Form Follows Function

 

QUESTION: While I normally associated blonde furniture with the 1950s, I was surprised to see a chest at a recent antique show that the dealer said dated to the early 19th century. She referred to it as Biedermeier, after a design movement in Vienna. Austria. Can you tell me more about this style of furniture/? I’ve never seen anything like it. 

ANSWER: Biedermeier was a German-based decorative movement which spread throughout Europe from 1815 to 1848. The style’s name came from Ludwig Eichrodt and Adolf Kussmaul, who depicted the typical bourgeois of the period under the name "Gottfried Biedermeier."–"Gott" meaning "God," fried" meaning "peace," "Bieder" meaning "commonplace,"_meier" meaning "steward"—in their Fliegende Blatter (Pamphlets), a Viennese journal of the day. However, it wasn’t called Biedermeier until 1886, when Georg Hirth wrote a book about 19th-century interior design and used the word "Biedermeier" to describe domestic German furniture of the 1820s and 1830s.

Biedermeier furniture suited the modest size and needs of comfortable bourgeois households.  In middle-class homes, with fewer separate rooms, the concept of the Wohninsel, or "living island," became popular. This made it possible to perform a number of activities in one room—writing, sewing, music making—each characterized by different furniture.

The “living island,” or as it’s known today living room, usually included an ottoman, several armchairs and chairs upholstered in woolen material, sometimes in silk or damask; a round table, a mirror and where possible a glass-fronted case for silver and a piano. The less severe appearance of Biedermeier furniture led to a less formal arrangement of rooms as a whole. Flowers, screens, worktables and knickknacks of all sorts helped to give a sense of family life. The bourgeoisie began to form a personal style, thus creating what’s now known as interior design.

People arranged suites of furniture in the corners, creating areas for eating, chatting,  reading, and doing embroidery. Each had a sofa, table and chairs—the most numerous items created in the Biedermeier style.

Prior to 1830, Viennese cabinetmakers began using mahogany in their furniture, gradually replacing walnut. They gave their finished pieces a light finish, often applying matching stains and finishes to pieces made in walnut, pear wood, and Hungarian "watered" ash.

Cabinetmakers used boards to construct their pieces, which meant that they designed furniture to be seen from the front and executed its ornamentation, such as relief pillars, pilasters, and caryatids, with this in mind.

And by 1830 Viennese craftsmen no longer relied upon French, German, and Italian designers for inspiration. Instead, they used native products, creating pieces based on Directoire and Empire designs, showing a good understanding of form, balance and the use of ornament in gilded bronze.

Viennese cabinetmakers used mostly veneers over a soft wood frame. Inlay served as the main decorative element, featuring the patterned graining of walnut and often reduced to a light-colored border. Sometimes, craftsmen used black poplar or bird's eye maple and colored woods such as cherry and pear also became popular.

Biedermeier furniture makers used gold and black paint to decorate their pieces. They constructed drawers and their housings so perfect and fitted that, even today, when someone pulls out a larger drawer and returns it, the other drawers in the same bank are propelled forward by the force of air created. They also dovetailed, molded and finished drawer linings, making intervening partitions flush on top and paneled beneath.

Cabinetmakers also employed less expensive stamped brass wreaths and festoons rather than bronze for decorative effect and gilded wooden stars instead of the elaborate metal ornaments of the Empire style. Sometimes, they chose cheaper, new materials such as pressed paper.

No previous period produced such a wealth of different types of seating, with a myriad of variations on the basic scheme of four legs, a seat, and a back. From 1815 to 1835, Biedermeier craftsmen discovered that a chair could be given literally hundreds of different shapes. Upholsterers padded their creations with horse-hair and covered them with brightly colored velvet and calico. Pleated fabrics covered furniture, walls, ceilings, and alcoves.

By the 1840s the Biedermeier style became romanticized—straight lines became curved and serpentine; simple surfaces became more and more embellished beyond the natural materials; humanistic form became more fantastic; and textures became experimental.

