Posts tagged "furniture"
Posted by Chris under Furniture Commentary on July 28, 2009
That's right: this here is a genuine IKEA tin desk machine-crafted around Y2K, about 20 years before WWIII. It is only one of 900 copies surviving from the original batch of 85,000...
Is this the future of antiques? I confess to actually running these kinds of narratives through my mind as I try to grasp what tomorrow's furniture world will be like. How long can our current pool of antiques last? Eventually, I suppose they will all break, rust, shatter or otherwise vanish into the thin air of history until the last remaining specimens become an endangered species of craftsmanship. So if we aren't producing new quality furniture, we are doomed to run out.
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Tags: furniture, philip k. dick, IKEA
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Posted by Chris under Furniture Commentary on July 21, 2009
Anybody who knows antiques and the reproductions that follow them knows that familiarizing yourself with various furniture periods can be a big help. That's why we decided to offer our readers a few useful summaries of the major furniture periods of England, starting with one of the first. This post is the 5th in a series of 7, continued from a discussion of Georgian furniture.
Regency furniture developed in the latter decades of the Georgian period, and represented the culmination of neoclassical design. While the years previous to the 19th century saw simpler furniture designs and less rich ornamentation, Regency furniture featured the development of embellished adornment and extravagance, thus anticipating the exoticism of Victorian furniture. Regency furniture grew so popular across the Atlantic that Americans adopted their own version, known as Federal style furniture, which lingered on a few decades after Regency styles fell out of favour in England.
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Tags: furniture, history, regency, george iv, georgian, empire
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Posted by under Furniture Commentary on July 15, 2009
A friend of mine asked me the other day about how I distinguish different wood types. Now, I only regularly deal with a limited selection of wood types, but there are two basic facts that you need to know.
1. The first, most important thing I could say on the subject is this: there is no such thing as a "cherry finish" (to name the most popular example). This is a misnomer invented for the convenience of cheap synthetic veneers made to look like cherry (or any other wood type), and the term has simply become so popular that it has come to incorrectly apply to real and imitation cherry alike. Finishing is the process of staining and coating applied to a wood.
2. The way to identify wood is by its grain—not by its color. There is, again, no such thing as a "cherry color." Before staining, nearly all wood simply looks, in color at least, like the normal timber you'll find at any hardware store. This is why you will find, for example, oak furniture that is very light, or orange, or even black (as when it is ebonized). Some woods, however, tend to be a certain color, like yew, which tends to be orange-ish, and all woods take differently to different stains. However, the rule still stands: you identify wood by its grain.
It is difficult to explain what each grain looks like, but it is easy to show with pictures. Just see the following. (Click on the pictures for larger sizes.)
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Tags: furniture, tips, wood
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Posted by Chris under Furniture Commentary on July 01, 2009
Anybody who knows antiques and the reproductions that follow them knows that familiarizing yourself with various furniture periods can be a big help. That's why we decided to offer our readers a few useful summaries of the major furniture periods of England, starting with one of the first. This post is the 4th in a series of 7, continued from a discussion of Queen Anne furniture.
Such was the rich, compelling character of Georgian period art and design that most English reproduction office furniture today is modeled directly after Georgian style examples. In fact, our office furniture collection owes virtually all of its designs and many of its construction techniques to the efforts of the master craftsmen of the Georgian and Victorian periods.
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Tags: furniture, history, georgian
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Posted by Chris under Furniture Commentary on June 23, 2009
Anybody who knows antiques and the reproductions that follow them knows that familiarizing yourself with various furniture periods can be a big help. That's why we decided to offer our readers a few useful summaries of the major furniture periods of England, starting with one of the first. This post is the 3rd in a series of 7, continued from a discussion of Jacobean furniture.
Remembered most for its recurrence near the end of the 19th century in the Queen Anne Revival (c1870-c1900), Queen Anne period furniture marks an important turn in English furniture history. Like many other aspects of English culture, Queen Anne style furniture grew quite popular in America, particularly during the Revival period just after the American Federal style tapered off. Although usually characterized by stylistic developments, this time also saw the introduction of mahogany into English furniture-making, which would become quite popular later in the 18th century.
