9 Ways to Help Identify Antique Furniture

QUESTION: Some friends of my mom’s gave me what looks like a Chippendale desk. They didn’t know anything about it, so I’ve had to do some research on my own. The only problem is that I can’t seem to find out much about it. Can you please help me out?

ANSWER: Not only will I try to tell you something about your desk, I’d like to give you and others some tips on what to look for when trying to identify antique furniture.

First and foremost, you need to determine if the piece you have is really an authentic antique or whether it’s a reproduction, a revival piece, a fake, or just a piece of junk. The key to the history of valuable antiques is whether they have a provenance—a history of ownership. This document lists the maker, all the owners to the present, and whether any repairs have been done to it. If you were spending five or six figures for a piece of furniture, you certainly would want to know everything you can about it.

But what about everyday pieces that don’t come with a provenance. Identifying them is a bit more difficult. Follow these steps and you should be able to determine quite a bit about any older piece of furniture that you have.

1. Determine the style. Using photographs in antiques books and photos online, try to determine the style of your piece. Certain styles, such as Chippendale, have telltale features, such as ball-and-claw feet, that help to identify them.

2. If it’s not authentic, determine if your piece is a revival or a reproduction. The difference between a revival and a reproduction is quite simple. The first is stylized version of the original style. So Colonial Revival furniture represents stylized versions of true 18th-century American Colonial pieces. A reproduction, on the other hand, is an exact replica of the original, often made of the same type of wood, using the same woodworking techniques.

3. Determine its age. Check to see if it has any nails or screws. An original Chippendale desk would have been assembled with pegs and mortar and tenon joints. Does it have any manufacturers labels anywhere? If so, then it’s definitely a Colonial Revival piece or even a fine reproduction from the mid-20th century.

4. Check any drawers for dovetailing. You can usually tell if the dovetails are handmade or done by machine. Those done by machine are very regular and even and can usually be found on pieces after about 1870.

5. Look inside the drawers or pullouts and see if the maker used the same wood—for example, mahogany. Later versions will have used some sort of fruitwood---pear, apple, or even poplar---for the drawer backs and sides. If its an older piece, the drawer bottoms will be made of a thinner version of the same wood.

6. Does the piece have decoration that isn’t in keeping with its style? Look at the detailing on your piece of furniture. Does it have added knobs or edging that doesn’t seem to go with the style of the piece. Often one of the owners of the piece may have added these to make it more up to date. The opposite also applies. Can you tell if any details have been removed for the sake of updating?.

7. Have any repairs been made to the piece? Look for signs of glue, nails, or screws that seem newer than the piece, itself. Also look for replaced wood panels, veneer, or detailing, such as finials.

8. Has the hardware been replaced or is it original? You can usually tell if hardware has been replaced. For instance, you’ll often see chests of drawers sporting glass or brass knobs. Originally, these chests usually had wooden knobs, but antique dealers, in an effort to make them more attractive to decorators, replace the original knobs with glass or brass ones. It’s actually better to replace missing original knob with a reproduction rather than replace the entire set with hardware that wouldn’t have been originally on the piece.

9. Were you told anything it about it? Did the seller or the person who gave you the piece tell you anything about its past? Did you ask them?

By studying the closeup photos that accompany this blog, you’ll notice the following about this desk.

First, your desk is definitely from the late 19th century---I’d say probably the 1880s, based on the 1886 mark you found. Second, the dovetails are definitely 19th century. But the real signs are the nails or screws that appear in one of the photos and the rather poor craftsmanship of the carving and joining. In an authentic Chippendale, the wood would be perfectly matched---the top of the leg where it joins the desk is a good example. Also, the stain would be even. I believe this piece had been refinished at some point, and not very well. I can tell that from the molding closeup from the front rim of the desk. And the last sign is the carving, itself. The little stars were stamped in. No 18th-century craftsman would have ever done that.

When asking someone to help you identify a piece, it helps if you take closeup photos of certain parts of the piece—hardware, dovetails, inside of drawers, carving, repairs, even the back.

Let the Sun Shine In

QUESTION: I recently purchased a very thin summer quilt with a sunburst pattern. It really brightens up my day to see the sun spread out on my bed. How did women come up with patterns like this? Do you have any idea of how old it might be?

