Classic Hardwood

I’m not normally a fan of celebrity endorsed furniture ranges; call me a cynic, but they tend to involve tacky Ikea style disposable pieces that last about as long as an episode of their latest reality TV show.

There has been a bit of googly bowled down the cricket pitch of furniture life by cookbook author and TV chef Paula Deen. She has recently launch a fifty piece (yes 50!) range of furniture through the US home furnishings company Universal Furniture.

For those of you not familiar with Paula, all you need to know is that she is the sort of person who exudes warmth and she’s the sort of person you’d feel comfortable around whilst she expertly whips you up a lovely meal!

Her inspirations are drawn from plantation style antiques and coastal designs. Four different finishes are available: Tobacco, which is clear laquer and rustic furniture style; Linen, Spanish Moss and Sea Oat, which are all various mat paint styles that have mild distressing applied.

Whilst nobody is going to be fooled into thinking that theses are real antiques, they are really nice looking items and seem to be well built. Let’s face it, that’s what we like about yesteryear’s antiques and they’re not going to cost you hundreds of thousands of pounds either!

So, if you like your chefs kindly, not sweary like Gordon Ramsay, then you may well like this new range of traditional furniture too.

Well, it seems that my posts on Grandfather Clocks have sunken in with some people in the know - Ikea are now doing a grandfather clock of their own.  Not only that, but it’s heavily influenced by art deco!  I never realised that I was such a leader in fashion!

Their clock is only £129 and whilst I wouldn’t say it was the highest quality piece of furniture, I would say that it seems like good value for money, and it would look good in a modern studio flat, or maybe in the reception of a small fashionable company.  I especially like the shelves that run where a traditional clock’s pendulum would normally be.

The simple, plain face bucks the trend in grandfather clock design in that it is almost entirely without features, yet there is a certain charm that comes with that.

I didn’t think when I started this blog that I’d ever be recommending Ikea furniture, and I still have my reservations about how long it will last.  Having not seen it in the flesh I couldn’t say what the quality of the materials will be like either.

More than anything though, I just thought I’d mention it because it’s such a rare occurance that anything I say about furniture is in line with popular cultural trends and tastes!

My previous posts can be found here: The History of Grandfather Clocks

In part two of our art deco discovery post we are going to look at some modern designers and their take on the art deco genre.

Barbara Barry has recently created a collection of art deco designs that epitomise the juxtaposition of refinement and opulence that art deco is famous for. Her chairs are resplendent with sexy curves, her tables shimmer with metal finishes, and her desks and cabinets are equally attractive. ( www.kohlerinteriors.com ).

Because art deco is a decorative as it is functional you will find items that were originally designed as dining room furniture in the bedroom and visa versa. Nancy Corzine’s chic desks fit the bill as beautiful examples of art deco, but are contemporary enough to have your laptop on! ( www.nancycorzine.com ).

Pieces originally designed for the dining room or bedroom can now be used anywhere. Wireless devices and laptops give clients even more freedom when choosing furniture, says of Naples, Fla., who, with husband Bryan, has been selling Art Deco furniture since 1998 through their online store, www.decodame.com.

“Art Deco cabinets have become very popular to place under the wall-mounted TV, giving people a place to store audio and video equipment,” says Lorial Francis from www.decodame.com, “Now a collector can enjoy a period Art Deco desk without cutting holes into it for chords.”

If you’re after vintage furniture as well as reproduction, Decodame’s collection includes a many products of each including sideboards crafted of, zebrawood or burled walnut. True luxury!

The iconic self-contained bar cabinet, is now becoming popular with the young trend setters. It fits nicely in a smaller apartment. Don’t forget that you don’t have to buy large pieces of furniture to get in on the art deco scene. Door knobs, light shades and hanging mirrors are inexpensive ways to bring art deco into your home.

Art Deco was a short-lived period of furniture design, but it left its mark in a big way. In this two part blog post we will be exploring what makes art deco so special, why its original life was cut short and how modern designers have suddenly grasped its inspiration for a renascence.

Inspired by post World War 1 modern excesses the audacious designs were brought to an abrupt end with the outbreak of World War 2.

Unlike many daring periods of furniture designs, Art deco has seen a revival. Not just with collectors of the period, or antiques dealers trying to shift some of their old junk, but with highly acclaimed furniture designers.

The reason Art Deco furniture is popular again now is that there has been a general return to simple geometric forms in all areas of design. People are looking for the familiar in such turbulent economic times, and good quality reproductions of Art Deco furniture can give a room a retro, yet luxurious feel.

There is a pleasing synergy of minimalism and traditional designs when it comes to Art Deco, and when used correctly it can be slotted into rooms that have an element of either in.

