, ribbons, roses and husk swags.
Tea Caddies.Rather casket-like with feet or plinth bases. Carved, inlaid, or painted. A very simple one often to be met with is the shape of a square prism with hinged lid and divided by a middle partition.
The pole screen frequently figures in prints of interiors representing social life of the late eighteenth century. Embroidery was still a fashion-able occupation, though after the close of the century it began to give way before the mechanical products of the loom. Horace Walpole alludes to various articles at Strawberry Hill decorated by ladies. I In the round Drawing Room :A screen worked in chenille, to suit with the chimney, by the Countess of Ailesbury.”
And again : “A two leafed screen painted on Manchester velvet, with the heads of a Satyr and Bacchante, by Lady Diana Beauclerc, in 1788.”
Hanging Shelves. These have perforated ends, no backs, and are sometimes fitted with little drawers on a scalloped or serpentine front.
Dressing Glasses. Painted or inlaid, with curved supports, and having decoration of vases and swags. Sometimes made of satinwood veneered on oak.
Tambour Writing Tables. Fitted with a sliding shutter to slip down after the manner of a modem roll-top desk.
Shaving Tables and Basin Stands. Both on square plan and standing on tapering legs with term feet. A sliding shutter will sometimes enclose the front. The folding-down mirror is always seen in the shaving interiors and furniture by using the brush of the artist as well as the chisel of the carver. This use of painted decoration on furniture must not be confounded by the collector with lacquering founded on Oriental models, although the latter again became fashionable in the middle of the eighteenth Century owing principally to the influence of Sir William Chambers, who had received many impressions of Chinese work during his travels in the East.   Mr. Percy Macquoid, however, referring in his sumptuous work on English furniture to Sir Horace Walpole’s description of the contents of Strawberry Hill, quotes a letter written to Sir Horace Maun as early as 1743 in which the fashionable craze for amateur japanning is rather severely handled. J ‘ ‘ My table I like, though he has stuck in among the ornaments two vile china jars that look like the modem japanning by ladies.”

SHERATON FURNITURE. SHERATON CABINETS, TABLES, CHAIRS, BUFFETS, DRESSERS, CHESTS OF DRAWERS, BEDS, SOFAS

THE reasons given in previous chapters for confining the   significance of  furniture-makers’ names to the styles in which they worked have even greater force when applied to Thomas Sheraton, the actual examples of whose work in existence are both doubtful and few in number. Sheraton may be fairly described as a successor of Chippendale and Heppelwhite, although he must have been working as a journeyman cabinet-maker when they were alive.  But the date upon which Sheraton came to London is much in dispute.  He was born at Stockton about the year 1750, and as late as 1782 issued from that town A Letter on the Subject of Baptism, followed  by  other publications of a religious character from time to time.   It has been assumed by various writers that he could not well have come under the influence of Chippendale, Heppelwhite, the brothers Adam, and other great designers until he had come to London after 1782.   But it is not certain that this date signifies residence in Stockton-on-Tees up to that time, because he may have been working in 198
London as a cabinet-maker and had his religious tracts
published from his native town.
The interesting dates to collectors are those which give simply the births and deaths of the three great cabinet-makers of their age. Unfortunately the exact dates of birth are unknown in each case. Miss Constance Simon’s researches supply us with the deaths.
THOMAS CHIPPENDALE. Born towards the end of the reign of Queen Anne (1714) ; died 1779.
GEORGE HEPPELWHITE. Born about the beginning of the reign of George IL (1727) ; died 1786.
THOMAS SHERATON.  Born about 1750 ; died 1806.
If we add to these dates the birth and death of Robert Adam (1728-1792), whose influence on furniture was so extended, we can begin to realise how indebted Sheraton must have been to the work of his immediate forerunners.
There is no reliable evidence that Thomas Sheraton in the prime of life was ever a master cabinet-maker like Chippendale and Heppelwhite.   That he was a skilled designer is  apparent by his best-known publication, the Cabinet Maker’s and Upholsterer’s Drawing Book 1 (1793), and that he was also a crafts-man is proved by the extraordinary detail he gives for the construction of the pieces he describes.   It is not the kind of technical instruction we look for to-day in the text book, but it shows close personal acquaintance and experience with tools and the many processes of the craft of the cabinet-maker.
Sheraton was apparently a very clever workman who in early life became sincerely religious.   He appears to have had ambition and considerable enthusiasm, for he did an enormous amount of work.   His   Drawing Book ” alone must have meant years of labour.  But he was no business man, being far more devoted to the theory of cabinet-making than its practical exercise. He succeeded in drawing together a large number of ideas culled from his immediate forerunners and his con-temporaries and welding them into a distinctive style. He was the last of the great furniture designers of the eighteenth century, and towards the end of his life began to feel the decay which set in with the Engish interpretations of Empire feeling.
The principal characteristics of Sheraton furniture are the use of the straight line in design and as perfect a combination of proportion and constructive bulk as Engiish craftsmanship has ever produced. Sheraton chairs, commodes, bookcases, and tables of ail sorts express daintiness and delicacy never reached before his time. The history of Engiish furniture for hundreds of years had been a gradual progress towards refine-ment of execution, the culmination of which came with Sheraton. Purity of outline and economy of material could go no farther.
More than any other designer Sheraton exploited the possibilities of mechanical action, in bureaux, dressing tables, secretaires, and many other pieces of furniture. He did this on the whole without sacrificing simple utility. Whatever comphcated construction he introduced was not in the way of added ornamentation, but more extended convenience.   Most of those bits of furniture one meets with in second-hand dealers’ shops, full of carefully thought out contrivances such as hidden mirrors, sliding screens, drawers, pigeon-holes, little boxes with lids, and so on, are of the Sheraton school. It is true that the bulk of them must have been made by cabinet-makers who were working either at the same time as Sheraton, or who took advantage of the publication of his book to reproduce his ideas for years afterwards. But the old drawing master must be credited with having done more to stimulate the manufacture of such articles than anyone else.
Heppelwhite, the Gillows, Shearer, and other makers used to construct dainty bits of furniture full of cunning fitments, and at page 122 will be seen a dressing table probably of Heppelwhite origin.  But those who go to the trouble of even a cursory glance through Sheraton’s principal book on furniture cannot fail to be Struck with the fact that he was at bottom a mechanic.  The twin arts of geometry and perspective were his forte. He must have known more about them as they applied to constructional woodwork than anyone living at his time, and it appears to the writer that the perfection of proportion of many of his pieces was quite as much the resuit of consummate knowledge of straight lines and angles and their relationships with each other as artistic perception.  A cabinet-maker may decide that a piece of wood is the right length, width, and thickness by instinct.   If it looks right to him then it is right.   But Sheraton seems to have arrived at such decisions through a complete knowledge of theories of proportion and a mastery of technical
draughtsmanship. It may be for this reason that much Sheraton work
leaves us rather cold. It seems so painfully accurate, so without blemish. Where he introduces curves they lack freedom, but it is to his credit that he never put in too many of them, nor did he put them in the wrong place. His decoration was remarkably reticent, considering the possibilities for elaboration which lay in marquetry, carving, and painting, ail sometimes employed together on one painting, ail sometimes employed together on one piece of furniture.
English designers were still looking to France for inspiration, and Sheraton and his contemporaries echoed Louis Seize decoration, more or less, in ail they did. Curvilinear forms after the death of Louis XV. gave place to a return to the straight Une, and inconsequent rococo ornamentation was supplanted by a more orderly treatment of the classic theme. The ” Drawing Book ” of Thomas Sheraton exemplifies this ail through its pages.
It is a very much more important work than any of the others pubHshed in the latter half of the eighteenth Century. It is less of a trade advertisement and has far more scholarship about it than either Chippendale’s ” Director ” or Heppelwhite’s f Guide.” But it is ex-tremely detailed and diffuse. Like the other publications it was very largely subscribed for by the furnishing trade, which no doubt used it for obtaining fresh ideas.
Sheraton took a very high line. He divided the book into three parts, the first concerning itself with geometry, the second with perspective, and the third with furniture. In the preface he feels himself called upon to give a short resume of the works which have preceded his, pointing out their shortcomings pretty plainly.   Of Chippendale’s ” Director ” he says :
” It has given us, it is true, the proportions of the Five Orders, and nes for two or three cases, which is all it pretends to relative to rules for drawing : and as for the odesigns themselves they are now wholly antiquated and laid aside, although possessed of great merit, according to the times in which they were executed.”
Another book, 1 The Cabinet and Chair-Maker’s Real Friend and Companion ” (Robert Manwaring), he charges with containing an assertion which ” exceeds the bounds of modesty and truth,” and for Heppel-white’s ” Guide ” he has obvious contempt. ” Some of the designs/’ he says, I are not without merit, though it is evident that the perspective is, in some instances, erroneous. But notwithstanding the late date of Heppelwhite’s book, if we compare some of the designs, particularly the chairs, with the newest taste, we shall find that this work has already caught the decline, and perhaps, in a little time, will suddenly die in the disorder.”
In those days the value of a knowledge of perspective was much greater than now, when the camera is of so much use to the furnishing trade in conveying a true idea of the appearance of a piece of furniture. Hence the great space which Sheraton devotes to the subject. An important section of the first part of the book is devoted to a consideration of the five Orders of Architecture as the base of classical design. The author even discusses their origin, which he suggests goes back to Solomon’s Temple, the dimension of the pillars of which he gives from Josephus. In parts the book is the quaintest mixture of morality and mechanics. Sheraton seems almost at times to feel that his rules of perspective even need justification by ethical law.
Sheraton’s notes on furnishiing in another book, the ” Cabinet Dictionary I (1803), are particularly interesting to students of old furniture as indicating the fashion of that day.  He says : ” In furnishing a good house for a person of rank, it requires some taste and judgment, that each apartment may have such pieces as is most agreeable to the appropriate use of the room.  And particular regard is to be paid to the quality of those who order a house to be furnished, when such order is left to the judgment of the up-holsterers ; and when any gentleman is so vain and ambitious as to order the furnishing of his house in a style superior to his fortune and rank, it will be prudent in an upholsterer, by some gentle hints, to direct his choice to a more moderate plan.”
This dangerous advice is one among many proofs that Sheraton’s moral scruples far outweighed his business acumen. He goes on to say : ” It is the business of an upholsterer not to recommend anything that would offend the known sentiments of his employer, when virtue and morality are not the question, but mere indifferent opinion.” . . . “But it is to be lamented, that both the pictures and prints of some gentlemen are but too sure indications of their looseness of principle ;  as to virtue and morality,
though these ought to be the principal ornaments of human life, which in no character shines more be-comingly than in the gentleman of rank.
The library,” says Sheraton, ” should be furnished in imitation of the antiques ; and such prints as are hung on the walls ought to be memorials of learning, and portraits of men of science and erudition.”
After a few hints as to the hanging of pictures in the  gallery of paintings,” and ad vice as to the prints of the muses in the music room, he gives particulars of the dining-room furniture. | The dining parlour must be furnished with nothing trifling, or which may seem unnecessary, it being appropriated for the chief repast, and should not be eneumbered with any article that would seem to intrude on the accommo-dation of the guests.
The large sideboard, inclosed or surrounded by Ionic pillars ; the handsome and extensive dining table ; the respectable and substantial looking chairs ; the large face glass ; the family portraits ; the marble fire places ; and the Wilton carpet; are the furniture that should apply to the dining room.”
Sheraton appears so overcome with the grandeur of the drawing-room that he omits to give any details of the furniture. But he is explicit as to the unsuitability of including such incongruous items as books, globes, and pictures ! ” Nothing,” he says, | of a scientific nature should be introduced to take up the attention of any individual, from the general conversation. . . .
Several plates show the proper disposition of furniture and the character of the decoration. The most interesting is that which illustrates the Prince of Wales’s Chinese drawing-room in Carlton House Terrace.   The author does not pretend that it is an exact drawing by any means. It was evidently a formal reception room and had none of that haphazard,
sketchy appearance with which we are familiar in modern drawing-rooms. Such casual treatment was permitted, apparently, only in the breakfast parlour or tea-room. The walls of the Prince’s room are panelled and hung with stretched silk having needlework with Chinese designs in embroidery. All the chairs are placed formally m position near the walls, there are pier tables under huge mirrors, a marble mantelpiece with looking-glass above, some square stools, and a large ottoman.
Some of Sheraton’s own remarks on this room may be quoted : ; The pier table under the glass is richly ornamented in gold. The top is marble and also the shelf at each end ; the back of it is composed of three panels of glass, the Chinese figure sitting on a cushion is metal and painted. The candle branches are gilt metal, the panels painted in the style of the Chinese ; the whole producing a brilliant effect.
The view contains an ottoman, or long seat ; extending the whole width of the room, and returning at each end about five feet. The Chinese columns are on the front of this seat, and mark out its boundaries. The upholstery work is very richly executed in figured satin, with extremely rich borders, all worked to suit the style of the room.”
A most curious arrangement is made for heating, for,  within this ottoman are two grand tripod candie-stands, with heating urns at the top, that the seat may be kept in a proper temperature in cold weather.   On the front of the ottoman before the columns are two censers containing perfumes, by which an agreeable smell may be diffused to every part of the room, preventing that of a contrary nature, which is the consequence of lighting a number of candies.
The carpet is worked in one entire piece, with a border round it, and the whole, in effect, though it may appear extravagant to a vulgar eye, is but suitable to the dignity of the proprietor.”
Sheraton shews another drawing-room which has similar characteristics.   There is a pier table opposite the fire-place having a high square mirror over it to correspond with the one over the mantelshelf.  Be-tween the four tall sash Windows are three console tables, and on the other side of the room a formal Sheraton settee with six arm-chairs.   No centre table, bookcase, china cabinet, horse screen, pole screen, or other piece of furniture having domestic interest is to be found in the late eighteenth century drawing-room, which was obviously copied from the French.   It is in the parlour and dining-rooms that the bulk of the furniture was seen.
The description of the Prince of Wales’s dining-room at Carlton House Terrace in one or two particulars suggests that the features seen there may be taken as indicating fashion in generai. They were not included exclusively for the Prince.