An identifying feature of Biedermeier furniture is its extremely restrained geometric appearance. Some furniture took on new roles; for example, a table became the family table, around which chairs were set for evening activities. Or table tops could be placed against the wall in a vertical position. A portable piano had a drawer for sewing things, while the upper drawer of a chest of drawers might be converted into a writing desk.

Next to the secretary, the sofa was one of the most popular of Biedermeier pieces. Rectangular, with a high back and sides, sofas looked deceptively hard. In fact, their depth and solidity made them very comfortable.

Armchairs, too, became more comfortable as changing fashions permitted men to sit back and take their ease.

Secretaries were popular as more people wrote letters. While designs varied, most featured a central niche, a mirror, and secret drawers. Cabinetmakers also produced veneered cupboards, vitrines, and wardrobes. 

To read more articles on antiques, please visit the Antiques Articles section of my Web site.  And to stay up to the minute on antiques and collectibles, please join the over 30,000 readers by following my free online magazine, #TheAntiquesAlmanac. Learn more about "Return to Toyland" in the 2024 Holiday Edition, online now. And to read daily posts about unique objects from the past and their histories, like the #Antiques and More Collection on Facebook.

Choo Choo Chugging Around the Christmas Tree

 

QUESTION: Every Christmas since I can remember, our family has got out an old tine train set that belonged to my grandfather and set it up under the Christmas tree. It still runs and is in good condition. All we know is that the set was made by a German company named Märklin. What can you tell us about this company?

ANSWER: From the looks of your train, I’d say it dates from the 1920s or 1930s. At the time, these trains were more toys than authentic models. Their design reflects the boxy look of European trains rather than the sleeker, simpler lines of American ones.

As the 1930s dawned, the Great Depression forced millions of people out of work. Owning an electric toy train was the ultimate. Kids even loved observing the trains displayed in department store windows. What could be more rewarding to a young boy than to receive a model train for Christmas? But these little trains were expensive so were out of reach of many families. 

Manufacturers lovingly handcrafted the earliest toy trains, made prior to 1850, of shining brass to run on the bare floor. But by the late 1830's, a number of prosperous toy companies began producing toy trains.  Around 1856, George W. Brown, a Connecticut firm, produced the first self-propelled train made of iron and  coated with tin to prevent rust. A wind up clockwork motor drove the engine and carriages on plush Victorian carpets on straight or curved tracks.

In 1859, tin smith Theodor Friedrich Wilhelm Märklin began producing doll house accessories made of lacquered tinplate. Although the Märklin Toy Company of Germany originally specialized in doll house accessories, It became known for its toy trains.

By the 1870's, the most popular trains were powered by steam. Utilizing alcohol or sometimes coal to propel. they duplicated the might and energy of their big, big brothers.

The tin toy makers in both Europe and the U.S. realized that profits could be made by selling toy trains to the masses and jumped on the toy model bandwagon. Early on, they set their sights on wealthier people by promoting their products’ snob appeal.

In 1891, Märklin began producing wind-up toy trains that ran on expandable sectional tracks and the following year created a sensation by making the first figure eight track layout. It also established a track gauge settings numbered from 0 to 4, which it presented that year at the Leipzig Toy Fair. These track gauges soon became international standards. Märklin began producing 0 gauge trains as early as 1895 and H0 scale in 1935. In 1972, the company rolled out diminutive Z scale trains, the smallest in the world in competition to  Arnold Rapido's introduction of N gauge.

Märklin’s owners noted that toy trains, like doll houses, offered the potential for future profits when, after the initial purchase, owners would expand by purchasing accessories for years to come. So, the company offered additional rolling stock and track with which to expand its boxed sets.

Electric trains became commercially successful by 1897 when the Cincinnati, Ohio, firm of Carlisle and Finch manufactured and sold a two-gauge unit for only three dollars, It also was the first to issue a model railway builder's instruction manual.

