The Search for Comfort

 

QUESTION:  I inherited a couch from my grandparents. I have tried to do research online, but the multitude of antique items is overwhelming. The couch appears to resemble the Chippendale style, but not exactly from what I have seen. My grandmother said the couch was already over 100 years old when she purchased it in the 1960's. What can you tell me about this piece? 

ANSWER: Sorry to say, but someone gave your grandmother misinformation about her couch. It’s not uncommon for dealers in used furniture to do this because they really don’t know how old the pieces they’re selling are and just want to sell them.

This couch dates from the 1920s or 1930s. It’s a great example of pseudo styles that manufacturers created to fill the need in the early to mid-20th century middle and working class markets. At that time, most people were looking forward and didn’t want “old” furniture in their homes. To buy all new furniture was a big deal, especially during the Great Depression. It was a way people impressed their friends and neighbors. Those who could afford to buy new furniture were definitely going places. So manufacturers produced some truly ugly, ostentatious pieces to fill this need. 

The roots of Modernism, grew out of pre-World War II industrialism. This furniture style used little or no ornamentation and a function over form concept. Influenced by Scandinavian, Japanese, and Italian designs, it featured industrial materials such as steel and plastic.

What all of the above styles had in common was that they were mostly produced for those that could afford them. Newly wealthy industrialists, bankers, and merchants wanted furniture that was in fashion and were willing to pay great sums for it. However, the common person couldn’t afford such luxuries and ended up with mass-produced pieces that didn’t cater to any taste in design.

What ordinary people wanted was their own form of luxury—comfortable chairs and couches that they could fall asleep in after a hard days work but that would also impress guests. They wanted just enough decoration to make the pieces seem elegant but not so much as to make them hard to care for. These needs resulted in overstuffed chairs and sofas with springs in their cushions to give added comfort, extremely stylized shallow carving that was easy to clean, and generally little decorative woodwork since using more added to the cost of the piece. Manufacturers could use cheap woods to build the frames which they then covered with upholstery.

Sitting prominently in the living rooms and family rooms of many 30 to 50-year-olds today is the ubiquitous “comfy” sofa, It takes up a huge about of space and can seat at least four or more people comfortably. Some models feature built-in lounge chairs with pop-up ottomans. The precursor to these giants was the sectional sofa. This unique piece of furniture came in sections. Buyers could buy as many sections as they needed to create a monster seating “pit,” popular in the 1980s. In some homes, condos, and apartments, the giant sofa is the only piece of furniture in the room, besides the giant flat-screen T.V. hung on the wall opposite it. 

While the sectional sofa certainly rose to fame in the mid-20th century, it has a more complex past. Before built-in cup holders and powered recliners, sectional sofas solved other problems for homeowners in the early 19th century, back before the start of the Civil War. Only a few examples remain intact, and most of them are in Virginia.

Antiques experts believe that end pieces of sectional sofas have long been mistaken for corner chairs, but evidence is sketchy. The loss of furniture makers, workshops, and a shortage of timber halted furniture production in the South. And destruction by the Union Army in Virginia led to the loss of most of these pieces. Back then, a sectional consisted of two tufted, carved and laminated sofas pushed together. Corner pieces were virtually nonexistent. 

Jumping ahead nearly 100 years to the era of Mid-Century Modern, the sectional sofa became the perfect showcase for the furniture designs of Charles & Ray Eames and George Nelson when the sleek, industrial profile of contemporary-style furniture appeared. The sectional also  answered the question of standardization versus customization when considering high consumer demand, thanks to department stores and catalogs. By breaking a sofa down into sectional pieces, known as modular design, it was easier to manufacture and ship, as well as mass-produce standard, individual pieces that could then be customized once they were the home.

And while comfort is a good thing, style is something else altogether and often the twain do not meet. But this comfort phenomenon didn’t just begin yesterday. It actually started 100 years ago in the 1920s. 

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 Sparkling World of Glass" in the 2021 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.

Sit Back and Get Comfy

QUESTION: While out antiquing recently I discovered a beautiful sofa that would add a lot of class to my living room. It’s in great shape, although it may eventually need to be reupholstered. The dealer said it was in the American Empire style. Although I like older things, I’m not very familiar with all the styles of furniture, especially those from the 19th century. What can you tell me about the American Empire style? Do you think this sofa will be a good investment? It isn’t all that comfortable, but I have a overstuffed one in my family room, so this one would be for more formal visits.