Sheraton says that there is ” a large glass over the chimney piece . . . to which are fixed candie-branches. At each end is a large sideboard, nearly twelve feet in length, standing between a couple of
Ionic columns, worked in composition to imitate fine
variegated marble, which have a most beautiful and magnificent effect. In the middle are placed a large range of dining tables, standing on pillars with four claws each, which is now the fashionable way of making these tables. The chairs are of mahogany, made in the style of the French, with broad top rails hanging over each back foot ; the legs are turned,” and the seats covered with red leather.” Sheraton remarks further : ” Many dining rooms of the first nobility have, however, only two columns and one sideboard, and those of less note have no columns.”
Collectors whose means do not permit them to compete in the auction-room for masterpieces may still find many bits of furniture of the Sheraton school well worth having, and at comparatively small pieces. In the chapter on Heppelwhite, distinctions have already been drawn between the chairs of the two designers, but a fuller analysis of the characteristics of Sheraton seats is necessary.
His best work was in solid satinwood, carved or painted.   He never succeeded, like Chippendale and Heppelwhite, in evolving a chair back which was peculiarly his own, but he certainly designed a large number of varying forms to which he imparted
recognisable character.   The amateur at once recog-
nises the typical Chippendale chair back with its
carved and pierced centre splat and bow-shaped crest-
rail.   He can see at a glance Heppelwhite’s shield back.
But there is no fundamental shape which we can say
is Sheraton’s.   It is rather in his treatment of designs
already known that Sheraton is distinctive, and that treatment is based upon angularity and accuracy of proportion. You will see, for instance, a Sheraton chair like the one opposite, obviously adapted from an Adam example, which has an almost unrelieved top rail above the lyre, another horizontal rail just above the seat level, and formal square legs decorated with fluting and carved feet.
Sheraton undoubtedly favoured the straight top-rail in his chair backs. He appears to have first thought of it as such, and then in response either to fashion or to a feeling within himself, to have modified it a little here and there. Sometimes one sees the middle third of the rail raised a quarter of an inch above the rest, the added thickness which resulted carved in short vertical flutings. The straight line, again, may be stopped short of the angles and dipped in a little concave curve to join the upright.
Where a Sheraton crest rail is slightly arched in the middle it appears as though the curve had been drawn with a pair of compasses, or struck from the two foci of an ellipse. It does not suggest the sweep of freehand drawing. The designer apparently thought in angles and admitted curves as modifications. In this no doubt he was constructionally right, particularly in developing an Anglicised version of Louis Seize which was in its essence a straight line style.
Sheraton chair legs, as already pointed out, may be looked upon as columns supporting the ends of the arms, with the seat junction an incident about two-thirds the way up.   In circular or turned legs he was undoubtedly the best interpreter of Louise Seize of his time. Heppelwhite and other makers used the turned leg, but collectors who find it in furniture of the late eighteenth century may assume that it denotes a Sheraton chair, table, or settee, unless there is conflicting evidence from some other part of the article. The carving will be in flutes, and the turning will show usually the thickest part about a quarter the way down from the top, just below a neck which in turn is under a square section decorated often with a carved patera. Sheraton feet run straight down in line with the leg. They do not splay out, excepting in the later examples which are adaptations from French Empire. In these instances it will usually be found that the backs curl over in convex fashion ” with broad top rails hanging over each back foot,’ as in the Prince of Wales’s dining-room.
Sideboards by Sheraton often have their front straight on plan, here again seeming to show that the designer regarded this as the fundamental une. The ends, however, were mostly convex, very rarely concave. The example at page 202 is interesting as showing features suggesting both Heppelwhite and Sheraton as the originator. It has a simple curved front with a top approaching the serpentine in shape. The treatment of the inlaid spandrils is very like Sheraton.
The side table with flanking pedestals and vases above had not given place to the fitted sideboard entirely, although the latter in Sheraton’s time must have begun to be very popular.   The author of the” Drawing Book * says that ” sideboards are often made without drawers of any sort, having simply a rail a little ornamented, and pedestals with vases at each end, which produce a grand effect.” This was no doubt precisely the case. If after 1780 or there-abouts a wealthy man with a large dining-room wished to express grandeur, he would have the side table and pedestals. But with Heppelwhite’s and Sheraton’s books to consult the country cabinet-maker could offer a very neat, composite piece of furniture to his clients who would doubtless prefer it, for reasons of space alone, if for no other consideration.
An interesting reference to sideboards with curved fronts occurs in the ” Drawing Book | which suggests that they were rather out of fashion to ten years before the end of the century. Sheraton says : ” It is not usual to make sideboards hollow in front, but in some circumstances it is evident that advantages will arise from it.   If a sideboard be required nine or ten feet long, as in some noblemen’s houses, and if the breadth of it be in proportion to the length, it will not be easy for a butler to reach across it.   I therefore think, in this case, a hollow front would obviate the difficulty, and at the same time have a very good effect, by taking off part of the appearance of the great length of such a sideboard.  Besides, if the sideboard be near the enter-ing door of the dining room, the hollow front will some-times secure the butler from the jostles of the other servants.”  A drawing and plan is given of such a sideboard, but it is over nine feet long, a most unusual length.
Small dining-rooms were often furnished in Sheraton’s day with sideboards having neither drawers nor pedestals. The custom was to place a wine cooler underneath, hooped with brass, partitioned and lined with lead for wine bottles. This attendant piece was easily accessible and took the place of cellaret drawers. It was occasionally used, however, in connection with sideboards which were fitted with cellarets, the arched opening in the centre of the larger piece of furniture being provided to enable the butler to get at the bottles beneath.
Dining tables at the end of the eighteenth Century were extremely well made, and even those showing Empire features can scarcely be regarded as having their appearance entirely spoiled.   Many patents were taken out for those which extended by means of loose leaves.   The ordinary useful dining tables about the year 1800 were supported upon pillars and claws, four claws to each pillar and running on brass castors. Both Heppelwhite and Sheraton curiously omit illustrations of dining tables in their works, but the former says :   ” For a Dining Room, instead of the Pier-tables, should be a set of dining tables,” and Sheraton gives a careful description of their mechanism in his dictionary.   Most of it is technical and of little interest to the collector, but it is evident that the tables were made any length to suit a particular room, ” by having a sufficient quantity of pillar and claw parts, for between each of these is a loose cap, fixed by means of iron straps and buttons, so that they are easily taken off and put aside.”   Sheraton used to allow in his calculation as to the size of these tables a space of two feet for each person sitting down. The patent tables of his day were made to draw out, loose flaps being enclosed in the piece to fall into place as required, an idea evidently the immediate forerunner of our extend-ing screw tables. Another patent dining table was on pillar and claw, but according to Sheraton ” the loose flaps cannot be mitred within the frame, but must be, when not used, put into some convenient place in the room where the dining table stands.”
Many pieces of Sheraton furniture made after 1800 are quite worth attention, if one allows for the fact that the best period of English furniture making was over. At the present time sofas of late Sheraton design, for instance, are cheap.   There is practically no demand for them.   But this will not always be the case, and the collector who makes money out of his hobby is he who buys at a low figure and bides his time for the market.  The character of these sofas is very easily recognised.   They have scroll ends, the legs are curved and splayed out and run on castors. The crest rail is usually perfectly straight, and the upholstery is horsehair as often as not.   Sheraton’s use of the splayed out legs at the latter period of his career was constant, and on the whole at this time they were the best support he designed.   His turned legs became vulgarised with the Empire influence, but this vulgarity did not appear so evident when French Empire was simply copied. Students of French work of this period will readily realise that it had character of its own, although it was heavy and pretentious.   But the Empire motif, clumsy and forbidding as it was, ruined Sheraton’s work entirely when he attempted to graft it on to his own delicately proportioned furniture.
Chair backs and the lattice work in bookcase doors which show diamond shaped divisions may generally be taken as later than 1800. Sheraton’s tracery in the best part of his career was flowing, even more so than that of Heppelwhite, but we see scarcely a curved one in the later glazed fronts. It is interesting to note that the revolt against wooden bedsteads on account of their supposed attraction for vermin came to a head at this time in the patenting of various methods of putting posts and rails together without having any crevices in which the insects could hide. Brass joints were used and when the posts and frame had been screwed together brass plates were fixed securely over at the point of junction. Some bedsteads had brass dovetail tenons which slipped into sockets of brass fixed in the pillars.
The four post bedstead had a long life after this, and Sheraton’s posts are particularly graceful and neatly ornamented. His schemes for upholstery were among the poorer parts of his work.
He designed three and four-back settees, sometimes upholstered, sometimes caned in back and seat. His dressing chests were often like chests of drawers when closed, the glass and other fitments being neatly packed away in the Upper compartment.
The short legs to such pieces are termed ” stump ” feet, the two inlaid cabinets at page 214 having them.

CHIPPENDALE FURNITURE. CHIPPENDALE TABLES, CHARS, BEDS, DRESSERS, CUPBOARDS, BEDS, SOFAS

NO style of furniture is better known to the average collector than Chippendale, yet no style  has  suffered  more  from  general ignorance about it.   The name appears to have caught the imaginations of collectors, apart from the huge prices realised at auction for authentic work of Chippendale.   Even to-day, when one would have thought the general characteristics of the style would be well known, it is not uncommon to hear auctioneers describe pieces of furniture as Chippendale which haveno more connection with the great cabinet-maker than they have with the great auk.   People rarely seem to mind this florid inaccuracy and most of the spectators at a sale do not appear to know it.   The name is a good one with which to advertise, and providing a piece of furniture looks more or less like mahogany in poor condition the seller is usually safe enough in describing it as Chippendale.   Alliteration, too, has done much to perpetuate the general belief that chairs were the principal work of Chippendale, and one is constantly finding their present price set up as a sort of standard by which to gauge values.   But for all this the fact remains that furniture by Chippendale is still the strongest magnet to draw those who are interested in eighteenth-century woodwork to any collection about to be brought under the hammer.
Authentic evidence of any piece of furniture having actually been made by Chippendale himself, or even turned out of his Workshops, is astonishingly rare, considering the immense inducements there are to find it.  For if the owner of a table, cabinet, bedstead, or side table supposed to be by Chippendale can bring documentary evidence in support of the claim the priee realised on selling may go up to almost anything, according to the competition there is among buyers. Considering the immense numbers of examples of Chippendale’s work in existence, which are generally accepted by experts as genuine, it is a very suspicious circumstance that more invoices and bills of the firm are not forthcoming to substantiate the belief in this authenticity.   The Chippendale firm must have had a big business in its dayЧindeed quite colossal if ail the pieces of furniture known by the name really came from the establishment, and after ail the period only dates back a Century and a half.   Mr. Percy Macquoid has given in his well-known work reproductions of bills from Chippendale, and Miss Constance Simon* also illustrates specimens.   But such documents themselves partake of the character of valuable manuscripts, so scarce are they, quite apart from their influence on the prices of furniture to which they allude. The fact is that Chippendale furniture in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred was made by Chippendale simply because authority asserts it. Proof is nearly always absent. The course taken is to conclude that if an article has the well-known decorative characteristics exploited by Chippendale, is exceptionally well designed and executed, and is old, then it is genuine.
Up to this time in English furniture no cabinet-maker had emerged as an individual.   Grinling Gibbons alone as a carver appears to have retained his per-sonality.   Daniel  Marot,  the  officiai  architect  to William III., as we have seen, influenced decoration and furniture considerably at the end of the seventeenth Century, but he was an imported expert and was not primarily a woodworker.  There must, of course, have been many extremely expert cabinet-makers in the later Stuart and early Georgian days, but they cannot be connected by name with any particular class of work.   Even if their names could be found, they would mean nothing to us.   But with Chippendale it was different.   He advertised himself, and it is largely through the advertisement of his book, ” The Gentle-man’s and Cabinet Maker’s Director,” that he has become so famous.   Original copies of this work (1754) are now exceedingly scarce, and if in perfect condition would bring ?50 or ?60 at auction.   Even editions subsequently published have appreciated in price, for collectors are glad to have for reference the principal means extant for authenticating Chippendale furniture.
Before dipping into the pages of the ” Director ” it will be helpful to give a few biographical details of the
family of the great cabinet-maker so as to fit him into his particular niche in the history of English furniture.
The first we hear of the family is that it was known in Worcestershire, where the great Chippendale’s father was a wood-carver of some local repute. There were three Chippendales concerned in the story of eighteenth-century cabinet-making, the last of whom succeeded his father in business and carried on the name with a partner named Haig, who subsequently retired. Miss Constance Simon gives the dates of the various developments of the Chippendales’ business through consulting records as follows :
The parish register of St. George’s Chapel, Mayfair, yields the information that a marriage was solemnised on the 10,th May, 1748, between Thomas Chippendale and Catherine Redshaw of St. Martin-in-the-Fields. Later on, ” at Christmas, 1749, Chippendale took a shop in Conduit Street, Long Acre, and in 1753 removed to larger premises N0. 60, St. Martin’s Lane.” The Gentleman’s Magazine, April 5th, 1755, says : ” A fire broke out in the Workshop of Mr. Chippendale, a cabinet-maker, near St. Martin’s Lane, which consumed the same, wherein were the chests of twenty-two workmen.” The Public Advertiser of 1766 is quoted as follows by Miss Simon : | Whereas by the Death of Mr. James Rannie, late of St. Martin’s Lane, Cabinet-Maker and Upholder, the partnership between him and Mr. Thomas Chippendale dissolved at his death, and the Trade will for the future be carried on by Mr. Chippendale on his own account.” The exact year of Thomas Chippendale’s death Miss Simon has found in an entry in the burial register of St. Martin’s Church. ” 1779 November 13, Thomas Chippendale.” In reference to the will, she also quotes under date of December, 1779: “On the sixteenth day, administration of the goods, chatteis, and credits of Thomas Chippendale, late of the parish of St. Martin’s in the ffields in the Co. of Middlesex, deceased, was granted to Elizabeth Chippendale widow, the relict of the said deceased, having been first sworn duly to administrate. ” After this event Chippendale’s eldest son succeeded to the business, Miss Simon’s consultation of directories yielding the following particulars :
The firm from 1779-1784 was styled Chippendale & Haig, but in 1785 Haig appears as the senior partner. Haig withdrew from the firm in 1796. In 1814 Chippendale opened a shop in the Haymarket, N0. 57, and for four years carried on the old St. Martin’s Lane business simultaneously with the new venture. In 1821 he removed to 42 Jermyn Street.” Miss Simon also notes that the will of this Thomas Chippendale was proved by Sarah Wheatley on 28th January, 1823.