Many consider the years prior to World War I to be the "Golden Age" of quality model trains. As the war approached, manufacturers converted their factories to produce war monitions, rifles and replacement parts. The Depression that followed the war precluded many of these operators from coming back and many disappeared.

But Märklin continued producing toy trains until May 11, 2006 when Kingsbridge, a London venture capital company, took it over. The company filed for bankruptcy on February 4, 2009, but on February 5, 2010, after purchasing the rival LGB Company, announced it had returned to profitable state. Many consider Märklin's older trains highly collectible today.

To read more articles on antiques, please visit the Antiques Articles section of my Web site.  And to stay up to the minute on antiques and collectibles, please join the over 30,000 readers by following my free online magazine, #TheAntiquesAlmanac. Learn more about "Lady Luck" in the 2024 Fall Edition, online now. And to read daily posts about unique objects from the past and their histories, like the #Antiques and More Collection on Facebook.

The World in Miniature

 

QUESTION: My great grandfather made a dollhouse for his daughter, who passed it down to her daughter, my grandmother, who passed it on to her daughter, my mother, who then passed it on to me. It’s a grand house, all handmade of wood. He styled it to the Victorian houses of the time. Over the years, each owner furnished it differently using both commercially made and homemade furnishings. When did little girls begin playing with dollhouses? And does my dollhouse have any value?

ANSWER: Dollhouses, in one form or another, have existed for centuries, most likely beginning with the ancient Egyptians. Archaeologists discovered the earliest known examples in the Egyptian tombs of the Old Kingdom, created nearly 5,000 years ago. They placed small clay replicas of their houses and belongings in and around burials to provide the comforts of home to the deceased in the afterlife. Although today’s dollhouses are different from these ancient ones, they include purposes other than play. Over the last five centuries, dollhouses have evolved from elaborate displays for adults, to household teaching tools, to objects of imagination  for children. 

Today's dollhouses can be traced back to the 16th century’s German baby house display cases, later found in The Netherlands and England. Known as a “dockenhaus,” meaning miniature house, “cabinet house,” or “baby house” (because of its size), these handcrafted items were not initially made for children to play with—they served as display cases for wealthy adults to fill with miniature furniture, fabrics, and artwork that reflected their own taste and lifestyle. 

One of the earliest examples of a dollhouse  was the Munich Baby House. Albrecht V, Duke of Bavaria, commissioned it between 1557 and 1558. It consisted of a cabinet display case made up of individual rooms. Dollhouses of this period showed idealized interiors complete with detailed furnishings and accessories. Artisans built cabinets by hand with architectural details, filled with miniature household items. The baby moniker referred to the scale of the houses rather than them being for babies. They were off-limits to children and were meant to house trophy collections of wealthy women. 

In the early 17th century, baby houses took on a more practical purpose. Nuremberg houses and Nuremberg kitchens, named for their primary place of manufacture in Germany, emerged as educational tools to teach young women how to decorate and care for a household. These versions of baby houses were less ornamental than their predecessors, typically made entirely out of metal and sometimes consisting of just a kitchen. But they were no less meticulous, featuring tiny handcrafted brooms, kettles, copper cooking pots, and mini masonry hearths at the heart of the kitchen. 

Between 1686 and 1710, gentlemen often possessed "cabinets of curiosities" to hold collections of various objects they had acquired in their lives and travels: indeed such a cabinet would often reside in a small reception room. In the Amsterdam of the Dutch Golden Age, their wealthy wives similarly created dollhouses as status symbols. 

By the 18th century, baby houses had become popular in England. The term “baby” in the baby house came from the Old English word meaning doll. These structures commonly had detailed and realistic facades, including doors and windows, informing what we commonly think of as the classic Victorian dollhouse. Craftsmen often modeled them after the owner’s home, and although they still functioned as displays of opulence, caring for them and decorating them also became a beloved hobby for women. Until the mid-18th century, dollhouses were unique, one-of-a-kind creations.