ANSWER: Patterned quilts have been around for a long time. While some appeared in Colonial times, the peak time for pattern quilts was the latter half of the 19th century. Amish women still meticulously hand-sew them, both for home use and for sale to tourists. Most quilts take hundreds of hours of work, so they’re priced rather high. Although some individuals did make the older ones, the most intricate ones were the result of a group of women sewing together in what became known as a “quilting bee.” This not only produced a quilt but provided a time for socializing and exchanging news and gossip. Yours looks to have been made by an individual, perhaps in the early 20th century.

During the years between the American Revolution and the beginning of the westward migration, bedcovers blossomed with cotton cutouts salvaged from leftover bits of expensive European chintz. Women carefully snipped around the bird and floral motifs of the imported chintzes and appliquéd them on fields of plain domestic cloth to make the most of the patterned fabric available to them. Known as patchwork quilts, these served a practical purpose—to keep people warm in bed at night.

But it was during the years of the westward journey, from 1840 to 1870, that women stitched the majority of patchwork quilts. As families moved west, fabric became scarce, so women creatively used what they had. While their Colonial forebearers used bits of leftover fabric, pioneer women also used pieces of old clothing and household linens. They stitched these scraps together in designated patterns with some pretty folksy names—the Hole in the Barn Door, Rocky Mountain Puzzle, Log Cabin, Galaxy of Stars, and hundreds of others that reflected the joys and sorrows of pioneer women’s lives. Only rarely did quilters use new pieces of cloth.

Another type of quilt popular at the time was the crazy quilt, a seemingly wild pattern made more coherent by a series of straight seams. Because of a lack of space and quilting supplies, individual pioneer women often assembled lap-sized quilts suitable for throwing over the legs when riding in a wagon or carriage in cold weather.

The dust on the westward movement slowly settled as howling locomotives took the place of the swaying Conestoga. Hastily thrown up shanties made way for gingerbread mansions filled to the rafters with sumptuous furnishings and awash with a rainbow of brilliant colors. The quilts of the late 1800s illustrate the extravagance of the Victorian age. In fact, the quilts that most typify those years when Victoria last reigned in England aren’t really quilts at all, but thin parlor throws meant to thrill the eye—not warm the body. At home on the tabletops, sofa arms, and piano backs of overstuffed parlors, these throws had neither quilting nor batting. Yet, in their own splashy way, they are as much masterworks of American stitchery as their pioneer predecessors.

Pieced from the best silks, satins, and velvets—materials newly available to the growing middle class—the patchwork throws of this era are rich mosaics of color and texture, emphasizing proficiency in embroidery and the mastering of different types of stitches. Women's magazines of the day printed detailed embroidery instructions for anyone to follow.

In an unprecedented outpouring of sentimentality, Victorian quilters filled their work with bits and pieces of their personal past: Father's vest pocket, lace from a wedding veil, ribbons commemorating political events or visits to faraway lands.

The First Lawn Chair

QUESTION: We’ve had a Windsor chair in our family as far back as I can remember. I believe it belonged to my great-great grandmother. Today, I use it as a chair at my computer desk. What can you tell me about this chair?

ANSWER: You have a standard bow-back Windsor chair, the kind found in just about every upper class household in Colonial America. While most people consider them delicate antiques, they’re quite sturdy and have many uses.

Today, the ubiquitous white modeled plastic patio chair appears on decks and patios throughout the world. It’s a serviceable chair, easily stacked and stored. But this isn’t the first chair of its kind. In fact, the lowly Windsor chair holds that honor.

One of the most graceful and usable of all traditional chairs, the Windsor is also the most successful piece of furniture in American history. Its origins, however, are English, dating back to the turned and joined stools of 16th-Century England. The name probably derives from Windsor, where a prolific chairmaker  produced and sold the chairs in the 18th Century. He sent them down the Thames River to London where people referred to them as coming "up from Windsor."

Wheelwrights rather than cabinetmakers made Windsor chairs in England. They remained farmhouse or tavern furniture for a long time. But here in America, homeowners embraced the Windsor as a sort of all-around chair. They could be stored in a hallway and brought into any room that needed more seating when guests arrived. They could be easily carried. And they could be brought outdoors to provide seating on the lawn on hot summer days. Even the most prominent members of Colonial communities used them. George Washington seated his guests on the East portico of Mount Vernon in 30 Windsor chairs.