A simple table of biographical details may be more useful to the average reader than further quotations which would only serve to elaborate facts already well authenticated.
FATHER
1720-1725. Approximate time of the first Thomas Chip-pendale removing from Worcestershire to London with his son, who became the famous cabinet-maker.
SON
1748.Marriage of the second Thomas Chippendale.
1748.His establishment of a shop in Conduit Street,
Long Acre.
1749.Removal to 60, St. Martin’s Lane.
1753.    His publication of У The Gentleman’s and Cabinet Maker’s Director.”
1766.  Death of Thomas Chippendale’s partner, Mr.
James Rannie. 1779.  Death of the second Thomas Chippendale.

GRANDSON
1779-1784. Partnership of the third Thomas Chippen-dale and Thomas Haig.
1796.  Withdrawal of Haig from the business.
1814.   Chippendale’s shop opened in the Haymarket.
1821.  Removal of the business to Jermyn Street.
1823. Proving of the third and last Thomas Chippen-dale’s will.
Now although the interest of the history of the family of Chippendale for a hundred years chiefly centres round the middle period when the most famous of the three cabinet-makers was in full work, collectors will find specimens dating from about 1780 very common. But they lack, as a rule, the character which distinguished the earlier work, and show evidence of the change in fashion which was asking for stiff, attenuated forms and inlay in place of substantial suavity and carving.
Reference has already been made to the walnut settee  as in some respects reminiscent of the work of Chippendale. At one time, indeed, it was actually catalogued as dating from 1760-1780. Ob-viously this was putting it very late, but the form of the ball and claw legs and the carving on the knees are very like Chippendale work about 1740. The legs of this piece may be usefully compared with those of the stool opposite, which show the C form on the insides of the knees.
The C form which is found over and over again in Chippendale’s work has been rather fancifully attributed to the cabinet-maker’s delight in introducing the first letter of his name into his carving.  A similar notion is abroad about the S shape in seventeenth-century work, which, as noted in chapter five, is regarded by the very imaginative as being derived from the first letter of Stuart.   But the C form is found in Louis Quinze decoration in profusion everywhere, and Chippendale is known to have been strongly influenced by French work of his day.   The gilt girandole in Room 56 of the Victoria and Albert Museum, acquired in 1913, is an excellent illustration of Chippendale’s French rococo manner.
It is very much the wisest plan for the modest collector to regard the name of Chippendale as indicating a style in furniture, and not as that of an individual. There is plenty of character about the style, but there is very little recognisable evidence of individual work about any one article. A piece of furniture is not like a picture, which affords so wide a field for the manifestation of the artist’s personality.
Again, it was never the custom to sign pieces of furniture as pictures are signed. Yet there seems to be an idea abroadЧmore with regard to Chippendale than any other worker in woodЧthat pieces of furniture can be identified as actually having been made by one particular person. The collector may make up his mind that if he waits for proof of such authorship in the case of any English eighteenth Century cabinet-maker before buying, he will never become possessed of anything. Even in cases which can be proved by documentary evidence as having come from the firm of Chippendale, there is no certainty that the great Thomas Chippendale actually did the work with his own hands. If the paragraph in the Gentleman’s Magazine already quoted shews anything clearly beyond the fact that Mr. Chippendale had a Workshop, it is that in that Workshop no fewer than twenty-two cabinet-makers were regularly employed. These considerations, however, do not detract from the fame of the master whose influence on the furniture of his day was so manifest.
It is difficult to attempt a broad definition which will enable the novice to recognise Chippendale furniture when he sees it, because the style passed through so many different phases. Yet some such generalisation appears necessary to start with so that the collector can form a rough idea of its main characteristics.
Chippendale furniture is made most frequently entirely of mahogany, with carved enrichment, and no inlay. Its construction is sturdy, but its ornamentation often exceedingly light and fragile.   Most of it
shews skilful exploitation of curvilinear forms. Fretted or pierced ornamentation is common, and in generalthe design of the decoration foliows Louis XV. models. Old Chippendale furniture in colour is inclined to brown, often becoming deep chocolate with an almost metallic looking patina.   It is never a hot red.   The following articles are commonly found in old Chippendale : chairs, stools, settees, commodes, dining tables, side tables, bookcases, card tables, basin stands, wine coolers, tripod tables, picture and mirror frames, writing tables, brackets, wardrobes, console and pier tables, organ cases, bureaux, secretaires, tall-boys, candlestands, clock cases, china cabinets, fire-screens, tea-caddies, bedsteads, and chests of drawers.
As far as can be ascertained Chippendale never made a sideboard as we understand the term. Even his side tables rarely had a drawer in them. The piece of furniture exploited by Heppelwhite and Sheraton with its flanking cupboards and drawer between is never to be seen in Chippendale furniture. The brothers Adam, it is true, had pieces of furniture made by Chippendale to their design, which at first consisted of a side table with separate pedestals having cupboards on which stood knife cases or butlers’ urns. Later these separate pieces were incorporated into the well-known Adam sideboards.
The principal phases of decorative character exploited by the great cabinet-maker were three, but it must be understood in giving them that they are not necessarily to be found separately in separate pieces of furniture.  Frequently they are mixed together, not   always very successfully.   But they followed one another in point of time.
The first of the three was the mainspring of Chippen-dale’s decoration up to about 1750, after which the Chinese craze came in and continued up to about 1765, when the Gothic taste began to supersede it.  Late Chippendale furniture shews frequently the influence of Louis Seize ornamentation, with which, however, its true character has nothing in common.  After the death of the great Thomas Chippendale in 1779, the firm in its later development made furniture according to the demands for classical work brought in by R. and J. Adam, who commissioned the cabinet-makers to construct to their designs.   Very fine examples of this phase are to be seen in three mahogany chairs made by Chippendale from designs by Adam and in the possession of the Worshipful Company of Drapers.  These chairs have nothing in their design which is charac-teristic of what we know as true Chippendale.  They have fine oval backs fretted out in wheel fashion and the legs are tapered in the fashion of Heppelwhite, and finished with ” term ” feet.
It is difficult to see how the great Chippendale, who it is surmised must have been born in the reign of Queen Anne, could have been influenced in this work by Louis Quatorze furniture, though it is sometimes stated that his earlier work shows evidence of it.
Louis Quinze came to the throne of France in 1715 and was succeeded by Louis Seize in 1774, and French writers have within recent years argued that the style in French decorative art known as Louis Quinze in reality began long before the death of the Grand Monarque.
Mr. G. Owen Wheeler, in his valuable work on furniture,* has gone to great pains to establish his contention that Chippendale was fully acquainted with Chinese forms in decoration before the return of Sir William Chambers who is usually credited with the introduction of the Chinese vogue into England from the East, and the reasons he gives seem certainly convincing, it He points out that Chambers, who had left England in 1744 at the age of eighteen for the East Indies, only returned in 1755 and published the book of Oriental designs he had collected two years afterwards, whereas in 1754 Chippendale’s ” Director ” contained Chinese designs which he issued in the hope of improving  the Chinese taste.” Mr. Wheeler brings more evidence of a similar character to bear.
Sir William Chambers, it appears to the writer, can in this connection only be regarded as a convenient name wherewith to indicate a revival in the taste for Chinese art, which had fitfully been in evidence in various forms since the time of Charles II. Chippendale in his extensive borrowings from the French must have obtained Oriental detail with the debased rococo features he exploited. For the French had used this detail considerably, not only in schemes of lacquered and painted decoration, but also for the general structure of pieces of furniture. M. Andre Sag Ho points out that in studying the most rococo examples of the furniture of the Louis XV  period, such as some of the works of Meissonier or Jacques Cafheri, for instance, there is no difficulty in discovering Chinese detail. French as well as English travellers like Sir William Chambers went to the East and returned laden with ideas to incorporate into Western art.
Examination of Chippendale’s famous publication, ” The Gentleman’s and Cabinet Maker’s Direct or,” shows the list of subscribers to the first edition to have numbered 317, of whom 149 are returned as cabinet-makers, joiners, upholders, and others engaged in the furnishing trade. The rest of the subscribers are l* noblemen and gentlemen | whom Chippendale ap-peals to in his preface to believe that if they will only honour him with their commands  every design in the book can be improved … in the execution of it.”
The places of residence of the many cabinet-makers who subscribed are not given in the majority of cases, but from those which appear it is evident the publication had a widespread circulation. A number are returned as having been sent to subscribers in York and Liverpool, Nottingham and Scarborough, as well as London.
The object of the book is fully explained in the preface and appears to have been twofold, to assist the buyer in the choice of designs, and the maker in the execution of them. There are a hundred and sixty plates, with descriptive letterpress to each one, and as careful measurements are given of the pieces of furniture illustrated, the publication must have been of great service to the trade. The significance of the ” Director ! to collectors of to-day is the
Chippendale’s work as distinguished from that of his contemporaries, and the assistance it gives in identifying genuine pieces. But the embarrassing fact is that some of the features we regard as being essentially Chippendale are not to be found illustrated in the work, notably the bail and claw foot, and many of the engraved plates show designs for pieces of furniture which the author never executed. The discrepancies have been explained by students of old English furniture in various ways.
Perhaps the appeal of the book to the two classes, gentlemen and cabinet-makers, and its date (1754) will together show why the work appeared as it did. Chippendale appealed to gentlemen as prospective customers, so he showed them articles of the latest fashion which in decorative character partook of a mixture of rococo, Chinese, and Gothic details.   He was asking wealthy and aristocratie people for commissions to execute fine and elaborate work. Obviously it would have been of no use putting before these the plain, unadorned furniture of the farmhouse, or the old-fashioned claw and bail which had been in use for half a century.   Then cabinet-makers would need no instruction in perfectly plain work which they had been turning out more or less according to tradition for the same period of time.   They would want some-thing in fashion which would help them in their work for fashionable people. It seems to the writer that Chippendale advertised the new, the fashionable, and the elaborate, and left the plain and homely alone as being scarcely worthy of the expense of copperplates.
The book starts with a bow of veneration to the Five Orders of Architecture, and a few rules as to how to draw in perspective, the rest of the work being taken up with examples of many different pieces of furniture.   Notwithstanding  the  rules,  many  of  the pieces are in  most villainous perspective and  it requires little imagination to agree with Chippendale in his statement that in work the designs will be vastly improved.  He notes in his preface that some of the profession have been diligent enough to represent them (especially those after the Gothic and Chinese manner) as so many specious drawings, impossible to be worked off by any mechanic whatsoever.” “It is not altogether surprising that they did take this point of view, for the detail in some of the plates is far too elaborate for woodwork, and as far as we know never was carried out.
A great many pieces of plain Chippendale furniture (using the name in its broad sense) which were made subsequently to the publication of the ” Director ” might well have been copied minus most of the ornament directly from the pages of the book.   For there are chairs, bookcases, tables, chests of drawers, china cabinets, settees, and other pieces which a good cabinet-maker would translate easily enough without the costly enrichments, yet still retain the essential characteristics of the style.   The hundred and forty-nine craftsmen who obtained possession of the book by subscription, one may be sure, used it in their Workshops and did a good deal to multiply the ” Chippendale ” furniture found so easily all over the country to-day.
The following list of pieces of furniture made by Chippendale or cabinet-makers of his school is given to enable the collector to identify some of the common characteristics of the style.
Tables.Supported on cabriole legs with ball and claw foot, or with legs square in section, finished with brackets, often perforated, in angle between top of leg and horizontal rail. A Chinese fret will sometimes be found on legs and rails. Dining tables are rare. They have the cabriole or square legs, and big, rather cumbrous flaps supported when up by legs which swing out as brackets.
Chairs.Cabriole legs with ball and claw in earlier specimens, with backs having perforated splat resemb-ling in general formation Queen Anne models.   Crest rail sometimes straight, but more frequently curved in one of the many bow-shaped interpretations of the period.  Arms padded in those which have upholstered backs.  The backs of those having perforated splats . composed in fine specimens of ribbons with rococo detail.   Rococo detail carved below the seat and on the knees of the legs.   The C scroll commonly in evidence, often in the chair backs and in the angles between seat and legs.   In specimens having square legs the Chinese fret is often employed, and there may be an underframing perforated or fretted out to correspond.   So-called ” French ” Chippendale chairs feet formed of scrolls taken from Louis Quinze examples. Gothic detail is seen in frets designed in imitation of lancet Windows.
Bookcases. Often made with the centre projecting a few inches, the wings being thus set back. Small ones four or five feet wide will be on the same plane without projection. The cornice with dentils may have a broken pediment and a centre ornament. There will be glazed doors, and in the lower part cupboards or drawers. Perforated decoration is often a feature of the top inside the angles of the broken pediment.
China Cabinets. Sometimes standing on four legs, square in section and decorated with frets ; at other times with the lower part filled in with cupboards and designed with a projecting centre like the bookcases. Chinese frets form a cresting above the cornice and there is frequently a pagoda-shaped top over, enriched with Louis Quinze detail. Top part frequently, but not always, glazed on three sides. The cornice above centre part may be surmounted with a scrolled or horn-shaped top filled in with fret perforation. If the lower part is not filled in the legs may be connected by a decoratively arranged underframing. Plain examples of Chippendale china cabinets usually have cupboards in the lower parts.
Bureaux. Made with a bookcase above enclosed by two doors or by a china cupboard. The lower part may stand on ogee feet and have four or five drawers with a hinged slab for writing. Above the cornice the broken pediment may occur, and sometimes a crown silver and border of greene damaske round it  and feathers will be in the centre, perforated frets being employed as well. Fittings inside the bureau follow Queen Anne models closely as to their arrangement, but the carved decoration is Chinese, Gothic, or Louis Quinze.
Side Tables.Long and fairly narrow, a common proportion for a small piain one being five feet long by two feet six inches wide. They have no drawer and stand on square legs finished with moulded or terminal feet. The carved cabriole with pad or claw and bail feet is also seen. In fine specimens the legs are perforated or ornamented with Gothic strap-work or Chinese frets.
Tripod Tables.Made, as their name indicates, to stand on three spreading legs, from the junction of which a carved and turned column rises to support a circular, square, or shaped top. This top has a ” gallery ! round it, often fretted out. A common edging in the shaped topped tables is the ” pie-crust ” which forais a boundary to a dished out centre.
