Black as Jet

QUESTION: I recently purchased a beautiful shiny black brooch that’s made of a very hard material, almost like stone. I’ve never seen anything like it. Can you tell me what it’s made of and something about it?

ANSWER: It looks like you’ve discovered a piece of Victorian mourning jewelry. One of the primary materials used to make pieces like your brooch was jet, a hard type of coal found along the Yorkshire coast of England.

On December 14, 1861, Queen  Victoria woke to find that her beloved husband, Albert, had died in his sleep of typhoid. Deeply distressed, Victoria went into full mourning and the England, out of respect and love for her, followed her example. An atmosphere of grief permeated English society. It was customary during this time for a widow to remain in full mourning for two years, and then half mourning for six months, but Queen Victoria never stopped grieving.

During the last half of the 19th century in the United States, especially after the Civil War, death was rampant and grief overshadowed both the North and South. More than a million lives were lost. When the war officially ended on April 9, 1865, a crippled nation already reeling  from the devastation of war became shrouded with grief.

Symbolic images of sorrow, love and devotion were the custom at the time. Men and women wore carved and molded pieces of mourning jewelry, an acceptable behavior during the  bereavement period. But by the 1890s, fashion and attitude had lightened, and people tucked the mementos of grief away for posterity.

In the early 1860s, the material of choice for black jewelry was jet, a hard type of lignite coal.  The best jet, found along the rocky Yorkshire shoreline, had a compact mineral structure making it strong enough to withstand carving and turning on a lathe. Jet also retained a high polish and resisted fading. As a result, an industry grew up around the mining and fabrication of jet during the mid-19th century in the small coastal village of Whitby.

At one time, the natural supply of jet was so plentiful that people could find substantial chunks of the shiny black substance washed up along the shore. Eventually however, the supply of true jet dwindled, so a replacement had to be found. Jet miners discovered coal in lower York which they mined from estuary beds where the tide washed into fresh water channels. However, this alternative jet was inferior to the original. It was soft and didn’t respond to carving and polishing as well as the Whitby variety.

The jet industry then turned to other sources for their supplies, importing jet from Spain and Cannel bituminous coal from Scotland to Whitby for use in making mourning jewelry. While these types of coal lacked hardness and luster, both were still better than the coal from southern Yorkshire. Artisans soon began carving jewelry components from these alternatives, and then combined them with decorative components fashioned from true Whitby jet.

When supplies of alternative jet became difficult to come by, fabricators sought other black materials, including black onyx and French jet; also called Vauxhall. Both became equally popular. In reality, French jet and Vauxhall are black glass, and it became an excellent substitute for true jet because it remained shiny and wouldn’t fade. It’s often difficult to tell the difference between authentic and faux jet by sight alone. Handling the materials immediately tells the difference. Black glass is heavy and cold to the touch because it doesn’t conduct heat, whereas true jet is light and room temperature. The details on carved jet items are often clean and sharp, while molded black glass may not be as defined and can also show signs of chipping or flaking.

Jet wasn't the only black colored`natural material that jewelry makers used to carve into mourning items. Bog Oak, a brownish black fossilized peat found deep in the bogs of Ireland,  is dark, lightweight and room temperature. It may appear to have a slight wood grain visible through its matte surface. Jewelry makers also used ebony, the heavy, tight-grained dark wood from the ebonaceae tree, to carve into jewelry items.

But for the Victorians, jet symbolized the deep emotional tie to a loved one through death.

The Quest for Artistic Furniture

QUESTION:  I inherited this chair from my mom but have no information on it. The only markings on the chair are “AT2-232” written with a marker on the bottom of the seat and “678” stamped into the wood on the bottom of the seat. Can you provide any information on the chair?

ANSWER: Your chair is made in the Art Nouveau style. It would have been a dining or desk chair in its day since it doesn’t have a padded seat. The number 678 on the bottom is probably the manufacturer’s model number. Many pieces of Art Nouveau furniture were mass-produced even though your chair looks as if it was handmade.

Art Nouveau or Jugendstil is an international philosophy and style of art and applied art—especially the decorative arts—that was popular from about 1890 to 1910. Art nouveau literally means "new art" in French.

Those two names came Gallerie Maison de l'Art Nouveau in Paris and the magazine Jugend in Munich, both of which popularized the style. Maison de l'Art Nouveau, or the House of New Art, was the name of the gallery opened in 1895 by German art dealer Siegfried Bing that featured exclusively modern art. In 1900, Bing produced an exhibition of color-coordinated modern furniture, tapestries, and objets d’art at the Exposition Universelle. Because his decorative displays became so strongly associated with this style, the style, itself, took on the name of his gallery, "Art Nouveau."

Inspired by natural forms, such as flowers and plants, Art Nouveau was a reaction to academic art of the 19th century and artists used lots of curved lines in their designs.

Though the Art Nouveau movement was innovative, it didn’t last long. It was important in American furniture history, however, because it heralded the end of the dismal darkness that was the close of the Victorian era. Rebelling against the overembellished furniture that flooded the furniture marketplace of the late 1890s, some European designers developed new ideas that found immediate approval with wealthy collectors. They began designing furniture and accessories with simple, flowing, fluid lines, taking their cues from nature, with its motion, curves, and endless cycling. Fairylike tendrils wove in, out, and around the leaves and stems of flowers, fruit, and nuts. The entire effect was one of delicate sensuality and naturalness, with faint overtones of sentimental decadence.