As a piece of furniture, the Windsor holds historical significance. Thomas Jefferson sat in a bow-back. writing-arm Windsor while composing the first draft of the Declaration of Independence in late June of 1776. And when Benjamin Franklin and other members of the Continental Congress voted to secede from the mother country on , July 1, 1776 in Independence Hall, they sat in bow-back Windsors.

There are eight different kinds of American Windsors, including the low-back, or Philadelphia Windsor, named for the city where a craftsman constructed the first Windsor in the colonies, the comb-back, fan-back, bow-back, loop-back, arch-back or New England armchair, rod-back, and arrow-back. Each had its distinct use. Windsor makers socketed all parts together except for the shaped arms of the fan-back, arrow-back, and rod-back chairs. On these, they doweled the inner ends of the arms or screwed them to the back uprights.

Windsor makers preferred pine, whitewood, and basswood for seats, hickory or ash for spindles, maple. yellow birch, or beech for turned legs. stretchers, and supports, and hickory, oak, ash, or beech for hoops. bows, or combs. And because of this, makers gave their Windsors several coats of dark green paint. In the 19th century, small factory workshops produced Windsors of pine and maple. And even to this day, craftsmen still use the same time-tested techniques for constructing reproduction Windsors.

The most common form of Windsor is the bow-back with its elliptical seat and seven tapered spindles that pierce a semi-circular arm rail and bowed top rail.

The Sleeping Chayre

QUESTION: Recently I purchased an old wingback chair at a local antique shop. It seems very old to me since it has ball and claw feet, plus it’s upholstery looks good but older in style, leading me to believe it had been done long ago. But I’m puzzled about the springs supporting the upper pillow. Perhaps they were also added at a later time. Can you tell me more about this type of chair and how old this one might be?

ANSWER: Unfortunately, your wing chair isn’t as old as you think. It dates from the Great Depression of the 1930s and would be considered a Colonial Revival piece. What led you to believe the chair was older were its ball and claw feet, made popular by Thomas Chippendale in the mid-18th century in England.

The Chippendale style of furniture remained popular until the end of the 18th century when interest in it disappeared until the Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia in 1876. The fair inspired furniture makers to re-create the styles of the American Colonial Period until all such furniture became known as Colonial Revival or just “period” furniture. Chippendale created chair designs for comfort, unlike the still, but stylish designs of Federal ones. His wingback chair offered the ultimate in comfort.

But where did the idea for a chair with wings originate? As early as the 17th century, people living in cold weather areas gathered by their fireplaces on crude wooden benches to keep warm. As the century progressed cabinetmakers added high backs with small wings to these benches. While they were functional, they were far from comfortable.

Furniture historians believe they originally intended the wings to prevent drafts from reaching the upper body of those who sat in these chairs. The chairs also prevented the immense heat a roaring fireplace fire from affecting the makeup of ladies who might be sitting too close to it. Makeup then was clay-based and tended to run when heated.

Unlike other chairs, wingbacks offered a greater level of comfort and beauty. With the onset of the 18-century, chairmakers began incorporating upholstery into their wingbacks. Chippendale molded the wingback design by adding elegant frames such as oversized wings and scrolling arms to offset the upholstery. However, most of his designs did not have a pillow seat. Instead, the upholstery was stretched over the springs and small amount of padding. The “knees” of the chair were also chunkier and lower to the ground than those of Sheraton and Hepplewhite.

Also called fireside chairs, wingbacks allowed a person sitting by the fireside to catch the heat while eliminating cold drafts from creeping around their back or sides, so chairmakers developed a new kind of chair known as the “Sleeping Chayre.” Not only did this chair have wings, enabling the sitter to stay warm, it’s back could also rachet to different angles for sleeping.

This led to an unusual use in the 18th century. Respiratory diseases were rampant back then, and people commonly believed that it was better for the sick person to sit up to prevent fluid from accumulating in their lungs. So wingback chairs eventually found a home by the fireplace in American Colonial bedrooms.

It was often common to find two of these chairs—one for the master and one for the mistress of the house—facing a small round table by the fireplace in the master bedroom of the house. Colonial couples often took their supper, known back then as “high tea,” in the warmth and comfort of their bedroom rather than in the drafty dining room downstairs.

Towards the 19-century, chairmakers generously stuffed wingbacks with horsehair for an added dose of padding. Covered in velvet or needlework to imitate contemporary French styles, they sported bright patterns and ornate fabric embellishments.