Candlestands.On tripod feet with a more or less decorated column supporting a circular or shaped tray.
Clock Cases.Arched door to face. Case long and narrow, the waist having columns at the sides.   Gothic or Chinese fretted ornaments in spandrils over face, in frieze and possibly in the angle pilasters.   A pagoda-like dome with carved finials.
Tea Caddies.Not square and box-like, but more resembling caskets with curved sides and carved corners and feet.   Fitted inside with small compartments.
Writing Tables. In principle constructed much like our modern pedestal writing desks with drawer at each side of a central opening for the knees. Sometimes the angles were rounded, and rare shapes are serpentine fronted. Angle columns are also seen in elaborate tables. Lion feet and masks above are characteristic but rare.
Settees and Sofas. Those with open backs are often of the two and three chair variety, carved with ribbon work, and C scrolls. The ” apron i or front rail below the stuffed seat may also be carved with gadroon and other ornaments. Chinese frets occasionally form the backs, and square legs are connected by rails. Carved bail and claw feet are common.
Chests of Drawers. Sometimes double or ” tall-boy ” with frieze and angle pilasters fretted in Chinese or Gothic style. The feet are ogee or square bracketed. The low chests of drawers have a simple wave moulding, the ” tall-boys I a cornice.
China Shelves. Usually examples of elaborate fret-work and small carved detail. They have no backs and are made to hang on the wall. Hanging cup-boards of similar character are sometimes to be met with having glazed fronts and wooden backs.   The shelves are sometimes ornamented with carved edging and a cresting of perforated work surrounds the
Beds. These had beautifully carved posts, sometimes made up of cluster columns, decorated with twisted ribbon work. The cresting above the cornice was a feature, being elaborately carved and perforated, the Louis XV. interpretation of acanthus and endive ornaments being used on many examples. Lions-paw feet are seen, but more commonly the posts are plinth-like at the bottom with terminal ends.
From the writings of Horace Walpole, whose voluminous letters might, one would have thought, have contained some gossipy reference to Chippendale, we get little to assist us in forming an idea of an interior of the eighteenth century with furniture from the fashionable cabinet-maker. But in a letter dated March 27th, 1760, to George Montagu, he gives an entertaining description of a house which might easily have been furnished with articles made from recipes culled from the ” Director ” published six years before.
” I breakfasted the day before yesterday at Elia Loelia Chudleigh’s. The house is not fine nor in good taste, but loaded with finery. Execrable varnished pictures, chests, cabinets, commodes, tables, stands, boxes, riding on one another’s backs and loaded with terreens, figures, and everything upon earth. Every favour she has bestowed is registered by a bit of Dresden china.   There is a glass case full of enamels, eggs, ambers, lapislazuli, carneos, toothpick cases, and all kinds of trinkets, things that she told me were her playthings ; another cupboard fu 11 of the finest japan, and candlesticks and vases of rock crystal ready to be thrown down in every corner.”
Although the house was not. according to Horace Walpole, in good taste, it would scarcely be fuller of incongruous articles than Strawberry Hill, where he went to live in 1747.  The published catalogue of the contents of this house makes it one vast museum of curiosities, and the references to furniture there are comparatively few. Yet he must have been furnishing when Chippendale was at the zenith of his fame. But Walpole had apparently no love for the new and fashionable, and was even critical of Adam’s work at Osterley. His letter to the Rev. William Mason, dated July 10th, 1778, refers to :
” the new apartments at Osterley Park. The first chamber a drawing room, not a large one, is the most superb and beautiful that can be conceived, and hung with Gobelin tapestry, and enriched by Adam in his best taste, except that he has stuck diminutive heads in bronze no bigger than a half-crown, into the chimney pieces of hair.’ The next is a light plain green velvet bedchamber. The bed is of green satn richly embroidered with colours, and with eight columns; too theatric and too like a modern head-dress, for round the outside of the dome are festoons of artificial flowers. What would Vitruvius think of a dome decorated by a milliner ! The last chamber, after these two proud rooms, chills you! It is called the Etruscan, and is painted all over like Wedgwood’s ware, with black and yellow small grotesques.  Even the chairs are of painted wood. It would be a pretty waiting room in a garden. I never saw such a profound tumble into the Bathos. It is going out of a palace into a potter’s field. Tapestry, carpets, glass, velvet, satin, are ail attributes of winter. There could be no excuse for such a cold termination, but its containing a cold bath next to the bed chamber and it is called taste to join these incongruities ! I hope I have put you in a passion.”
These chairs Mr. Macquoid states were made by Chippendale, though in design they are Adam. Like the chairs in the possession of the Drapers’ Company, already alluded to, they illustrate the way in which Chippendale was employed to make furniture quite different in character from that which is usually associated with his name. There is an arm-chair in the Victoria and Albert Museum given by Mr. R. Berens, made of beech veneered with walnut and sycamore and having a cane seat which is notwithstanding its marquetry.
After the death of the great Thomas Chippendale the firm became more and more the executera of designs by other people, and in the early nineteenth century nothing to distinguish it from other makers all furniture. It by quite possible that some all the debased Empire work which characterised Engiish furniture after 1800 was made in the workshops of the last Chippendale.

THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY CHARLES II and JAMES II FURNTURE
Charles II. 1660-1685. James II., 1685-1689

After the grooved horizontally for bed cords reign of Queen Anne, Holland exercised a greater influence over English decorative arts than any other country, not excepting France. The salient features of the reproduction chippendale writing table history of the slant front sriting desk swedish uk only two countries at this time is enough to show how this came about. The Dutch were a maritime race and the marquetry nest of tables ir commercial interests extended all over the imperial mahogany end table world. They were the 1930’s oak draw leaf table great importers of Eastern productions into Western Europe, and the edwardian bureau trade between England and Holland was considerable. They were Protestants, and the international silver company antique candelabra ir ideals had much in common with those of English Protestants, notwithstanding the french style armchair white caning bitter political trade rivalry which resulted in conflicts between the history tea caddies painted primitive two countries. Charles II. had spent much time in Holland while a royal refugee during the how did victorians use the sideboard Commonwealth, and it was the verge and folio escapement noise re that he became fixed with ambitions which later on crystallised into the antique sofa table drawer inlaid wood granting of a charter to the historismus double eagle side table price English East India Company. He introduced the tiger claw fob taste for highly decorated furniture inspired by Japanese and Chinese models adapted and copied in the dining table mid century round six leg spider leg manufacture of articles which found favour at the french art deco walnut arm chair Hague and in Paris. In
furniture, as in other outward expressions of the antique dresser curved social change, the fiddle pattern teaspoon with wp hallmark re was a loosening of the 1762 antique italian vases hard grip which had been held on extravagance and unnecessary embellishment, and elaborate carving began to appear on chairs, cabinets, tables, stools, and the jacobean bow saw chest architectural fittings of rooms. The period is distinguished in the regency hairy paw foot card table lain by exuberance, but it was not the henry xvi furniture comparatively clumsy elaboration of James I. or the thos russell & son pocketwatch stately magnificence of the berlin wegely blue fluted Elizabethan style. It was more graceful than either of the antique furniture portugal se, perhaps a little small and pettifogging in some of its manifestations, but on the sideboard shell scallop ebay whole expressive of a richer and more cultured domestic life.
Two of the antique hale company chairs most noticeable developments in crafts-manship which are associated with the antique roccocco furniture 1700 later Stuart period are the art deco cabinet legs introduction of lacquer as an applied embellishment to woodwork, and the reproduction relief carved oak desk library table cornucopia use of silver leaf to enhance the dublin has the figure of hibernia in a rectangular shield beauty of carving, These two innovations resulted in the antique gueridon louis xv creation of some of the excavation at pompeii influence on neoclassicism richest examples of seventeenth-Century cabinet-making which main to us. As a rule the solid silver rowell oxford cigarettes y are beyond the renaissance revival dining table 6 legs purse and beyond the end of 19th century french decoration opportunity of the antique mahogany furniture marble new orleans average collector, but the french antique settee y illustrate well the antique dresser with canadle shelves desire for warmth and colour in decoration which found simpler expression in other ways, Towards the antique dining room chair with flower pattern on back end of the tekke sunburst 1880 reign of James II the red porcelain shield and star mark and cross rage for lacquered furniture had extended so much hat a book appeared by John Stalker and George Parker, entitled ” A Treatise of Japanning and Varnishing ‘ which gave many carefully compiled recipes for the satinwood shield back chairs use of amateurs and Professionals practising the stretcher candle stand craft, mixed with not a little entertaining conversational twaddle. The style of the north italian painted chest book, which is dated 1688, may be gathered by the barley twist parlor chair following extract from the pirouette lamp blue glass desk lamp french art deco preface.
It was evident that even in those days the small military campaing chest trunk furniture woodwork value of appeal for public support through a picturesquely worded advertisement was well realiscd. The volume contains recipes which must have been in use a great many years. They could scarcely have been invented for the willow pattern pottery sake of publication. So we may assume that lacquered furniture was not only imported from abroad in the flemish furniture reign of Charles IL, but was made in England in considerable quantities. Otherwise the mahogany carved coffee table glass tray source of the antique federal secretary with reeded legs many recipes would hardly have been available, and the 3 tier claw foot table demand for the high end european music stands, inlaid, canadian wooden music stands book would not have bee large enough to justify its compilation. There is als evidence that the antique ivory chest of drawers authors thought that the japanese octagonal table lady of the highboy furniture house would be as fascinated with the antique wall pendulum clock 1900 chance thus provided of beautifying the 9ct gold watch 1900 home with her own hands as her descendant is attracted by the french floral paintings possibilities which lie in the dresser1950sinlay handy tin of enamel.
It is easy to understand how it comes about that old lacquered furniture is rare when one remembers the antique sofa bench permanent human foible of being careless and slovenly over work which can be successfully hidden. The need for using the karpen furniture company best seasoned wood and for making pieces of furniture thoroughly well was not so apparent when by a judicious application of lacquer the 1920 italian walnut veneer bedroom suite poor foundation might be made, in the antique elephant foot rugs afghanistan words of Messr Stalker & Parker, ?delightful beyond expression.
Common deal was used for furniture which had hitherto been made of the winged hardwood mirrors more durable oak and walnut. Varnish or lacquer was liberally applied and the unique dining tables with unique mechanical leaf extensions woodwork lade to look as near like ” polished Marble ” as possible. Notwithstanding the extending georgian candlestick authors’ assertion that lacquer is strong and durable, it certainly will not stand rough usage, and in the flowers inlay antique display case many cases where furniture was poorly made to start with it rapidly fell to pieces during succeeding generations. |There is no reason, of course, why good lacquered furniture should not have survived even two hundred years or more in houses where consistent care was taken of it, and where it stayed more less in its original position. We are not without exellent specimens of old lac which have thus been preserved. A splendid example of the lion’s foot casters time of Charles II. was one of the 17th century spanish jug proudest acquisitions to the japanese metalwork Victoria and Albert Museum in the what kind of paint do i use to antique a mirror year 1912. It is a black English lacquered cabinet decorated with birds and flowers in coloured and gilt composition in relief. The mounts are brass, and the antique early american highboy stand of wood is carved with cherubs, birds, and foliage in the dresser makers of the 1920’s characteristic manner of the caned panel sofa period, being finished with a covering of silver leaf ” This bold type of lacquer,” says the william bennet silver official description, ” is extremely rare and illustrates the antique furniture golden lotus first effort made in England towards imitating the louis xvi style cherry wood dining chairs cabriole leg Chinese and Dutch Cabinets which were the bed makers in england n being imported into this country.” For many years before lacquering became the antique art deco italian sideboard fashionable craze for leisured people who needed entertaining occupation, original Eastern work had been imported into England. Sometimes it came in the what is neoclassical made of form of panels, which were obviously more easily packed than chests, though the table de salon style queen ann latter were utilised at the antique art deco changing dresser same time as packing cases for china and other fragile productions of the antique cabinet veneer lock East. These panels were fitted into carcase work by English craftsmen and mounted on stands of the antique round foot stool kind just described. But Western exponents of the chauncey jerome fusee steeple craft of lacquering betrayed the antique spoon collecters mselves, as might be expected, by the chippendale mahogany mirror eagle finial ir curious rendering of Oriental designs. At the antique english dining room table with brass claw feet end of Stalker & Parker’s book are patterns in the antique furniture walnut Chinese manner which show no more relationship with the limousin lamp art of the kauffahrtei scene cup East than that exhibited by the brass feet for sets of draws Pagoda in Kew Gardens. There is a lack of spirit and animation about the pendulum mercure cloisonne m, a dullness of draughts-manship, and a coarseness of treatment quite foreign to the quartered oak veneering1700’s spontaneous charm of Chinese decorative art. This lack of ability, however, to reproduce Oriental lac with convincing fidelity mattered little in mounting original panels which would the greatbatch pitcher mselves be the small antique handkerchief table principal decorative feature of a cabinet. The chief embellish-ment to be added by the silver cigarette case 1833 floral engraving English cabinet-maker was the french settees stand which in style was Anglicised French Renaissance. A Charles II. lac cabinet exhibits one of the french empire revival buffet a deux’ most diverting instances of mixture of racial characteristics in one piece of furniture which is to be found in the 1930s lyre back chairs whole history of decorative art. The result is a certain inconsequent gaiety of effect, partly caused no doubt by variety in colour. The cabinet might be black lacquer with brass mounts and various tinted details, or it might be bright red lacquer, or brown, green, or dove colour. The stand was some?times black, often silver, and occasionally gold. Col-lectors who look for old lac will find the brass lamp three candlestick black variety most common. It is to be seen on long case clocks, cupboards, chairs and settees, dining tables and articles for the american desks toilet. Red lacquer is more uncommon, but it is not so much sought after by many people on account of the art deco dressers california glaring colour which will not always harmonise satisfactorily with its surroundings. Green and silver lacquer are both rare and the english antique cigar wine screw stand re is a low-toned brown not frequently seen. A most beautiful straw-like yellow may occasionally be met with.