ANSWER: The American Empire style is one that isn’t particularly familiar to even moderate antique enthusiasts. It was more of a transitional style, and its pieces come in a wide variety of designs and ornateness.

But before looking at the American Empire style, let’s take a look at how the sofa evolved. People didn’t even know what a sofa was before 1700. They reserved chairs for important guests. Less important ones sat on stools and benches.

By the 18th century, chair makers began to pad the seats of their chairs. Some even padded the backs, but chair backs of the time were still straight and stiff. When the Queen Anne style appeared around 1750, chairs became a bit more comfortable because their backs were curved.

The word sofa itself comes from the Arabic ‘soffah’, which refers to a raised part of the floor covered with rugs and cushions, while the word couch comes from the French word ‘coucher’ and literally means ‘to lay down’.

The first true sofa was the camel-back, so named for the padded hump in its back. The back, seat, and arms also had sufficient padding, making it the most comfortable seat in the room. Thomas Chippendale designed elegant camel-back sofas with simple, thick square legs that gave them stability.

By the dawn of the 19th century, the Federal style had come into vogue. Sofas became straighter, but the seats were narrower and harder. This was the age of good posture—no slouching was allowed. People had to sit up straight. Both the furniture and the clothing they wore dictated it. People back then couldn’t lean back and doze off like they can today.

By the 1830s, the Empire style had gotten a hold in Europe. It took a decade or so for it to travel across the Atlantic Ocean to America. Empire sofas went a step further and rounded the back cushion so people could not lean back.

By the 1850s, people wanted more comfort in their sofas. Sofa makers angled the backs gave their pieces thicker cushions. But even these sofas still had carved wooden pieces that poked and prodded if a person didn’t sit straight.

The Mission style of the early 20th century didn’t improve much on the comfort scale. Sofas in the first two decades featured heavy, square wooden frames with a padded seat and perhaps a few loose cushions for comfort.

It wasn’t until the 1920s that the overstuffed, deep-cushioned sofa appeared. This style has existed until today in one form or another. The large, L-shaped super overstuffed versions found in today’s home are a far cry from the camel-back sofas of the 18th century.

American Empire is a French-inspired Neoclassical style of American furniture and decoration that takes its name and originates from the Empire style introduced during the First French Empire period under Napoleon's rule.



It gained its greatest popularity in the U.S. after 1820. Many examples of American Empire cabinetmaking are characterized by antiquities-inspired carving—gilt-brass ormolu, and decorative inlays such as stamped-brass banding with egg-and-dart, diamond, or Greek-key patterns, or individual shapes such as stars or circles.

The most elaborate furniture in this style appeared between 1815 and 1825, often incorporating columns with rope-twist carving, animal-paw feet, anthemion, stars, and acanthus-leaf ornamentation, sometimes in combination with gilding and vert antique, an antique green simulating aged bronze. A simplified version of American Empire furniture, often referred to as the Grecian style, generally has plainer surfaces in curved forms, highly figured mahogany veneers, and sometimes gilt-stenciled decorations. Many examples of this style survive, exemplified by massive chests of drawers with scroll pillars and glass pulls, work tables with scroll feet and fiddleback chairs.

American Empire sofas are in high demand today. Fine examples can sell for anywhere between $10,000 and $30,000. Of course, that’s for those in excellent condition and fully restored. So yes, buying one would be a good investment, as long as it’s held for at least 10 years.

To read more articles on antiques, please visit the Antiques Article section of my Web site.  And to stay up to the minute on antiques and collectibles, please join the other 18,000 readers by following my free online magazine, #TheAntiquesAlmanac. Learn more about Colonial America in the Spring 2018 Edition, "Early Americana," online now.

Charles Eastlake—America’s Harbinger of Taste

QUESTION: I have a three-piece set of furniture that belonged to my grandparents and perhaps to their parents, and I'm trying to identify what it is. Can you tell me if you think it might be Eastlake and if so, what can you tell me about this furniture style?