Most people know dollhouses as toy houses made in miniature. Since the early 20th century, dollhouses have been primarily for children, but the collection of them is for  adults.

Originally, dollhouses weren’t made to scale. By the time manufacturers began to mass produce them, the scale of 1:12 or 1" scale became the standard.

Germany produced the most prized dollhouses and doll house miniatures up until World War I. The doll houses were produced in Nuremberg, Germany; which, since the 16th century, was coined as the 'toy city.' Their baby houses were thought to be the origin for the basic standards of contemporary doll houses. Notable German miniature companies included Märklin, Christian Hacker, Moritz Reichel, Rock and Graner, and others.

The Bliss Manufacturing mass-produced the first dollhouses in the United States in the 1890s, even as the U.S. imported them and miniature furnishings from Germany. Despite becoming more mainstream in the early 1900s, dollhouses didn’t become affordable for most families until after World War II. The postwar economic boom, along with increased manufacturing materials and abilities, made them fixtures in playrooms throughout country.

The TynieToy Company of Providence, Rhode Island, made authentic replicas of American antique houses and furniture in a uniform scale beginning in about 1917. Other American companies of the early 20th century were Roger Williams Toys, Tootsietoy, Schoenhut, and the Wisconsin Toy Company. 

After World War II, manufacturers produced dollhouses in factories on a larger scale with less detailed craftsmanship than before. By the 1950s, the typical dollhouse was made of painted sheet metal filled with plastic furniture. Such houses cost little enough that the majority of girls could own one.

In the United States, most houses have an open back and a fancy facade, while British houses are more likely to have a hinged front that opens to reveal the rooms.

To read more articles on antiques, please visit the Antiques Articles section of my Web site.  And to stay up to the minute on antiques and collectibles, please join the over 30,000 readers by following my free online magazine, #TheAntiquesAlmanac. Learn more about "Lady Luck" in the 2024 Fall Edition, online now. And to read daily posts about unique objects from the past and their histories, like the #Antiques and More Collection on Facebook.

Portable Timekeepers

QUESTION: My grandfather left me the pocket watch he had received on his retirement. The watch is a Waltham. It still works but I’m not sure if it keeps good time. I already have a wristwatch and a smartphone, so I really don’t need this pocket watch. Is this watch collectible? If so, would it be a good idea for me to start a collection of them?

ANSWER: Your grandfather probably didn’t use his pocket watch very much. Businesses commonly gave gold pocket watches to members of their management staff upon their retirement. Before you do anything, you should take his watch to a watchmaker to have it checked and cleaned. Chances are, the watch is in like-new condition.

Pocket watches date back to the early 16th century. German locksmith Peter Henlein from Nuremburg invented the first to portable timepiece. Henlein also invented a spring-driven mechanism which made the personal timepiece possible. Spiral springs could be wound and uncoiled to move the hour hand of the clock. However, this mechanism was highly inaccurate because coiled springs don't unwind at a constant speed. But having a timepiece people could or wear on a chain, even if it was off by an hour or so, was a great improvement.

However, Henlein’s portable clock had a heavy drum-shaped brass box-like case, typically four or five inches wide and abut three inches thick, take up too much space in a person’s pouch. Unfortunately, pickpockets could easily snatch a pouch worn outside a person's clothing, so cautious people began to hide their pocket clock inside their clothing. This proved to be uncomfortable, so people began wearing their clocks on a  chain around their necks.

By 1653, tailors had begun sewing small pockets called "fobs," from the German word fuppe, into the waistband of breeches, in which to carry a watch, money, or other valuables. The fob, which means to cheat or misrepresent, was meant to prevent any  thief from easily removing a person's valuables.

By the end of the 18th Century, improvements in watchmaking resulted in watches that were thinner and more rounded. Tailors sewed smaller fob pockets into vests so that people could carry a watch attached to a chain.

