One of the more interesting do-it-yourself shows on public television is “New Yankee Workshop.” This show creates old style furniture and wood work with modern power tools. My interest in the show is in how the concepts of antique furniture and design and manufacturing is explained clearly while the furniture is being made.
Of course, an antique furniture is not just a matter of wood carpentry according to a fixed or dated design. Even if you make a wicker chair based on a 200-year old design, it might look like an antique, but it would not be an antique. Antique furniture has a charm which cannot be copied. Besides, it has lasted a hundred years, with proper care, it should last another hundred years.
Finding antique furniture is a hard activity. It’s going from one old place to the next, checking out registries for estate sales, or flea markets and garage sales. It is checking out the armoire, or the chaise lounge for authenticity.
Some of the many major furniture periods which are very much sought after for antique furniture:
• Gothic style furniture are influenced by medieval church architecture characterized by high arches and grandiose vaulted ceilings.
• Elizabethan furniture are from 1558 to 1603 during the Renaissance period in England. Separate again is Renaissance style, where furniture are mainly from oak, with scroll and arabesque carvings and horizontal emphasis.
• Early Americana and Pilgrim styles are for furniture made in the New World from the mid-1600s to the late 1700s and early 1800s. Amish furniture designs are from this era.
• Moorish influence pervades the Jacobean era from the early to mid-1600s.
• Louis XIII, Baoque-style prevalent during the late 1500s to the mid 1600s in France. Designs include gildings, spiral turnings, cherubs and cartouches
• Louis XIV, also called The Sun King, was noted for marquetry inlaid furniture. Opulent and grandiose.
• Baroque was flamboyant, heavy and very decorative. This was derived from 17th century Italian architecture.
• Rococo is a more exuberant style than the Baroque. Characterized by asymmetrical lines with shell, floral, and foliate motifs.
• Commonwealth, in contrast with the Baroque style, this was a flat unadorned style common during the protectorate of Oliver Cromwell.
Latter day antiques include the Regence, Louis XV and Victorian.
Each of these eras and styles have more than passing merit for the collector.