ANSWER: What you have is an Eastlake parlor set, dating from around 1880. But it wasn’t designed by Charles Locke Eastlake. Instead, he only suggested designs in his book Hints on Household Taste in Furniture, Upholstery and Other Details. More than any other person, he was responsible for introducing the principles of the English design reform movement to America.

Eastlake considered simplicity the key to beauty. He thought the objects in people's homes should be attractive and well made by workers who took pride in their hand work or machine work. His influence led to a broad demand for relatively simple, clean-lined "art furniture" between 1870 and 1890.

Written to instruct the average housewife in the principles of tasteful home decoration, Eastlake’s book achieved immediate popularity. Though Eastlake included some of his own sketches among the illustrations of well-designed furniture chosen for his book, he was primarily a critic of taste, not a furniture designer. The furniture illustrated in it had ornamental features including shallow carving, marquetry, incised or pierced geometric designs, rows of turned spindles, chamfered edges, brass strap hinges, bail handles, and keyhole hardware inspired by Gothic forms. Every decorative device, according to Eastlake, also had to fulfill a useful function.

He especially disdained the "shaped" forms of Rococo Revival. He considered the curved forms of this Victorian style rickety and constructively weak. To relieve the simplicity of rectilinear forms, Eastlake advised using turned legs or spindle supports.

For those who wished more richness in their furniture, he suggested restrained, conventionalized carving, inlay, and sometimes even veneer. Eastlake believed ornament should be stylized rather than naturalistic.

His book further suggested that furniture be made of solid, strongly grained woods such as mahogany, walnut, or oak. Most Eastlake-style furniture found today is usually made of the latter.He preferred oil-rubbed finishes to "French-polished" ones, and disliked the shiny look of varnish.

To the modern eye, Eastlake-style furniture, with its intricate marquetry, gilded incised designs, spindled galleries, inset tiles, richly grained woods, and decorative turned elements, hardly seems “simple.” But in contrast to the heavily carved furniture of earlier Victorian decades, embellished with naturalistic roses and bunches of grapes imposed on the elaborate Rococo shapes now regarded as the embodiment of Victorian design, Eastlake-inspired furniture was remarkably functional and clean-lined.

Eastlake-style furniture often featured tables and chests with marble tops, some the traditional white, others in rich Italian pinks and browns. Tables and chairs had aprons and legs incised with horizontal or vertical lines called reeding and camfered corners. Round legs on chairs also featured ring-like annulets. And acanthus leaf designs could be found incised into even the least expensive pieces.

Unfortunately, while Eastlake-style furniture may have looked refined, most chairs and sofas weren’t very comfortable and were meant to be used in formal parlors for guests only.

Bed in a Box

QUESTION:  My grandmother had a “bed in a box” that we used to sleep on as children when we would come to visit. My brother has it currently, but I amin the process of trying to get it home. We believe it is between 100-200 lbs and I think it is walnut. It is a 3x3 foot cube 23 inches deep and it is just a cot that rolls into a two-doored cabinet. I have always loved it, and it’s one of the few things I wanted when my grandma passed. I was wondering if you have any information for me because I can't find anything about it.

ANSWER: To save space, furniture makers over the 125 years or so have come up with some ingenious devices. The “bed in a box” the person mentions above is just one of the unique ways that city dwellers found to get more people into a room. When immigrants began arriving in greater numbers in the latter part of the 19th century, whole families often had to live in one room–eating, relaxing, and sleeping in the same space.

The first person to become aware of this problem was Sarah Goode, the owner of a furniture store in Chicago. She invented a folding cabinet bed that when not in use looked like a desk standing against the wall and became the first African American woman to receive a U.S. patent for her invention on July 14, 1885.

Since city apartment dwellers often had little space for beds, Goode and others created variations on what we now call the “hideaway” bed. Goode’s design was far more elaborate than a bed-in-a-box. Her folding bed unit had hinged sections that were easily raised or lowered by an adult.

Cabinet beds, like sofa beds, are another innovation along the same lines. Essentially, when the cabinet folds down, it changes shape revealing a bed. You'll also notice that the design of the furniture is similar to that found in early Sears catalogs. Many of these pieces were manufactured in Indiana. Another variation was the rolling trundle bed. This large rectangular box rolled under high late 18th and early 19th-century beds for storage during the day. At night, an adult or child would pull on a rope and drag the bed out for sleeping.