It is to this period that we are accustomed to assign pieces of furniture having the chair styles kidney back picturesque twisted or barley-sugar ” rails, and as a general rule the blog antiques xviii lyon feature is fairly indicative of the antique isfahan prayer rug vase reigns of Charles IL and James II. During the antique american serpentine chest of drawers Protectorate the leopold stickley rails and uprights of chairs and tables were turned very simply, even crudely, knob-turning being common. It seems reasonable to suppose that this knob-turning gradually developed into the antique hepplewhite chairs catalogue twisted form which was brought to the karpen furniture couch limit of its possibilities in the brass lion paw dining table reign of William and Mary. Gate-leg tables, side tables, dressers, and chests of drawers on stands ail shewed it, and it frequently occurs in long case clocks which came into use about this time. Several examples of clocks by Thomas Tompion (1638-1713), the cost of repair of antique cabinet split in half ” father of English clockmaking,” are shown by Britten * in long cases having the yellow sunburst silk rug hoods supported by twisted columns on each side of the reproduction mahogany drop leaf table face. Tompion clocks are among the antigue mirror hand held crystal handle rarest and most valuable of English timepieces. In the exposition antique ceramics london Horological Dia-logues of John Smith (1675) we read of ” setting up long swing pendulums after you have taken it from the antique furniture, art noveau chair, roman head conin,” adding ‘? the czechoslovakian lusterware same rule that is given for this serves for all other trunck-cases whatsoever.” Collectors who have the girandoles opportunity of becoming possessed of grandfather clocks of the verge watchmakers, 18th,19th century late seventeenth Century may consider the antique 17th century spanish secretaire: covered in leather with brass brass nails mselves very fortunate, for the american indian women iron outdoor art date of the antiique oak dining chairs ir invention is certainly not prior to the 18th century dressers with glass handles Restoration.

ANTIQUE QUEEN ANNE PERIOD FURNITURE I702-I714

FURNITURE known to collectors under the antique art deco writing desk name of Queen Anne illustrates in the palissy gay day main, as far as construction goes, the antique movado pocket watch gold development of curvilinear forms in place of the 18th century bed legs traditional straight lines upon which the antitque furniture paw casters south africa skeletons of most woodwork of the shaped metal lanterns sixteenth and seventeenth centuries were built up. There are many chairs of this period in which no straight lines whatever are seen, and it is quite common for the 18th century new england chest of drawers cabinet work, which by this time had reached a very high degree of neatness and complexity, to shew nothing but curves excepting in a vertical direction, and even here the pair queen anne 1712 silver candlesticks slightest approach to stiffness was modified by inlaid enrichment in flowing lines. Refer?ence to the coffee table antique glasgow various photographs illustrating early eighteenth century furniture will make this point clear. In the french provincial showwood walnut chair in the covers for silver tea service set Victoria and Albert Museum straight lines are entirely absent, every surface being shaped and bent and the netsuke meiji dynasty corners softened with gentle contours. The seat shews the cabriole legs stand typical Queen Anne form, splaying out in almost balloon form towards the superstructure desk front and becoming concave at the louis xvi arm chair sides. It also illustrates what was a very important departure, resulting in added comfort to the potschappel (carl thieme) user of chairs. This is the glass cornucopia vase in steel cage shaping of the oldoak trestle dining table back splat to be more in conformity with the drop leaf cupboard spinal curvature of the art deco walnut chair 1930 human body.
It is to the antique italian pottery reign of Queen Anne that the square leg sofa table cabriole leg is usually assigned, which, as we have seen, began its development in English furniture during the kitchen dresser on legs preceding period. Instead of, as in William and Mary furniture, the antique dining table wood clawfoot Stuart S-shaped legs dictating the central frieze drawer ornamental character of the pottery marks czechoslovakia early cabriole, we find the gilded regency window seat cabriole a finished article with its own appropriate decoration. Quite the japanese bronze jardiniere commonest enrichment was the what is the difference in a chaise and a settee shell which was carved on knees and repeated on the leather topped tables antique back cresting, and also in many cases on the pre war oak dining tables swelling apron in the destiny persian carpet centre below the satyress with lyre seat. The latter feature is seen in the panel back chair yorkshire wool-work covered stool from the lyre back settee Victoria and Albert Museum on opposite page, though other points about it suggest its having been made at a later date than the leroy antiques clock maker reign of Queen Anne.
It was about the antique empire gentleman’s dresser constructed in two sections year 1700 that the porcelainmost collected claw and bail foot began to make its appearance, an exceedingly satisfactory termination to the 8 foot oval drop leaf dining table french legs of furniture. It lasted in popularity with furniture makers for half a century. The claws differ in character, the 19th century english dining commonest, owever, being that of a bird, usually regarded as an agle. The head and beak of the fusee watch by rotherhams eagle are often found
as terminations to the 1860 four poster bed swelling curvilinear arms of hairs. While the marquess cutlery claw and bail undoubtedly give decorative character, the phillip webb’s arts and crafts armchair of 1866 plainer pad-footed cabrioles
are typical of the 17c italian cabinet with hidden period and sometimes express a suavity and finish of contour denied to the colonial american period furniture more elaborately treated foot. In the deco clothing love seat a form of short set te very much in favour at the art nouveau leather top bureau beginning of the verge watchmakers, 18th,19th century eighteenth Century?all the lady desk louis xvi characteristics referred to will be found, but the settees and chaises carved enrichment of the mahogany flower pictures legs and arms suggest that this beautiful specimen may have beer made after the cromwellian armchair reign of Queen Anne and possibly as Iat as the greco roman furniture opening years of George II. For the gothic bird cages detail shews the unmarked antigue plates use of the french louis xvi settee sets,new orleans C scroll which Chippendale exploited so successfully, and the gold bell shaped flower seed pearls earrings treatment of the antique chrysoprase carving itself gives rise to the chrome hearts chair ebony feeling that it was executed by a craftsman influenced somewhat by Louis Quinze ornament. The settee is of walnut, the viennese style decoration most extensively used wood in Queen Anne’s reign, but not unknown to Chippendale, who employed it in some of his earlier work. But considered as a whole, in form, proportion and une, the scandavian art deco chairs settee is typical of late Queen Anne furniture as it is understood by the antique chair spring bottom seat repair connoisseur and dealer to-day.
The card table of oak, veneered with walnut and having carved walnut legs, is distinctly earlier. The top is covered with green cloth, the double ended upholstered victorian settee value under surface of the brandt brass lion paw table hinged portion being treated with green morocco leather. While this piece has been restored in places it is nevertheless a characteristic table, the c1790 slant top desk history legs in particular being graceful specimens of the silver lustre staffordshire long cabriole with bail and claw feet. When open it displays a top of four equal sides interspaced by four oval concave receptacles for money or counters, and a plain circular panel at each corner to hold silver candlesticks. The undurframing is hinged in such a way as to permit of two of the samson armorial chinese export tea caddy legs supporting the multiple drawer chest 160 cm wide leaf when open after the antique pedestal stand-wood with iron legs and adjustable top manner of the bronze clock stamped em ordinary flap table. On the antique persian wall hangings of lions knees of the philadelphia chippendale slant front desk block front cabriole is a carved detail con-sisting of a shell and pendant.
Lacquered furniture continued to be popular, and as trade with the banjo clocks eli East grew in importance and began to partake less and less of the west indies drop leaf table spirit of a very speculative adventure, furniture makers and dealers in England made use of the antique oriental rugs made in italy craftsmanship of China and Japan to embellish the antique coffee tables with lion feet and brass mouldings ir home productions.
There was an enormous trade in lacquer, and Miss Singleton quotes in her book on Dutch and Flemish furniture some interesting particulars of sales of cargoes of three ships at the large putti on marble clock East India House in 1700, which realised ?200,000. From the staffordshire figure of the elements m we learn that lacquered trunks, escritoiresJ bowls, cups, dishes, etc., no doubt hundreds of the adam serpentine fronted sideboard se articles would be small and insignificant, but one must not lose sight of the bears’ paw feet in furniture fact that a great deal of lacquered work so imported was introduced into English furniture for its decorative value, and so affected style. Actual tables, inlaid, from the antique home neocolonial se three ships and the 17th century sideboard oak re were in addition lacquered tables not inlaid, while lacquered boards were imported for use in the zebrawood tables doors and drawer fronts of cabinets made in England.
Our imports of lac, however, still came to a great extent through Holland, and Mr. J. Fitzhenry’s base to a Dutch toilet glass of about the buffet with lion’s head pulls and paw legs year 1700 will afford an excellent idea of the antique candlestand table smaller articles of ure imported. A characteristic form in the martini schuetzen rifle shaping of this interesting bit of lacquered work domed recesses, a feature which was found, corner cupboards, bureaux, secretaires, and pieces of furniture, as well as in the vintage inlaid drop leaf table architectural fitments of rooms well into the afshar rug reign of George I.
The small collector will have frequently to adjudicate upon the white italian antique wardrobe merits of the pine country chest of drawers feet Queen Anne mirror frame, and sometimes upon glass of the asian rosewood imperial dragon sofa with marble back period. The latter is certainly more decorative than new glass, but if the cushion cut diamond earrings claw basket setting mirror is required for practical purposes it is useless, often spotty and badly damaged at the victorian slide fold over card table back.
All Queen Anne mirrors are by no means beautiful. Some are extremely ugly, the gold spanish earrings ir crestings over-elaborate and heavy and the vase shaped splat regency mouldings of the napoleon biscuit porcelain frame coarse and insignificant in character. They are often found gilt, and the brass tea decanter ornament in relief may be carved or gesso.
An example of gesso decoration is seen in the antique ball and claw ladies writing desk frame of the mid century credenzas with brass doors wall mirror. This does not strike one as being conspicuously overdone with ornament, and
shape is quite characteristic of the porcelain marks bell with a bow period. Col-ors should notice the the year 1750 antique wood bedframe interrupted pediment of the antique 1769 german chest with hidden compartments cresting with the antique style clothes cupboards shield between as details frequently found in various forms in Queen Anne furniture. There is practically no limit to feather edging, cross banding, herringbone patterning and stringing with which early eighteenth Century work is elabor-ated, and the clocks charles bullard enclosing doors of the antique dining room table with brass claw feet piece are as well finished inside as out. This is a point collectors will do well to observe, for the 19th century wooden washstand inner inlaid surfaces, having suffered less from exposure, are likely in a good and well-kept piece to appear newer than the thomas sheraton rent table y really are.
In this inlaid cabinet the russian neoclassical cylinder bureau feet are characteristic the english gate leg drop leaf dining table cabinet Queen Anne style with the antique mahogany chippendale dining chairs delaware ir ogee brackets. This form of foot to chests of drawers is common enough, and will be found in much furniture of the type of antique occasional armchairs simpler and homelike kinds all through the czecho slovakia identification marks first half of the simple deadbeat escapement clock eighteenth Century.
It is to the antique individual fish knives and forks english ivory handle Queen Anne period that the chest of draws construction familiar walnut bureau belongs, witb its sloping lid and veneered decoration, having a glazed case or cabinet of drawers over. This piece of furniture as well as the large wooden frame with carved leaves many china cabinets of the elaborately carved 18th century oak clock cases period were tall and surmounted by pediments of various kinds, which never entirely went out of fashion right through the hinged round dining tables eighteenth Century. A common top is the antique desks 19th century smee broadly moulded doming which will be found also on long case clocks of the frankenthal china candelabra period. The horn-shaped pediment is also to be seen. Many of the example of antique chest of drawers handles drawer fronts which form the antique french german bisque porcelain figurines Uttings to bureaux are serpentine in plan with a domed recess in the georgian furniture legs middle concealing perhaps a secret drawer or slide.
The love seat or courting settee shewn in our illustration is not characteristic of a considerable number of others made at this time in which the earthenware 19c money box motif was to join two chair backs together side by side. This method was exploited later on by Chippendale, Heppelwhite, Sheraton, and many most interesting settees resulted. Queen Anne chairs were lower in the furniture period ornaments backs than the antique oak dining table with barrel center y had been before and the silver vine myott spoon shaping made the antique 19th century furniture m comfortable. The splat which was urn-shaped or formed by the columns clocks symmetrical use of the fusee watch by rotherhams C scroll began to be a prominent feature. It was not usually pierced, though examples are to be seen of this treatment. The arms splayed out much in the viennese antique chair same general direction the french bureau cabinet y had taken since the meissen man leaning against tree stump days of Charles IL, but the paw foot furniture legs y were well set back and had a wider embrace. The legs in true Queen Anne chairs when the polish antique dresser cabriole had been fully exploited were not joined up by stretcher work, though collectors cannot rely upon this entirely in ascertaining style, for many undoubtedly genuine specimens have the small oak arm chair might have been dressing table chair ir legs thus connected. By 1710 however, or the sheraton secretaire desk early american reabouts, stretcher work had practically ceased and the antique corner desk chair with arm cabriole legs stood unsupported. Some chair backs with bow-shaped top rail have the enamel courting scene 2 dogs broad centre spoon splat connected with the antique mirror noyer side rails a little lower than the antique lamps with spelter figures cresting, giving almost the mother of pearl mirror - antique black appearance of a double top rail. This feature is not to be found after Queen Anne.
A piece of furniture of which thousands must have been made for household purposes ail over the walnut chest of drawers locking wooden ornate handles country was the large yellow porcelain fruit bowl tall-boy or tall-boy chest. The latter is more characteristic of the myott and son imperial porcelaine period. It usually stands on short club legs, has five drawers in the wootton patent office (wells fargo) lower part arranged over an arched or serpentine shaping. The legs are as a rule unsupported by stretchers, and the this set was likely made by newhall, spode or derby. it was made between 1800 and 1810. re are four club legs, two in front and two behind. The upper part, which is narrower than the gilt mirrors 91cm x 63cm lower and separated from it by a simple moulding, has usually three long drawers getting shallower as the 1920 single pedestal roll top desk y ascend and two, or possibly three, small drawers at the italian antique clothes top. The moulding at the sheffield ironstone china top is deep but not often of the antique collectors oil paint sets convex ovolo form. Occasionally the settee or daybed and french front angles will be chamfered or perhaps reeded. It is worth while to study the antique furniture mall escutcheons and handles of such pieces. They will be simple and shapely, for Queen Anne metal furniture was never surpassed in its grace. and suitability. No engraving ornaments it, and the swedish bombay chest, nyc handles are wide and low, falling in a gentle dip.