Early pocket watches only had an hour hand. The dial wasn’t covered with glass, but usually had a hinged brass cover, often decoratively pierced with grillwork so the time could be read without opening. Watchmakers created movements of iron or steel, held together with tapered pins and wedges, until after 1550 when screws appeared. Many of the movements included striking or alarm mechanisms. The shape of the watches soon evolved into a rounded form called Nuremberg eggs. And even later in the century a trend for unusually shaped watches, shaped like books, animals, fruit, stars, flowers, insects, crosses, and even skulls, became popular. Beginning in 1610, a glass crystal covered the watch dials. To wind and set the watch, the owner opened the back and fitted a key to a square arbor and turned it.

The first solution to uneven unwinding came when watchmakers realized the spring uncoiled at a more constant pace when it wasn’t wound tightly. Watchmakers invented several ways to prevent this. The stackfreed was a cam with an additional spring that compensated for the main spring's changes in speed, and the fusee was a stop that prevented the spring from being wound too tightly. It was usually made of stiff hog bristle.

In 1675 several watchmakers discovered that a spiral spring attached to the balance greatly increased accuracy. Suddenly, watches reflected the correct time within minutes rather than being off by close to an hour. Until this time, watches had to be wound twice a day. A fourth wheel added to the movement decreased the winding required to once per day. Less than 100 years later, watchmakers added a hand to measure seconds. As years passed, people wanted calendars to mark the day, date and month, phases of the moon, as well as alarms, chimes and music.

Early pocket watches had no covering to protect the face or the hour hand. In the 18th century English watchmakers began creating gold and silver cases to slide the watch into to protect it. Watchmakers added glass crystals to protect the dial around 1610 but because they were translucent, people still had to remove them to read the time.

English watchmakers added jewels, usually second-rate gemstones in the 18th century as bearings in the watches to prevent friction and wear between metal parts. However, watchmakers from other countries didn’t adopt "jeweling" for nearly another 100 years. Today, the number of jewels a watch has is a sign of its quality and durability. Most pocket watches have between 7 and 21 jewels.

Pocket watches came in either of two types of cases—hunting or open-faced. Hunting case watches, popular during the 19th century, have a spring-hinged circular metal lid or cover, that closes over the watch-dial and crystal, protecting them from dust, scratches and other damage or debris, and opens when the owner pushes a button. Most antique hunter-case watches have the lid-hinges at the 9 o'clock position and the stem and crown of the watch at the 3 o'clock position. By 1900, the open face watch took over and hunting case watches became less commonplace. Watchmakers made cases of silver and gold. Many were gold-filled, with two thin sheets of gold on the outside around a thicker layer of brass. They also used a variety of silver-colored material, with names like silveride, usually nickel based.

Waltham pocket watches are very collectible. But because watch designs changed often in the early years, they sometimes made only a few of some models. A good example is the Waltham Model Appleton, a size 20, 18-carat gold watch with a rear key wind that had sold for $10,000. Because so many were made and in such variety, collectors can buy a pocket watch in running condition from as low as $100 US up to the $1000s if you want. Since most pocket watches don’t appreciate much in value, it’s possible to start a modest collection on a limited budget.

To read more articles on antiques, please visit the Antiques Articles section of my Web site.  And to stay up to the minute on antiques and collectibles, please join the over 30,000 readers by following my free online magazine, #TheAntiquesAlmanac. Learn more about "The  Vernacular Style" in the 2024 Winter Edition, online now. And to read daily posts about unique objects from the past and their histories, like the #Antiques and More Collection on Facebook.

Dreaming of a Brite Christmas

 

QUESTION: For several years I’ve been searching for older ornaments for my Christmas tree. I’ve seen a good number at flea markets and antique cooperatives. Many of these are still in their original boxes marked “Shiny Brite.” I’d like to know more about this company. When did they produce ornaments and what kind did they produce?

