Category Illustrated History Of Furniture

The Great Exhibition: Exhibitors and contemporary Cabinet Mahers—Exhibition of 1862, London; 1867, Paris; and subsequently—Description of Illustrations— Fourdinois, Wright, and Mansfield—The South Kensington Museum—Revival of Marquetry—Comparison of Present Day with that of a Hundred Years ago— Mstheticism—Traditions—Trades-Unionism—The Arts and Crafts Exhibition Society—Independence of Furniture—Present Fashions—Writers on Design—Modern Furniture in other Countries—Concluding Remarks,

n the previous chapter attention has been called to the success of the National Exhibition in Paris of 1849; in the same year the competition of our manufacturers at Birmingham gave an impetus to Industrial Art in England, and there was about this time a general forward movement...

In the Court Room of the Skinners’ Company there are tables which are now used’ with extensions, so as to form a horseshoe table for committee meetings. They are good examples of the heavy and solid carving in mahogany, early in the century before the fashion had gone out of representing the heads and feet of animals in the designs of furniture. These tables have massive legs, with lion’s heads and claws, carved with great skill and shewing much spirit, the wood being of the best quality and rich in color.

In the work of the manufacturers just enumerated, may be traced the influence of the "Empire" style...

The French Revolution and First Empire—Influence on design of Napoleon’s Campaigns—The Cabinet presented to Marie Louise—Dutch Furniture of the time— English Furniture—Sheraton’s later work—Thomas Hope, architect—George Smith’s designs—Fashion during the Regency—Gothic revival—Seddon’s Furniture—Other Makers—Influence on design of the Restoration in France—Furniture of William IV...

In the chapter on Louis XV. and Louis XVI. furniture, it has been shewn how France went through a similar change about this same period. In Chippendale’s chairs and console tables, in his state bedsteads and his lamp-stands, one can recognise the broken scrolls and curved lines, so familiar in the bronze mountings of Caffieri. The influence of the change which had occurred in France during the Louis Seize period is equally evident in the Adams’ treatment. It was helped forward by the migration into this country of skilled workmen from France, during the troubles of the revolution at the end of the century. Some of Chippendale’s designs bear such titles as "French chairs" or a "Bombe-fronted Commode." These

might have appeared as illustrations in a contemporary book on Frenc...

Chinese style—Sir William Chambers—The Brothers Adams’ work—Pergelesi, Cipriani, and Angelica Rauffmann—Architects of the time—Wedgwood and Flaxman—Chippendale’s Work and his Contemporaries—Chair in the Barbers’ Hall— Lock, Shearer, Hepplewhite, Ince, Mayhew, Sheraton—Introduction of Satinwood and Mahogany—Gillows of Lancaster and London—History of the Sideboard—The Dining Room—Furniture of the time.

oon after the second half of the eighteenth century had set in, during the latter days of the second George, and the early part of his successor’s long reign, there is a distinct change in the design of English decorative furniture.

Sir William Chambers, R. A...

It is probable that for some little time previous to the death of Louis XV., the influence of the beautiful daughter of Maria Theresa on the fashions of the day was manifested in furniture and its accessories. We know that Marie Antoinette disliked the pomp and ceremony of Court functions, and preferred a simpler way of living at the favourite farm house which was given to her husband as a residence on his marriage, four years before his accession to the throne; and here she delighted to mix with the bourgeoise on the terrace at Versailles, or, donning a simple dress of white muslin, would busy herself in the garden or dairy...

When the old King died, at the ripe age of 77, the crown devolved on his great – grandson, then a child five years old, and therefore a Regency became necessary; and this period of some eight years, until the death of Philip, Duke of Orleans, in 1723, when the King was declared to have attained his majority at the age of 13, is known as L’Epooh de la Regenee, and is a landmark in the history of furniture.

There was a great change about this period of French history in the social condition of the upper classes in France. The pomp and extravagance of the late monarch had emptied the coffers of the noblesse, and in order to recruit their finances, marriages became common which a decade or two before that time would hardly have been thought possible...

Palace of Versailles: "Grand" and "Petit Trianon"—-the three Styles of Louis XIV., XV. and XVI.—Colbert and Lebrun—Andre Charles Boule and his Work—Carved and Gilt Furniture—The Regency and its Influence—Alteration in Condition of French Society—Watteau,, Lancret, and Boucher. Louis XV. Furniture: Famous Ebenistes— Vernis Martin Furniture—Caffieri and Gouthiere Mountings—Sevres Porcelain introduced into Cabinets—Gobelins Tapestry—The "Bureau du Roi." Louis XVI. and Marie Antoinette: The Queen’s Influence—The Painters Chardin and Greuze—More simple Designs—Characteristic Ornaments of Louis XVI...

While the changes of fashion in Western, as contrasted with Eastern countries, are comparatively rapid, the record of two or three centuries presenting a history of great and well-defined alterations in manners, customs, and therefore, of furniture, the more conservative Oriental has been content to reproduce, from generation to generation, the traditions of his forefathers; and we find that, from the time of the Moorish conquest and spread of Arabesque design, no radical change in Saracenic Art occurred until French and English energy and enterprise forced European fashions into Egypt: as a consequence, the original quaintness and Orientalism natural to the country, are being gradually replaced by buildings, decoration, and furniture of European fashion.

The carved pulpit, from a mosque i...

The Persians have from time immemorial been an artistic people, and their style of Art throughout successive conquests and generations has varied but little.

Major-General Murdoch Smith, R. E., the present Director of the branch of the South Kensington Museum in Edinburgh, who resided for some years in Persia, and had the assistance when there of M. Richard (a well-known French antiquarian), made a collection of objets d’art some years ago for the Science and Art Department, which is now in the Kensington Museum, but it contains comparatively little that can be actually termed furniture; and it is extremely difficult to meet with important specimens of ornamental wordwork of native workmanship. Those in the Museum, and in other collections, are generally small

ornamental articles...