One observes the italian bookcase short centre arched opening so typical of early eighteenth Century furniture in dressing tables, tall-boy chests, knee-hole tables, and cabinet Stands. The arch is also seen in the rococo furniture motives dresser of the high end cherry wood coffee tables period which took to itself the antique oval dressingtable mirror universal cabriole supports. These legs were connected across the duverdry & bloquel carriage clock front of the antique heavy gold albert piece above the large library tables knee with a rail made interesting by curvilinear shaping frequently repeated in another rail underneath the court cupboard prices (early american) cornice and in the court cupboards for sale styles supporting the antique william & mary trestle table shelves. Some dressers shew a curious scarcity of legs, a length of over eight feet in the francis crump silversmith dresser being supported by only four cabrioles, one at each corner of the barnsley clockmaker piece. The fact that dressers so constructed have lasted for hundred years, however, is sufficient proof that the gordon russell dining room chairs supports have been adequate. On the was jacobean chairs made by monks other hand, perfect piece of construction should not only be strong enough, but should look so, and not cause the antique french louis style chairs stuffed with horsehair collector to wonder whether after all some of the mahogany nail studded coffee table legs are not missing. The point, of course, is purely one of artistic morality, but inasmuch as the antique corner wardrobe appeal of old furniture is largely artistic it should be noted. In the four poster bed 1860 Charles II period we have already observed tops. This type, however, is late, and was more in use in early Georgian houses. A study of the high sided settee whole period which saw in so many ways a revolution in domestic ideals as well as a great change in the how to find the maker of a carriage clock reigning house, shows that the antique terracotta bottle sonsco japan William and Mary and Queen Anne styles brought extended comfort into middle-class houses in a way which had never been done before. More people possessed articles of which care had to be taken, and the negretti & zambra enormous influx of china from the how are designs put on antique furniture without using inlay East found its way into the antique clocks made in dublin homes of those who up to this had been content with pewter. It was an age in which the antique glazed pottery hand signed engraved hilda collection of nick-nacks became extended, with the different types of antique wash stands result that cabinets were required for storage and display. The Revocation of the heavily carved jacobean sideboard Edict of Nantes in 1685 had brought many skilled weavers and other craftsmen to England, and the antique commode and chamber pot ir productions were now an important part of the restoring oak veneer industrial Output. Holland, which was the swan and lyre motif in furniture country from which we had received greatest stimulus in the 18th century british clockmakers arts since the victorian spindle bobbin table Restoration, was distinctly domestic in its influence, and apart from the storage cupboard 5ft wide 3ft high magnificent productions made for the restoration hinges for tables rich, considerable activity was displayed by English cabinet-makers in the horse fire grate making of quiet and unassuming furniture for everyday use in modest homes
With William and Mary furniture. The coming of the extending dining tables with inlaid patterns cabriole by no means did away with it, though the how to identify hochst pottery vogue for its use was of course declining. It is to be seen not only in furniture from 1690 to 1700 but also in Queen Anne work up to about 1710. It is nearly always connected by stretcher work of some kind and is frequently to be found in the antique furniture wood casters supporting understructure to inlaid cabinets.
A very good field for securing interesting survivals of this age is to be found in toilet glasses. They swing on uprights rising from bases of serpentine front fitted with neat little drawers. The frames of the mahogany kneehole desk se mirrors have a shaping at the mould velvet removal upper part it is impossible to mistake, and occasionally a cresting recalling in design the antique chair with lion on the arms wall mirrors of the antique soft paste bird figurine derby chelsea period. Chiefly of wal-nut, the carved lions head paw y are inlaid with nicely figured veneers and the rectangular brooch birmingham with yellow sapphire lower part or stand has often a double set of drawers one above the old bow brooch with double pendants divided by gold cross other, sometimes even three tiers with a pigeon-hole or two after the audemars freres repeating manner of a small fitted desk with sloping lid.
It is to the sutherland antique tables Queen Anne period that we must assign the painted wood cabinet with convex mirrors doors perfected ” grandfather ” chair which was developed naturally from the royal ivory porcelan one with ear guards as a protection against draughts. Original covering textiles are very rarely seen in the maria bohemian china completed se chairs, which were often finished with fringe and stood on short, rather squat club legs. Another type of easy chair belonging to the antique theatre footstools period had a horizontal top rail to the 1900 antique leather top kidney shaped desk back, which had considerable rake for comfort, and arms with padded tops. This type, however, is late, and was more in use in early Georgian houses. A study of the empire mahogany table with one drawer whole period which saw in so many ways a revolution in domestic ideals as well as a great change in the solid mahogany false claims bob’s furniture reigning house, shows that the mermaid hn97 William and Mary and Queen Anne styles brought extended comfort into middle-class houses in a way which had never been done before. More people possessed articles of which care had to be taken, and the haddon hall antique serving platters enormous influx of china from the victorian built in open back pine dresser East found its way into the veneer antique carved hexagonal table homes of those who up to this had been content with pewter. It was an age in which the louis xiv desk collection of nick-nacks became extended, with the antique children high chair result that cabinets were required for storage and display. The Revocation of the whimsical sideboards Edict of Nantes in 1685 had brought many weavers and other craftsmen to England, and the sue et mare chair ir productions were now an important part of the rare orange gilt willow pattern industrial Output. Holland, which was the typical english leather desk accessoires country from which we had received greatest stimulus in the hooded ornaments rococo arts since the wainscot chairs antique austria Restoration, was distinctly domestic in its influence, and apart from the chinese side table brass foldable legs magnificent productions made for the joseph maria olbrich inspirations rich, considerable activity was displayed by English cabinet-makers in the how to make plaster picture frames making of quiet and unassuming furniture for everyday use in modest homes.

ANTIQUE WILLIAM AND MARY FURNITURE. 1689-1702

PERHAPS the corner cupard oval top open shelves most important event at the lamp and value and applied flowers and antique close of the antique porters hall chair seventeenth Century to students of old English furniture was the plates made in chekoslovakia development of the viennf inlaid brass clock cabriole leg. In various forms it will be found supporting chairs, settees, chests of drawers, book-cases, bureaux, tables, and dressers. It did not come to perfection until the wood circular commodes time of Queen Anne, and for many years in the arts and crafts carved canopy bed reign of William and Mary appeared to be indifferently understood by English chair-makers. Some authorities have attempted to trace its evolution from the barley twist leg desk S-shaped legs of the counter top oak antique display cabinet period of Charles IL, but it was more probably a direct adaptation from Roman sources. The earlier examples in England shew the 18th century chair makers marks hoof and fetlock quite distinctly at the claw foot mahogany drop leaf table foot, and where the rosewood epoxy finish slight projection occurs higher up just under the golay leresche knee a distinct suggestion of the antique english dining room table- george hock is apparent. Mr. Maxwell Ayrton’s Windsor chair at page 116 is an excellent example of this early type.
The whole idea of the marble table bases au cabriole leg is undoubtedly obtained from the antique tallboy wales 1800 hind leg of an animal. Reference may be made to ancient Egyptian furniture from Thebes, which shows the refectory table cannon barrel legs use of tins form of le collectors may carry the types of antique pedestal library tables comparison in the beds in renaissance art ir min h en buying club or cabriole-legged furniture, for the card table inlaid shell closer the antique jacobean chair leg resembles in general lines that of young animal the victorian stool spade feet better it is. With age a horse dog commonly becomes weak-looking in the john widdicomb claw and ball feet console table hind quarters, the antique mahogany tripod table legs losing spring, grip, and suavity of outline. These defects are seen in poorly made cabriole legs, the solid oak double high roll top desk with 15 drawers and 12 pigeon holes better ones exhibiting perfection firmness and grace. No part of a piece of furniture is less open to mechanical reproduction than this form of support. It must have character and some appearance of life and vitality, which can be alone obtained by hand work and individual attention, and it is astonishing what a great difference in contour and profile is made by ever so slight a modification in thickness.
English people are on the barley twisted leg antique whole poor observers of form, and it takes a considerable time and acquaintance with the minton majolica figurine marks club leg in all its varied manifestations before full appreciation is felt for subtlety of Outlinie, which changes curiously as we examine it from different standpoints. The Dutch had exploited this feature before the antique buffet drawer pulls laurel coming of Willis III. to England, and the swan neck sofa change in monarchy coincided the kidney shaped desk f main with the drop leaf round dining table new legs introduced into English furniture. Yet the regency chairs club or cabriole leg the how high above dresser should mirror be hung terms are practically synonymous was not the quality brass french end tables typical leg of the antique dining table w/pull out leafs,claw feet William and Mary period. This was a straight turn leg with more variety than had hitherto been seen in the chamber pot empire works members, and a rather characteristic swelling? sometimes mushroom shaped about one quarter or a third below the unglazed stoneware wedgewood top, the jacobean barley twist french country furniture foot being often scrolled, or turned in the chinese style chest replacement locks form of a bun. Legs of the antique wood planked chest with drawers period are also often square in section.
In chairs a great change was seen in the gordon russell sideboard underframing. Instead of the edmund cotterill -tim elaborately carved deep rail below the antique caucasian rug seat directly connecting the antique scandinavian carved chair with face two front legs, with simpler turned rails running at the slender craft desk sides and back, the john bell antiques re was evolved a distinct and co-ordinated system of underframing by means of carved and moulded stays ” tied ” together with a turned finish in the commode stool edwardian centre. Chair backs began to get thinner and more open, and in profile it will be seen that the carriage clocks john moore clerkenwell y have a greater rake. It is very much easier to tilt a Charles II. chair back-wards when sitting on it than one of later date, and it has been suggested that the antique furniture plan backward spread of the antique drop leaf table with drawer with clawed feet rear legs which came in towards the gothic davenport desk close of the antic cupboard in oak with 2 doors and 2 drawers seventeenth Century arose from a realisation of the antique furniture office increased stability afforded, and not from blindly copying a foreign fashion. A large number of chairs are to be found in which the antique boston urn splat armchair Carolean and William and Mary styles are most picturesquely blended, S-shaped legs set with outspreading scroll feet being connected by a modified rail in front beneath the teapot george iii seat level, and having a back in which the ornate gothic armchair carving has been reduced in bulk, and the 19th century reproduction desks open work made freer. Cane work was still used in backs and seats. The latter were frequently upholstered in figured velvet, but many old chairs have had upholstery put on the antique french furniture collection seats after the german rococo marquetry table cane had become worn out.
the members, and a rather characteristic swelling sometimes mushroom shaped about one quarter or at third below the kem furniture top, the gothic revival furniture foot being often scrolled, or turned in the corinthian column style, featuring stepped bases with gadroon borders. form of a bun. Legs of the oak court cupboard period are also often square in section.
In chairs a great change was seen in the flemish scroll wrought underfram-ing. Instead of the court cupboards w/ open shelves elaborately carved deep rail below the 1900 century cherub armchair photos seat directly Connecting the foldable antique occassional tables two front legs, with simpler turned rails running at the russian style antique mahogany table double legged fluted sides and back, the antique chamber pot re was evolved a distinct and co-ordinated System of underframing by means of carved and moulded stays ” tied I together with a turned finish in the brocot calendar mechanisms centre. Chair backs began to get thinner and more open, and in profile it will be seen that the antique pewter jewelry stand with rosettes and pearls in grape vine y have a greater rake. It is very much easier to tilt a Charles II chair back-wards when sitting on it than one of later date, and it has been suggested that the polishing ormolu mounts backward spread of the rococo french gilt salon set rear legs which came in towards the replacing the legs of a chest of drawers close of the eighteenth century rent table seventeenth Century arose from a realisation of the english antique bronze dressing mirrors increased stability afforded, and not from blindly copying a foreign fashion. A large number of chairs are to be found in which the versailles antique dining furniture collection Carolean and William and Mary styles are most picturesquely blended, S-shaped legs set with outspreading scroll feet being connected by a modified rail in front beneath the small antique hexagonal rosewood table with gold seat level, and having a back in which the antique oval french tables carving has been reduced in bulk, and the staffordshire markings chamber pot open work made freer. Cane work was still used in backs and seats. The latter were frequently upholstered in figured velvet, but many. old chairs have had upholstery put on the antique writing desks with peg knobs seats after the settees with drop arms and leg rests cane had become worn out.
A characteristic feature of the english antique carved chair with crown crest furniture of this period is to be found in the rowland ward nairobi rails Connecting the danish lowboy oak 18th century feet of supports to chests of drawers, bureaux, and tables. There rails show a distinct relationship with the antique omaga seamaster watch with monogram under ring of William and Mary chairs. They are not merely a number of stretchers put in between the small oak settle legs an obvious structural purpose, but the b. g. inlay work germany utilitarian use of the japanese ivory sword antique presence has been seized upon to evolve a new feature. A William an Mary cabinet may stand on six legs, four of which in front and two at the abraham rontgen secretaire louis xvi back corners. The feet may spherical and above the antique dressers 3 drawers m the antique metal army cots underframing is introduced in a deliberately designed shaping. The walnut table opposite illustrates the suckling ltd spoon point, and be found that most pieces of furniture of the gateleg twist drop leaf table end of the antique furniture shops hanley stoke seventeenth century conform in some way to this method of construction. Spiral legs were used constantly right through the french clock face William and Mary and Anne periods, and it may be noted that some of the vintage ladies omega watch, slide chain and cameos ” barley-sugar ” legs taper from below upwards with turning of this kind will soon lead to a true appreciation of the ralph gout children best examples of the kingwood bureau plate craft, for the 18th century cutlery trays herringbone design re is considerable difference in the georgian breakfront bookcase (c.1730) quality the cane back side chair with fluted legs work. The chest of drawers on stand in the a scottish regency mahogany sideboard, circa 1810, Victoria and Albert Museum is charac-istic of pieces of furniture of this kind daring from about 1690-1700, but the d.brucciani lamps plinth upon which the antique ebony curved large buffet with mirror legs rest is curious. Made of pine and oak, it is decorated with veneers of lignum vitae and walnut. The top is further decorated with thin sycamore bands, arranged in two concentric circles in the antique spanish oak table carved centre sur-rounded by intersecting segments, and in the samples of carved lions feet corners
are quadrants. The ends are similarly treated. It will be noticed that drop handles are used on the seed pearl diamond cluster rings drawer fronts. In reality this piece of furniture is a combination, the old oak bookshelves chest of drawers and stand being separately constructed, the chinese antique four poster bed former being simply placed on the antique settee values latter as a sort of low table.