ANSWER: Today, the trend is to decorate Christmas trees with handcrafted ornaments, from simpler ones sold at church bazar to finely crafted ones of wood, silver, and gold sold at Christmas markets throughout the world. But some people prefer to decorate their trees with nostalgic glass ornaments from their childhood.

Ornaments that decorated yesterday’s trees continue to create holiday traditions. Shiny glass orbs hang from branches in bright, shiny colors, and sparkly patterns. Shiny Brite was a mid-20th-century brand created by German-American immigrant Max Eckardt.

Blown-glass Christmas ornaments with hand-painted accents got their start in the German village of Lauscha in the 1840s. Glassmakers blew molten glass into molds shaped like fruit and nuts, then silvered the inside with a special compound of silver nitrate and sugar water. 

As a native of a small village near Lauscha, Eckhardt knew the appeal of glass ornaments and also saw their potential in the American market. He had been importing hand-blown glass balls from his homeland since the early 20th century. He had the foresight to anticipate a disruption in his supply of glass from Germany from the upcoming World War II and in 1937, he established the Shiny Brite Company in New York.  The silver nitrate coating on the insides of his ornaments inspired him to name his company Shiny Brite.

To keep his company afloat, Eckhardt sought the help of New York’s Corning Glass Company, with the promise that F.W. Woolworth would place a large order if Corning could modify its glass ribbon machine, which made light bulbs, to produce ornaments. This machine, built in 1926, produced 2,000 light bulbs per minute. The transition was a success, and Woolworth’s ordered more than 235,000 ornaments. In December 1939,Eckhardt shipped the first machine-made batch to its 5-and-10-Cent Stores, where they sold for 2 to 10 cents each.

By 1940, Corning was producing 300,000 unadorned ornaments per day, sending the clear glass balls to outside artists, including those at Eckardt’s factories, to be hand decorated. After being lined with silver nitrate, the ornaments ran through a lacquer bath, received decoration from Eckardt’s employees and packaging in brown cardboard boxes. According to a LIFE magazine article from December 1940, Corning Glass Works expected to produce 40 million ornaments by the end of that year, supplying 100 percent of the domestic ornament market.

Originally, the ornaments were plain silver, but eventually Eckardt produced them in a large variety of colors: with classic red the most popular color in the 1940s, followed by green, gold, pink and blue, both in solids and stripes. The company also offered Shiny Brite ornaments in a variety of shapes besides balls, including tops, bells, icicles, teardrops, trees, finials, pine cones, and Japanese lanterns, and reflectors. Workers decorated some with mica “snow.”

Through the 1940s and 1950s, Shiny Brite ornaments became the most popular tree ornaments in the U.S. Eckhardt stressed that they were American-made as a selling point during World War II by featuring Uncle Sam shaking hands with Santa on the front of the original 1940's boxes.

Corning continued to crank out Shiny Brite ornaments, and by the 1950s, production reached a rate of 1,000 per minute; with machines also painting them at that time. The 1950s was the peak of Shiny Brite production and popularity, with Eckardt operating four New Jersey factories to keep pace with the demand.

Shiny Brite ornaments dangled from trees through the early 1960s, until plastic ornaments became more popular. But over the years, vintage Shiny Brites have remained popular with collectors for their beauty and nostalgia, and acting as a sort of time capsule of American holiday history. They are some of the most sought after vintage ornaments from the mid 20th century and are the perfect decoration for those Space-Age aluminum trees.

To read more articles on antiques, please visit the Antiques Articles section of my Web site.  And to stay up to the minute on antiques and collectibles, please join the over 30,000 readers by following my free online magazine, #TheAntiquesAlmanac. Learn more about "The Age of Photography" in the 2023 Holiday Edition, online now. And to read daily posts about unique objects from the past and their histories, like the #Antiques and More Collection on Facebook.