Many of today’s interior and furniture designers, such as Nancy Corzine, Barbara Barry, Jeffrey Bilhuber and Richard Mishaan, use it in their work.

Geometric shapes, split with zigzag stripes, or hot coloured stars can make bold statements and provide interesting focal points. A deco piece will always drawer the eye, even when you have stunning paintings or antiques in along side it.

In part two of our look at art deco furniture we will look in more detail at the work of modern designers who have embraced the art deco world.

Grotty 2nd Hand Furniture Shop

Whilst it may be tempting to go round markets, second hand shops, antiques dealers, car boot sales and ebay, trying to find that something a little different for your home, it seldom makes sense when trying to kit out a whole room at once.

The prime example of this is the dining room.
When you design your bedroom, living room or conservatory it’s fine to have some fun, putting the odd antique lamp table or funky sixties chair in amongst the rest of the furniture to give a bit of character, or an avant-garde feel to the room. But dining room furniture tends to be a different story.

Dining rooms are probably the most formal room in the house. Generally you use the room for one specific task: dining! When designing a formal room there should always be a sense of continuity and order. There’s no real need for loud décor or unusual chairs.

Sure, you need it to be stylish and make a statement about yourself, but this isn’t going to be a room you kick your shoes off in and lounge about, it’s a place to dine, chat or maybe even play cards, but the mood should always be more ‘dinner party’ than ‘Ann Summers party‘!

Dining Room Set

For this reason, it’s always a good idea to go for a dining room set. At a basic level these tend to be made up of a dining table and a quantity of matching chairs. However, you are often able to find dining sets that include sideboards, dressers and even matching serving trolleys!

The other advantage of this is the fact that more often than not you can save money by buying in bulk and many online furniture retailers will offer discounts on selected dining sets.

One tip to remember: If you ever do have the need to use your dining table for something a little more recreational, then a table cloth is an instant makeover!

In keeping with my previous post (sorry for the delay, by the way), I am going to continue with my theme of classic contemporary furniture.  This time it’s another chair, but wood furniture this time; the Hans Wegner Sawbuck Chair.

Born in Tønder in Denmark on 2nd April 1914, Hans Wegner was a skilled carpenter at an early age due to being a son of a cobbler who trained in the skills.  When he reached adulthood he went into design where his knowledge of wood and contruction proved invaluable. Pushed in the direction of architecture (like a lot of deigners of his era), Hans resisted and stuck with his love of designing furniture - especially chairs.  He came out with many classic pieces, including one of the first truly stylish folding chairs and the ‘Peacock Chair’, which had an overexagerated curved and slatted back which fanned out like a peacock’s plumage.

One of his most overlooked pieces, however, is the Sawbuck Chair.  It happens to be my favourite example of his work, combining form with the natural beauty of two contrasting woods.  This is why I was delighted to find out that they are now being remanufactured by the original maker exclusively for Carl Hansen and Son.  The price tag is more than a little weighty at $3,00.00 (US), but that’s nothing compared to what a mint condition original example will cost you at auction!

Designed as a reading chair, the most striking aspect (aside from the rakish angle you sit at) is the combination of such contrasting woods: North American walnut and European oak.  The combination really doesn’t sound like it should work, but as you can see by the pictures I have featured, I believe it does - beautifully.

Sadly, Hans Wegner died in 2007.  I think the last word should go to him because it sums up exactly what I like about the sawbuck chair:

“A chair is to have no backside. It should be beautiful from all sides and angles.”

Whilst the title of my blog is Classic Hardwood, it’s not just wood furniture I’m interested in. It has to be said that, on the whole, furniture today is poorly designed and built, most of it being pretty much as disposable as the ubiquitous Bic ballpoint pen (and just as bad for the environment!). That is why I almost always go for antiques, except when I find high quality furniture in a furniture sale!

That said, there are some modern designs and designers that cannot be ignored. One of which is Mario Bellini. Mario Bellini is well known for his architecture, urban planning and sculptures, but what is less well known is that he also indulged in other forms of popular design. From shelving to sofas and computers to cassette decks, he’s turned his hand to most things.

My personal favourite is the CAB412/413 universal side chair. Designed in 1977, it won the 1978 Popular Award of the Resources Council, Inc.

The reason I like it so much is that it echoes nature in its simplicity, and it functions perfectly as a result. Consisting of a load-bearing skeleton with its leather skin stretched over it to elastically accommodate the human body, the similarity to an animal is obvious.

What makes it all the more impressive is that the leather is simply zipped over the fame, meaning that should you want a change of colour, or if you damage it, the easily transportable leather can be swapped with very little hassle. So there you go, I do like contemporary and modern furniture as well as my beloved antiques!