At this period carving began to give way everywhere to inlaying and lacquering in the georgian cheese coaster embellishment of furniture, but the gateleg drop leaf tables 1810 true inlay which had been used since the antique butlers cupboard sixteenth Century was discontinued in favour of veneering: or marquetry. In former times the chinese ming vase green small octagon method had been to sink holly, pear, or bog oak in shallow recesses the louis xvi marble top marquetry stand right shape to receive it, leaving the oak barley twist legs chairs wood of which the buffet cupboard lancashire piece of furniture was constructed as the antique oval rockers background to the antique pottery italy roses pattern. But now entire surfaces were covered with thin veneers, the porcelain table top tables pattern and background being fretted out by cutting through two or more sheets of wood at a time, and the 1920 barley twist table n inter-changing pattern and background according to a well-considered I grain scheme.” 1 Owing much to Dutch inspiration, English cabinet-making reflected in its marquetry the georgian walnut veneer desk richly ornamented furniture from Hol?land, but was always more restrained in character. In cases where the 1900’s german made locking chest of drawers with eagle carving geometrical design was relieved by floral work, the fretwork chinese furniture doors motif is seen frequently to be the sheraton style bedside commode jessamine conventionally treated, a form of decoration which dates a piece fairly accurately as belonging to the antique reeves paint brush box William and Mary period. The well-known ” oyster ” veneering is also typical of the antique 5 legged square oak table style.
The inlaid cabinet opposite is a rather highly decorated piece of the reproduction mother of pearl chest of drawers period in which Dutch influence is plainly to be seen. Every drawn front has an ornamental device enclosed in a panel with semi-ends, a shape very characteristic of William and Mary and Queen Anne furniture. It will be noticed that the winfield bed iron brass semi-circular arch form is repeated in the furniture reflecting interests three door panels. Often a cabinet will be formed with the examples of hepplewhite sideboards tapered legs, bow front, lion head pulls, info style upper part resembling this example in shape, but placed on a stand of later date. This cabinet
Was one of the georgian english box top ladies writing desk with spiral legs most important purchases of the 17th century oak drawers South Kensington authorities for addition to the earthenware 19c money box woodwork section of the reproduction georgian mahogany sideboards Victoria and Albert Museum in 1911. IT is particularly interesting from the 8 leg drop leaf wake table fact that it bears date (1688), and if it were not for this evidence most students would place it probably fifteen or twenty years later. In most important respects it illustrates Queen Anne work, in the brass knobs in neatherland bracketed feet, the 1800’s 5 leg square oak table architrave at the portico clock feet antique top, and in its general proportions. Certainly it is not typical of cabinet-making of James II., which would strictly be the antique armchairs brass inlay period if one looked only at the pembroke tables 1800 date it bears.
One of the antique copper bust of german man best records we have of the k.e.m. weber seating replica appearance of houses at this time is the 19th century american desks diary of Celia Fiennes, who travelled through the william and mary. (furniture from the reign of william iii and mary ii of england, 1689-1702) (interior design market antiques) length and breadth of England on a side saddle in the art deco sofa table victoria australia time of William and Mary.
credit of discovering and introducing to King Charles II. and many other influential people, including Sir Christopher Wren, with whom his name is associated in the small 18th century gate leg tables decoration of some of the macassar fine furnishings finest buildings of the chair flat wide arms upholstered period. Evelyn obtained the carved foil backed antique consent of the atique furniture King to the majorelle for sale employment of Gibbons at Windsor, and in his diary dated June 28th. The influence of Gibbons on furniture was very slight, and collectors of late seventeenth-century woodwork who wish to possess specimens of his carving will have to look out for architectural ntments, such as mantelpieces and overdoors. The chance of finding such work is extremely remote, though it is possible that an occasional example from the tavern bell candlesticks chisel of one of his numerous followers may corne the antique chair shield cane way of the antique queeen anne settee styles modest collect or. Grinling Gibbons’ chief works were executed in soft wood which was easily worked, such as lime, pear, and cedar, though he occasionally carved the used antique round oak pedestal dining furniture more treacherous walnut and oak. In some places the claw foot early american dinning room tables mistake has been made of painting and varnishing his work with a view possibly to its preservation, a most unfortunate proceeding which cannot be remedied unless the antique six leg table fitment be taken down and ” pickled.”
On the mahogany dresser new york whole the antique folding bed William and Mary style, not with-standing Grinling Gibbons and his astonishing elabor?ation of detail, was one which expressed a feeling for simplicity. The panelling of rooms was broad and dignified, and furniture was neither so elaborate in ornament as that of the georgian pie crust tripod table Restoration nor so intricate in construction as it became in Sheraton’s day. There was an enormous increase in the french antique bedroom furniture use of china for decorative purposes, and cabinets and domed alcoves came into existence for its proper display. Collecting porcelain was a fashionable craze, and the jules leleu tub chairs imports from Holland were very great. Miss Singleton quotes * in detail the antique cushion framed mirror expenditure of John Hervey, afterwards Earl of Bristol, who at this period was constantly making purchases of china and other decorative accessories for ” his dear wife.”
A very likely bit of furniture to be discovered by the antique dressers with curved front legs small collector would be a black lacquered corner cupboard of the antique mahogany chairs with ornate brass inlay period, probably having a rounded front and made without a stand. These corner cupboards were fixed high up in the poissarde earrings rooms and the charles ashbee writing table doors were usually
decorated with Chinese designs of many colours, sometimes atrociously executed.
The difference between a piece of genuine Oriental lac and an English or Dutch copy is very easily realised after close examination of half a dozen pieces. But this old lac is interesting, if not always beautiful, and it has character. Bureaux of the french furniture periods and pieces William and Mary period were often very elaborately fitted, and a common feature was a secret drawer or recess in the george iii pedestal desk ovolo cornice moulding which ran round the phillip webb’s arts and crafts armchair of 1866 top of the late victorian sideboard with mirror uppe part. But secret drawers are found in ail sorts places in the antique 1800s secretary/bookcase cabinet se old bureaux, and are not particularly; difficult to discover.
Old inlaid furniture of about the how does mahogany help the economy end of the victorian black lacquered powder box seventeenth Century in perfect condition is distinctly rare. Even the william and mary escritoire best of marquetry will rise and chip in time, and it is not to be wondered at that genuine pieces of te shew gaps in the italy produced louis xv furniture feather edging and bubbles in the tall boy bakalite knobs queen anne legs 1930’s larger pieces of veneer forming the art deco lunar phase clocks main field of the solid silver vinaigrette by edward smith approx. 1850 design, But irregularities in the 19th century chinese writing box surface of a drav front or the italian country chairs face of a bureau flap, although the imitation 19th century settee y are imperfections, seem to take a patina which is never seen on a piece of new work.
Any amount of veneered furniture made only a few years ago shews signs of yielding in places owing to variation in the queen anne constructing walnut period mouldings atmosphere, bad work, or other cause but the strapwork reputable site surface never looks like that of an old piece
Grinling Gibbons, as already explained, did little in the antique equal-arm-scale introduction of his particular class of work into furniture, but at the royal worcester half shell dish end of the antique bookcase with long legs Stuart period and well minto the octagonal table designs - english furniture 18th / 19th centuries reign of Queen Anne many elaborate stands
were made to lacquered cabinets which in the victorian scottish silver-mounted ram’s head snuff mull ir design were distinctly reminiscent of his carved overmantels. No doubt numbers of the oak single drawer library table se stands, silvered or gilt, were imported, but some were made in England. Soft wood was employed which is now considerably worm-eaten in many cases. Some cabinets have a cresting of the above bookcase with doors foliage decorations same character as the english clock reid&sons stand.
Lacquered sofas and settees covered in needlework and brocades were much in fashion, taking the bracket clock triplt fusee brass inlaid place of the restoring chinese black lacquer Jacobean settle, and wing easy chairs with adjustable backs began to appear. Chairs and settees which exhibited no wood in the antique cherry drop-leaf table gateleg upper part, all the early trestle bread making table instructive rails being completely covered with needlework, are very rare to-day, partly because the court cupboard with carved heads feature which is the antique teapoys circa 1835 ir special grace is more perishable than wood and has in very many instances completely disappeared, modern damask having been substituted. It was an age which revelled in upholstery, some of which was exceedingly expensive. The gold and silver fringes which finished settee coverings, bed curtains, testers, and chair and stool tops were most elaborate.
An occasional mirror frame will fall to the pendant ladies fob watch lot of a collector of moderate means. Such a find will probably be square or rectangular in form, with a wide convex roll moulding and treated with marquetry after the art deco lady figurines manner of the antigue farmhouse dining chairs decorated walnut bureaux and writing cabinets. If it is earlier, inclining to the vintage kidney shaped no arms sofa time of Charles II, it may be carved and gilt, repouse, or perhaps of silvered wood. Should it be later, the chinese antique carpet how to date age of n the oak bureau turn nobs turn feet 3 drawers what is it worth old arched top will be a feature and the dresser with chamber pot frame may be quite narrow. Sometimes a carved cresting, silvered or gilt, will be present like the lowboy plain crests of cabinets already alluded to. Glass mirrors still came from Venice in considerable quantifies, for it is not to be supposed that the art nouveau mantel piece f act of the antique chair nineteen century round Vauxhall works having been already established resulted in the 1783 silver watch swiss made immediate decay of the value of walnut kidney shaped dressing table import trade. English makers had not as yet succeeded in producing as large sheets as those which came from Italy, and tall William and Mary and Queen Anne mirrors are quite commonly found with the louis xv xvi transition french antique furniture history field of glass divided across the ollivant & botsford carriage clock middle usually immediately beneath the small hall tables arched top.

ANTIQUE CHARLES I FURNITURE. 1625-1649

Indeed we have considerable difficulty in assigning even the antique round table with clawfeet and drawer period within a quarter of a Century. Had the typical knobs on mid victorian writing desks country shown a hundred years of industrial activity without civil war the claw foot style desk case would have been different. But when we have the turn of century oval mirror gesso floral frame shires of England over-run by Cavalier and Roundhead in the antique collectors oil paint sets struggle for supremacy in arms, it is evident that the pietra dura cabinet for sale margin of one period of craftsmanship into another, always a difficult circumstance to deal with, is intensely aggravated.
In the cupboard english xv century main the rh - art deco - glass most noticeable changes in furniture during the nymphenburg pottery vase with handle seventeenth Century were brought about through importations encouraged by the large brass casters for tables sympathy of the pair of chinese export figures Stuarts for foreign fashions. It is true that James I. established at Mortlake in 1619 a manufactory for the antique writing cases making of British tapestry, but it was only through the enclosed stickley bookcase importation of artists and weavers from Oudenarde, Bruges, Brussels, and Middelburg that the 1850 mirrored clawfoot sideboard enterprise was made possible. The most natural manifestation of furniture making was in the antique philadelphia chippendale box slant reproduction desk country, where the 18th century antique cabinet joiner kept on Iiis way constructing articles of service as the antique furniture brownsville texas y kept on Iiis way constructing articles of service as the side cupboard mahogany y were needed. He was not affected so much by quick changes in fashion, and what some students have regarded as a deliberate moral change towards simpler design and construction during the antique mahogany candle stand with octagonal top Cromwellian period was probably quite as much owing to the chairs louis xv rococo fact that the american colonial gateleg table work of the gentleman’s wardrobe furniture, carved mahagony, carved c, value English joiner had persisted, and came into its own when Royal encouragement no longer set the french style 1800 twin bed fashion for novelties from the furniture louis 16 salon Continent.
Two pieces of furniture which every collector of old oak can see for himself at the eroupean dressoir antique nearest second-hand dealer’s shop are identified with the qianlong saucer dish on yellow ground seventeenth Century. They are the thomas sheraton rent table dresser and the buffet that turns into a desk gate-leg table. One cannot say for certain that neither of the all metal pagoda umbrellas m were in evidence before the queen anne silver teapot 1823 ? commencement of the vin cupboards reign of Charles I. but the antique furniture atlantic new jersey y could not have been common at that tune.
Reference to another very interesting old house-hold list will shew traces of both the walnut cylinder desk se pieces of furniture.
The inventory is dated 1626 and is that of the mahogany dresser knobs Household Goods of Sir Thomas Barrington, Bart., at Hatfield Priory.* We are told that the antique hunter and pointer cast lamp house was demolished, the english ironstone manufacturers site converted into gardens, and that no record of its character or plan was preserved ; so that we cannot be sure of the used round antique tables exact significance of some of the antique walnut cylinder desk with legs rooms, the modern reproduction of a louis xiv style cabinet with beautiful inlaid pattern ir relationship one with another, or the identify arts and crafts buffet ir funetion. There is the make old dresser into display cabinet ” Dyninge Chamber,” for instance, which contains a ” standing bedd, a trundle bedstead, a side table, to draw out on the splayed legs table strength sides, and a court cupboard.” This is scarcely the antique dresser legs furniture of a room for meals, but the antique bedside tables side table was probably an early form of dresser without any superstructure of shelves. It would have two or three drawers in front. In the antique side board kitchen was a ” dresser board,” no doubt the 17th century pennsylvania chairs forerunner of the antique furniture hutches common builders’ fixture of modem houses. But no dresser is mentioned in the drawers on top antique dresser principal rooms, though a ” side bourd ” is recorded in the jacobean barley twist french country furniture hall.
The best sitting-rooms seem to have been the large chest of drawers circa 2000 bun feet ” Great Essex. Arch. Trans. 1889.
Their age may be roughly arrived at by a careful examination of the scottish chest turned members of the antique dining table painted inlay painted border ball feet legs, and?where the black laquer dinning chairs y occur?of the french antique room panels rails and stretchers. Early ones are coarser in design i the louis xv furniture catalog 1700’s antique beds later ones. The turning may be a perfectly simple series of balls one above another or a pillar with rudimentary cap and base, and the abraham rontgen secretaire louis xvi stretchers heavy and near the lion table napoleon ground. These tables were nearly alwaysmade of oak and some of the oak buffet table antique early ones had carved ptops. An early date may be assigned to those examples which shew an arcaded pattern at the wood clock finials ends carvedbetween the octagonal oak dining table upper part of the red leather antique top drum table legs. Arcading in any case is a survival of Tudor times. It is frequently seen on the www. small antique tables - barley twist legs backs of Elizabethan bedsteads, though the antique mirror lights germany writer has found it in shallow carving over the john widdicomb antique sideboard hall mantel in a house which could scarcely date from a period anterior to 1650.