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Tags: furniture, history, queen anne
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Posted by Chris under Furniture Commentary on June 19, 2009
Many people ask us how to tell the difference between dovetails that are cut by hand and those that are cut by machine. Once you know, it's fairly easy to tell. Just have a look at these pictures:
Click on the above pictures to view them in larger sizes
The picture on the left is an example of machine-cut dovetails. Note how square they are, and how many. The dovetails on the right, however, have been cut by hand, and are narrower, tapered, and fewer. Whether or not dovetails are hand-cut is one of many indicators of age when dating an antique, since machine-cut dovetails entered into prominence after the
Edwardian Period.
Tags: dovetails, furniture
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Posted by Chris under Furniture Commentary on June 16, 2009
Anybody who knows antiques and the reproductions that follow them knows that familiarizing yourself with various furniture periods can be a big help. That's why we decided to offer our readers a few useful summaries of the major furniture periods of England, starting with one of the first. This post is the 2nd in a series of 7, continued from a discussion of Elizabethan furniture.
As a time that saw the emergence of King James I’s famous Bible as well as the Virginia colony of Jamestown and some of the finest English art ever (including Shakespeare and Milton), the Jacobean period also preceded the regicide of King Charles I and the bloody English Civil War that followed. Many of the tensions that exploded in those years mounted during King James I’s reign, and so this period represents a very important period in English history. Perhaps it is for this reason that Jacobean history has always been seen with a distinctness and clarity that other periods have seldom attained. As for Jacobean furniture style, it has survived mostly through the styles that succeeded it, particularly as a result of 19th century Eclectic Revivalism.
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Tags: furniture, history, jacobean
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Posted by Chris under Company News on June 12, 2009
This month's container arrived a few days ago and we thought we'd share a couple of our favourite items with you.
When we found the grandfather clock in England, we knew we had to bring it home. The clock dates back all the way to the Georgian period, around 1815, and is made of quartersawn oak and flame mahogany. This particular clock is unusual because it is in near perfect condition, with very few nicks and a new French polish.
The cane-backed armchair is one of a set of 6 that arrived in excellent condition, which is unusual for cane furniture. They date from c1920.
The adorable little side table, made with flame mahogany, is a c1920 reproduction of a Georgian Period antique.
Tags: container, arrivals, furniture, clock, chair, table
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Posted by Chris under Furniture Commentary on June 04, 2009
Anybody who knows antiques and the reproductions that follow them knows that familiarizing yourself with various furniture periods can be a big help. That's why we decided to offer our readers a few useful summaries of the major furniture periods of England, starting with one of the first. This will be the first in a series of seven posts, so stick around!
Named after the long reign of Queen Elizabeth I (1558-1603), the Elizabethan period marks the end of the Tudor style, itself named after the Tudor monarchs, beginning with the accession of Henry VII in 1485 and ending with Queen Elizabeth herself (read more about Tudor history). For the most part, the Tudor style featured a replacement of medieval designs (which followed Roman models) by those that developed out of the Renaissance. Elizabethan period furniture did see a return to some of the older medieval and Gothic styles, manifested partly in the Elizabethan tendency to use heavy furniture.
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Tags: furniture, history, elizabethan, tudor, medieval
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Posted by Chris under Furniture Commentary on June 02, 2009
We often see people who are in the market for antiques but don't know where to look, or how. So we decided to put together a helpful list of tips to help make buying antique furniture easier for our readers.
1. Take measurements—before leaving.
Many people leave the home or office without knowing how large or small they need their furniture to be. After all the effort of finding the perfect antique, learning that it won't fit through your doorway can be a real downer—you may also find yourself coming back the next day only to see a sold sticker on your favourite table, or having to leave a show on its last day. So take measurements and come prepared with pen, notepad, tape measure, and camera in hand. Now that you are prepared, you can begin looking for the perfect antique.
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Tags: furniture, tips, veneer
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