Let’s face it, even though some of us moan about the television and how it has ruined social skills forever, we all enjoy sitting down in front of the box and watching our favorite programmes after a harty dinner. However, a big plasma screen and all the gubbins that goes with it doesn’t sit quite right when you have a living room full of the finest antique furniture.  The question is, what do you do with the telly?

A die hard antiques fan may go so far as to buy a big wooden TV set from yesteryear

The other method is the one Bond villains seem to like, where the massive flat screen appears from the wall by way of a series of electrical motors and clever hidden doors.

These are both too extreme for most people though, so Kelly Giesen from Kelly G Design has come up with an elegant, if slightly bizarre, way of hiding your television away. She has come up with a flase fireplace surround and decorative fire guard.

It’s really very simple.  There are appatures within the surround for wiring, freeview boxes, etc. and when you’re not watching whichever celebrity dancing contest is currently floating your boat, you just put the fire guard in place.  Hey-presto! No more ugly 21st century technology to sully your room!

There are obvious downsides to this though.  The main one being that the TV is very low down and, unless you like sitting on the floor, you may end up with a bad neck by the time the drum beats signal that the horror of Eastenders is finally over.

The other one is that if you already have feature fire places you may not want to do away with them, or convert them into glorified TV cabinets.

Still, if you don’t want your telly on view when your not using it (and you’re not a Bond villain) you may find this a logical solution to your problem.

Seldom seen in England, a lowboy is a small table with long legs and one or more rows of drawers. The name is a contradiction of the name of a tallboy, which is a tall, thin chest of drawers.

Traditionally they were most often used as dressing tables and as such many antique lowboys came fitted with mirrors. Care should be taken when purchasing an antique lowboy with a mirror as they may have been retro-fitted. As such the value would be seriously affected. The design, however, is so versatile that they can be used in a multitude of situations, these days you can even buy modern lowboys that are designed especially as television and media units. In my opinion a fifty inch plasma TV on top of a mock antique lowboy looks pretty ridiculous, but if that’s what floats your boat, go for it. I think you’re better off getting yourself some modern furniture such as contemporary oak TV cabinets.

Lowboys were favourite pieces of furniture in the 18th century, both in England and in America. Traditionally they were made of oak, but walnut and mahogany were also used. The drawer fronts tended to be adorned with brass pulls and escutcheons. Being a small item, a lot of the time lowboys were quite plain, but some elegant examples in the Queen Anne and Chippendale styles often have cabriole legs with carved knees, and claw-and-ball feet. Sculpting was sometimes used on the front.

On the whole, designs changed very little until the end of the 19th century when walnut became the prominent wood used and the legs got longer and thinner. These examples started to look more like desks than the original lowboy design.

In general, it was normal to have three drawers. However, on colonial examples (for some reason) it was de rigour to only have two! They also evolved into a taller table than their name suggests. Rather than being desk-like, though, these became a for of console or hall table.

The highly featured examples are of interest to the collector, but nine times out of ten you will find that they have undergone repairs which devalue them significantly. For that reason the more plain examples are a better bet if you’re looking for an original piece.

The lowboy is a much overlooked piece of furniture today (if you pardon the pun!), but the right example in the right setting will provide interest. Also, due to this lack of popularity, you can pick up very nice antique examples at bargain prices at a furniture sale.

In the final part of this series we will be looking at the modern history of the grandfather clock.

Initially the clock makers were constructing the cases, but their joinery skills weren’t up to much, so joiners were soon employed to design and build these. As such, ornamental cases soon became available. These also became more and more advanced with time, especially in the Victorian era. Glass frontage was also added due to customer demand to be able to watch the workings of the clocks.

These were the first clocks that you would recognise as resembling the grandfather clocks of today, but they were known as ‘long case’ clocks. The term “grandfather clock” became its most popular name after a song writer called Henry Clay wrote a song named “Grandfather Clock” in 1876.

A great variety of woods were used for the case construction. The most popular being oak, but walnut and mahogany were also used. These days ash wood has become popular due to the increase in ash furniture on the market.

Despite the fact that these clocks were manufactured in Europe and America from the early 18th Century onwards, it wasn’t until the late 19th Century that they became affordable to anyone but the very rich.

Today, not only are the cases carefully crafted of fine wood, (many have added beautifully decorated finials), but they also have intricately designed pendulums, they chime the hour, and they only need to be key wound once every month.

Nowadays the grandfather clock has once again become a rich person’s clock, again, this is mostly because of the steadily decreasing size of new houses these days, but also because they are seen as antiques. There are, in fact, many manufacturers of modern grandfather clocks, some of which produce some very contemporary designs, such as glass cabinets, gothic designs, 100% chrome plated, art deco, or even brightly coloured plastic! In my opinion though, a classic oak grandfather clock will compliment a room full of wood furniture beautifully.