The Art Nouveau years found their greatest expression in accessories, not furniture. This was the era that fostered the whirlwind careers of Louis Comfort Tiffany and others who worked in glass, china, pottery, and metal. Those substances were far easier to shape into the undulating styles of the time than was wood. Most wooden furniture during this period was custom-made and therefore usually of good quality and fine woods, featuring asymmetrical lines, as well as stylized animal and plant forms.

Art Nouveau is a "total" art style, embracing architecture, graphic art, interior design, and most of the decorative arts including jewelery, furniture, textiles, household silver and other utensils and lighting, as well as the fine arts. Artists desired to combine the fine arts and applied arts, even for utilitarian objects, such as tableware, cigarette cases, and silverware. Art historians consider it an important transition between the eclectic historic revival styles of the 19th-century and Modernism.

Three international art exhibitions—the Barcelona Universal Exposition of 1888, the Exposition Universelle of 1900 in Paris, and the Esposizione Internazionale d'Arte Decorativa Moderna of 1902 in Turin, Italy— showcased an overview of this modern style in every medium.

Like most design styles, Art Nouveau sought to harmonize and modernize forms of the Rococo style, such as flame and shell textures. Artists and designers also advocated the use of stylized organic forms as a source of inspiration, and expanded their use of natural forms with seaweed, grasses, and insects.

But unlike the craftsman-oriented Arts and Crafts Movement, the artists of the Art Nouveau Movement  used new materials, machined surfaces, and abstraction in their designs. The stylized nature of Art Nouveau design made it expensive to produce, therefore, only the wealthy could afford it. Unlike furniture handmade by the craftsmen of the Arts and Crafts Movement, that of the Art Nouveau Movement was produced in factories by normal manufacturing techniques. Finishes were highly polished or varnished, and designs in general were usually complex, with curving shapes.

Several notable designers of Art Nouveau furniture were also architects who designed furniture for specific buildings they had also designed, a way of working inherited from the Arts and Crafts Movement. One such designer is Antoni Gaudí, who produced many notable buildings in and around Barcelona, Spain.

A Sign of Welcome

QUESTION: At a number of Americana antique shows I’ve attended, I’ve seen pineapples used as decoration, especially on pieces of furniture from the 18th century. Can you tell me why cabinetmakers used them so much?

ANSWER: Pineapples have long been associated with Southern hospitality. Many people associate pineapples with Colonial Williamsburg. Perhaps that’s because it began decorating with them in the 1930s. But the idea didn’t start there.

Christopher Columbus discovered pineapples in 1493 on the Caribbean island of Guadeloupe. Since the fresh sweet fruit wasn’t available back home, his crew looked on it with awe and wonder. In Renaissance Europe, fresh fruit was seldom available. Common sweets were also rare. Sugar derived from cane was expensive and had to be imported from the Middle East and Asia.

In the West Indies, however, pineapples were a plentiful native fruit. So much so that the locals used it to both warn away intruders and welcome guests. They planted barriers of pineapple around their village because they believed their sharp, spiky leaves deterred unwelcome visitors. But they also hung the fruit on their gates as a symbol of hospitality and abundance.

Columbus and his men brought these sweet, succulent fruits back to Europe where they became instantly popular. But not everyone embraced the spiky fruit. When Charles V, King of Spain and Holy Roman Emperor had an early opportunity to taste the pineapple, he refused, fearing that it might poison him.

In 1657, Captain Richard Ligon published A True and Exact Story of Barbados, an account of his travels from London to the West Indies. In his journal, he devoted entire pages to the pineapple.

Diaries of the time often recorded gifts of pineapples presented to the king, and late 17th century ship manifests listed pineapples making their way from Barbados and Bermuda to England.

European gardeners perfected a hothouse method for growing pineapples, and in 1675, John Rose presented King Charles II of England with the first pineapple grown in England. The king later posed for an official portrait of him receiving the pineapple as a gift. The act was symbolic of royal privilege.

During the 18th century in England, greenhouse gardening became a popular hobby for the nobility, who coveted pineapples. The fruits often served double duty at dinner parties, first as an elaborate table decoration, and then as dessert.

The Spanish were probably the first to adopt the pineapple as a symbol of hospitality, carving pineapple designs into much of their woodwork: The custom soon spread throughout Europe, where it became fashionable to incorporate pineapple motifs into furnishings. Eventually, cabinetmakers adorned tall case clocks with pineapple finials. This custom continued into the early 20th century.

Sea captains, who sailed to the Caribbean Islands and returned to the New England Colonies with cargoes of fruit, spices and rum, first introduced the pineapple as a symbol of hospitality in America. Upon their return, the captains would spear a pineapple on the fence post outside their home, where it would serve as an invitation for friends to visit and share their food, drink, and tales of adventure.

Before long, American innkeepers adopted the pineapple as a means of welcoming guests. Inns would feature pineapple motifs on their signs and advertising literature, while pineapple-related items within their establishment included carvings on bedposts, vanities and dressers along with furniture, brasses, doorknobs, lamps and candleholders.

American architects also embraced the pineapple. Early estates and public buildings often have carved wooden or stone pineapple gate posts and copper or brass pineapple weather vanes. One such example is the home of Virginia's William Byrd. In 1730, Byrd ordered a carved door surround from London for his Westover plantation mansion on the James River. The door featured a broken-scroll pediment with a pineapple in the center.

The pineapple continued to find its way into home decor. Carpets, draperies, napkins and tablecloths often had pineapple designs woven into them. And women stitched pineapples into their quilts and needlework.