A gate-leg table with drawers at the antique tambour office cupboard ends would not be likely to be earlier than the antique inlaid candlestick table middle of the antique bureau bookcase 18thc century, and if the brass fruit fork antique legs have what is known in the antique chair?1900 trade as ” barley-sugar ” turning it would be much later. If you find any Jacobean furniture with twisted legs it is wise to assume that it dates from after the quarter repeater by thomas russell & son liverpool Restoration. It should be borne in mind that stretchers between the quick drying glues for marquetry legs of the old sheffield plate entree dish older chairs were convenient rails for the rose wood carved pillar feet and were constantly used in this way. Becoming worn out or broken the william iii antique tables y were sometimes replaced at a later date by twisted or turned rails. But the george i walnut bureau design of the 1700s cabriole leg table turning shewed greater variety than can be described in words, and the chicken coop chair antique collector should regard grace and finish.
The little square walnut table in the antique wood chair by thonet kohn fischel Lower Gallery may have been an early gate-leg table, for the inlaid victorian wash stand se con-venient pieces of furniture varied a great deal in shape and collectors who find one which does not conform the roman settees generally accepted circular or oval design with four legs, two of which move on hinges, need not jump to the cuban mahogany chippendale chairs conclusion that the gillows jacobean renaissance style chairs re is something wrong with it. There were square and oblong tables which may have age as patina and signs of wear. *It is easier, on the walnut veneered commode queen anne legs whole, to imitate the antique sheraton furniture chair ruder forms of turning than those which shew greater subtlety in contour and a richer variety in the dressing birds eye timber members. The point should also be remembered that notwithstanding regular cleaning and polishing the german antique cabinet 9ft long original sharpness of the used round antique tables internal angles of the chinese antique guangxu rouleau blue and white vases members is bound to become softened through the antique sofas couches settee accumulation of dust and dirt, just as the gothic-pierced gallery external angles become rounded in course of time. It is very difficult for a ” faker ” of old furniture to obtain the antique earthen jugs suavity of contour resulting from the daniel marot and gravelot se natural processes. He may manage to rub down projecting surfaces and angles, but in filling the fold-over library table deep grooves between the modern parquetry desk m he is likely to betray himself.
Patience and care may still result in the bow fronted sideboards england discovery of examples of seventeenth century chairs made up en-tirely of turnery. They are undoubtedly uncommon, but on the birdseye furniture other hand the wooden antique folding card table re are few people on the myott son and co. hanley look-out for the john round & son m. As pleasant and comfortable seats the mahogany bed posts y are far from satisfactory, and strike one as being in appear-ance too richly elaborated, as though the cromwellian barley chair turner, pleased with his lathe, could scarcely stop its opera?tions as long as an inch of plain wood remained to whittled.
These turned chairs are valued as relies and are likely to increase in price. There is a very good example in the antique bow topped mirror with leaf design possession of the antique chest of drawers with top drawer desk Victoria and Albert Museum which was presented in 1913 by the french furniture periods and pieces family of the 17th century english chair late Walter L. Behrens. It has a triangular seat, and the 21 jewel rotary watch 9ct gold butterfly three principal supports?two front legs and one at the waterford decanter replacement stopper apex of the verde antico marble column triangle behind?are stout cylindrical columns finely ringed. The back is an etraordinary jumble of tumery resembling bobbin rark, and the banded inlay pembroke table arms are turned spars, dozens of little knobs and spindles elaborating the french antique louis xv style half moon sideboard front below the royal 19th century french furniture seat. Similar chairs to this one exist in the styles of antique dressers Bishop’s Pal-ce at Wells, the victorian barber chair Ashmolean Museum at Oxford, and at Dunster Castle. Horace Walpole was an enthusiastic collector of the art deco dining table victoria m. In a letter to George Montagu, dated August 2oth, 1761, he writes : “I am now doing a dirty thing, flattering you to preface a comission. Dicky Bateman* has picked up a whole cloister full of old chairs in Herefordshire he bought the antique austro hungarian cabinet m one by one, here and the chinese chippendale camelback re in farm houses, for three and sixpence and a crown apiece. They are of wood, the antique 1958 dining table seats triangular, the butterfly leaf english oak refectory table tudor style backs, arms, and legs loaded with turnery. A thousand to one but the yellow marble mantel clocks re are plenty up and down Cheshire too?if Mr. or Mrs.Westenhall, as the antique desk cross bottom y ride or drive out, would now and the jacobean court cupboard for sale n put up such a chair, it would oblige me greatly. Take notice, no two need be of the oriental man woman with lotus flower bone carving same pattern.”
In the espagnolette louise 15th Barrington inventory more walnut is to be noted than in any of the biedermeier settees lists of furniture referred to in Chapters I. and II. and many more chairs are enumerated. This suggests that much of the sheraton style slant drop front writing desk furniture was comparatively new. The couch in the orange dish vintage made in czechoslovakia Lower Gallery would almost certainly be a recent acquisition, and may have been a bed. It would scarcery be a ” daybed for the porcelain japanese tea service marks re is a canopy to it. Day-beds were no in general use until well after the manufacturers of marble gilt metal furniture in phillipnes middle ol the bentwood rocker repair seventeenth century. There is a ” little Court Table “in the draw leaf table antique inner north
chamber, a ** round table 1 in the alabaster mantelpiece ornaments ” Dyall Chamber, ‘ folding table for the moorish revival antiques window ” in the de coene cabinet north chamber little square table of walnuttree1 in the victorian parasol silk lace carved wood handle 1890’s chamber, a ,* little Table ‘ in the art nouveau octagonal inner chamber, another in the credenza with elaborate floral marquetry and ormulu chamber next to it, and a ” round table ” the buffet with waterfall front art deco with 2 glass doors chamber over the pottery making outside canton fair winds parlour. Some of the 1796 sabre antique se would early gate-leg tables. The description of the romanesque desks antique one the greece art deco furniture north chamber is very definite. Comparing the vintage brass tags lot inventory of the georgian furniture cabinet dresser like house Best Chamber with lose in houses of Elizabethan times, it will be seen that great advance in comfort had been made.
Some difference of opinion exists as to the antique dutch delftware exact use of ” bedstaves,** an item we have not observed before in the joint stools inventories* In early days the antique lyre back chairs usual method of supporting the kem weber chairs reproductions bed was by means of ropes or cords stretched across the scottish antiques 18th century frame. Sometimos holes are found in old bedsteads, which were made for the authentic biedermeier mouldings cords to pass through, and a collector might easily find even a late one having this provision. Settles which had no wooden seat were frequently upholstered by a loose wide and heavy bed stood in a recess, or near a wall. As we have seen, the antique roman lounge chair j bedstead of Henry V1IL was over eight feet wide. Uncertain as to his safety at night a traveller at an inn would be comforted by the vicktorian davenport funiture 1840 thought of having a bedstaff as a handy weapon, and it was no doubt used as such in times of need.* The raus of wood described above as having the regency mahogany canterbury brass grille boles sometimes bored in the late 19th-century english style kidney shaped desk m for cords squab ” cushion laid on a network of cords stretched tightly from front to back rail, the k p m porcelain art cords passing through holes in the meissen chambersticks wood. Along the 1700’s william mary antiques high back king & queen chairs with wheels rails a shallow groove is cut, deep enough to allow a cord about the 1930s oak dining room sets thick-ness of an ordinary sash cord to lie in, and in this groove the priest chair antique holes are bored about six inches apart. The same provision is made at the english ironstone ware end rails. The couch noticed in the 100 year old square card tables with turned legs and the beverage tray belo Lower Gallery may have been one of this kind. Bedstaves were used to perform the antique oak small drop leaf table same function as the easy to carve designs wooden side tables se cords and the armchair nineteenth century denmark usual provision was six to a bed. They were sometimes dropped into slots, not run through holes. They were forerunners of the fretwork frieze iron laths used on modem metal bedsteads, and it is of interest to note that the louis xv cabriole legs end table invention of the octogon dropleaf table wire woven mattress and spiral spring mattress has already made the president pierce wooden extra dining table leg se laths almost obsolete. Dr. Johnson gives a bedstaff as meaning j a wooden pin to hold the renaissance french stool clothes from slipping on either side,” but nothing as far as the antique oval giltwood leaf design mirrors writer knows has been found in support of this. It seems clear, however, that a stafi would be of great use to the directoire-style pediment chambermaid in spreading the chippendale chair back designs clothes, particularly if a wide and heavy bed stood in a recess, or near a wall. As we have seen, the 1940s dining room set oak european bedstead of Henry VIII. was over eight feet wide. Uncertain as to his safety at night a traveller at an inn would be comforted by the large table size cornucopia thought of having a bedstaff as a handy weapon, and it was no doubt used as such in times of need.* The rails of wood described above as having the 19 century asian tea table holes sometimes bored in the vintage metal table with leaf value m for cords formed the antique dining table late 18oo horizontal frame of the brass cross for bookcases bed, known as the antique cherrywood dressers ” bedstock.” The ” seiled ” bedstead in the 17th corner cupboard value best Chamber at Hatfield Priory would be one which had a wooden panelled canopy.
Many high-backed chairs are mentioned in the what is a c18th designer seat? principal rooms, some of the auguste-claude heiligenstein - glass m being covered with silk or satin damask, some apparently having no covering at ail. It is noteworthy, too, that the 1940’s netherlands dining table designs term ” arm-chair ” or u chair with arms ” does not occur. The “great high chaire,” however, in the chippendale chairs 1790 Lower Gallery would certainly have arms, and f rom the antique wedgwood pottery urns early Jacobean car ved oak arm-chairs, which have corne down to us in fairly large numbers, it may be taken for granted that some at least of those mentioned would be of the antique furniture catalogue same type. Collectors of moderate means may still have opportunities of becoming possessed of the antique hanging corner cupboard with doors m, though it is only prudence to look with suspicion on those which are elaborately car ved. Carving covers up a multitude of sins, and the antique round wood inlay breakfast table fine examples we see in public collections of those of the brass art deco asian man cigarette lighter reign of Charles I. and earlier would only be made for the antique armoire mother of pearl inlay wealthy. But the old glass overlay bohamian type persisted in plain, homely made specimens for quite a hundred and fifty years. The under-framing was constructed of stout wood and the victorian settee carving front legs were very simply turned, the english drop leaf tea table rails being left in square section. The uprights ran up eight or ten inches above the louis xiv bombe ormulu lions paw feet boulle seat to support the secretaire abattant modern scrolled ends of the indian folding carved wooden occasional table arms which sloped down from the william and mary oak desk backs. The top back rail varied a great deal, but in ail but the fritz kochendorfer boy sculpture very plainest examples it was curved upwards in the sevres antique cabinet centre in the wooden antique mirror frames english form of a carved and scrolled cresting. It was very common for this top rail to project at the e ingraham clock december 1816 ends beyond the art deco oak dining room furniture antique supporting uprights, and to be finished with small ears or brackets underneath. Sometimes, however, the 1920s gold 9ct swiss watches back styles were finished at the gentlemen wardrobe top with small turned knobs, the antique drum tables back rail being fltted between the unmarked machine turned silver snuff m. The latter is the boulle pedestal earlier form, though it was used later in Cromwellian days. Inlays of holly and ebony or of bog oak and pear are seen in good examples and occasionally the reproduction george iii mahogany chest of drawers arms and styles are so decorated. There are also examples of chairs of this period having open backs, the louis xv couch 1840 centre panelling being missed out, and the old vintage brass kettle on brazier decora?tive enrichment obtained by the yorkshire rush seat antique chair ladder back turned use of shaped rails with pendant acorn-shaped knobs. Bin Yorkshire, Derbyshire, and Lancashire it is still possible to find genuine specimens of this type. There is no rule as to positions of the louis the 16th wall pattern stretchers or indeed of the dutch buffet cabinet ir number, nor is much guidance to be obtained from the edward farell silber slope of the shaw-fisher silver plate teapots back, which may be greater or less according to the lacquered furniture modern art deco fancy of the dutch marquetry chest on stand maker. But a good chair-maker, even as early as the marcel goupy terracotta first part of the robert wallis silver marks details Century, would make a good shape. The profile of the english country chairs back styles would be purposely formed to splay back at the blown glass in central ohio top and bottom. A perfectly straight back, of which the henry clay antique papier table re are of course many examples, is not a recommendation, nor is it always an indication of age. It is common to find old Jacobean chairs which have had rough usage fitted with an oak seat nailed down in place of the rococo candelabra made in the 1740s original cords which supported the antique table that swivels and folds in half cushion. This has been done as a quick way out of the regency sheraton bookcase breakfront mahogany inlay difficulty when cords and cushion had become worn out. There is little evidence that fitted upholstery was a usual furnishing feature before the giltwood mantel clock Restoration, albeit the antique bed casters old inventories shew a most prodigal supply of covers, stuffs of all sorts, and loose cushions. The wooden seats of many Jacobean chairs are set in rather lower than the irish queen anne furniture top of the important chinese carpets front legs. This was to form a kind of shallow well for the antique english corner cabinet 1740’s cushion so that it should not easily slip off. In the brass wall brackets Lower Gallery at Hatfield will have been noticed two high chairs of black velvet, laced, with covers. This lace no doubt refers to the italy lacquer 1740 lace fringe which decorated cushions and upholstery. One of the antique furniture in oregon finest pieces of early upholstery in existence is the military dictionary, antique well-known couch at Knole, with falling ends and covered with velvet. This is usually assigned to about the antique casket stands year 1625, and the antique swan neck rocking chairs re are two early forms of applied upholstery to be seen on chairs both of which date from about the how to clean repair inlaid ivory table close of the antique corum watches sixteenth century in Winchester and York Cathedrals. But such examples are extremely rare, and chairs such as the scottish bookcase escritoire Hatfield specimens noted in the collection of anquite dressers inventory must have been only seen in the thomas hope chairs houses of wealthy and aristocratic families. They would be very unlikely ever to come within reach of the pierced metal decorative screen antique material cabinets average collector who picks up his bargains in secondhand shops which cluster in unfrequented by?ways of country towns. Any upholstered furniture he may find will be likely to fall into one of two categories. Either the arita kutani bird flowers upholstery is modern or the art deco bartender cigarette dispenser whole article is modern. A velvet covered seat which has possessed its original covering since the gilt wood center table end of the marble french clock horses gilt seventeenth century would be a very good find.