Antique Chest Of Drawers

TALLBOYS OR CHESTS ON CHESTS
About 1710-1820
Chippendale-style mahogany tallboy, about 1765-1780.
Adevelopment of the chest on stand, used in bedrooms to store clothing. Especially popular during the second half of the 18thC - from when most date - despite being too high to use fully without standing on a chair.
Formed as two chests of drawers, the upper one slightly narrower than the lower. Nearly all straight-fronted, with bracket (often ogee) feet, though some around 1760 are serpentine, and later, from about 1780,
bow-fronted, with splayed ’swept’ feet.
Upper part has two or three short drawers above three feet long. A projecting moulded cornice is common; occasionally a broken pediment. Some have a frieze too; on early examples, occasionally, a cushion frieze
conceals a drawer.
Fashionably, corners canted; carved as columns or pilasters, in the mid-century, shallow Gothic or Chinese fret, or simple reeding or fluting.
Lower chest has three long drawers; mouldings around base and top into which upper chest slots. Occasionally a cavetto moulding (semi-circular concave niche) decorated with marquetry sunburst pattern, on bottom drawer of walnut examples. Occasionally a brushing slide at top; sometimes a secretaire drawer (see DESKS, P. 111).
Drawers usually - not always - of diminishing depth within each chest. Handles sometimes aligned.
Left, Sheraton mahogany tallboy, about 1800; right, late-18thC mahogany secretaire tallboy.
Walnut veneer; mahogany (solid or veneer). Occasionally rosewood, amboyna and other highly figured woods during Regency. Sometimes country versions in oak. Oak and pine for carcases.
As for CHESTS OF DRAWERS (see p. 87). The separate projecting cornice slots over blocks glued at corners of top. Occasionally low relief carving on frieze.
Polish; (rarely) japanning.
VALUES
Even the plainest tallboy will now fetch a four-figure sum and the best quality easily five. An early date, a cavetto moulding, a secretaire drawer, and, to a lesser extent, a brushing slide, and well figured and coloured veneers, will push the price up.
MARRIAGES
In the past tallboys were less fashionable than today and many were split up and sold as two separate chests of drawers. The reverse process is now common, so watch for marriages. Look for: correct conformation of
drawers; matching timber on all sides, including backboards; identical construction of all drawers; rough, unfinished surface on tops of both parts (neither would have been visible); canted corners on top and bottom, or top only.

CHESTS  serpentine, 1770-1800
A fine quality serpentine mahogany chest with canted fluted corners, a slide and bracket feet. The handles are possibly original. 1770-1780
A Sheraton design mahogany serpentine chest featuring inlaid shell motifs and boxwood and ebony stringing lines. The plate handles may be original. Note the heavy bracket feet.
1780-1800
A mahogany serpentine chest of drawers without slide and with a narrower corner with fluting, on bracket feet. The drawers are cross-banded and the swan-neck handles are original. 1770-1790
A mahogany serpentine chest on splayed feet with inlaid boxwood. stringing lines and mahogany crossbanding. Note how the corners terminate in a sharp edge without a canted surface or decoration. The splayed feet follow the late eighteenth century designs of Hepplewhite. 1780-1800
CHESTS  dower, and trunks, on stands
A walnut chest on a more elaborate stand, with cabriole legs incorporating shell motifs and ball-and-claw feet. Carrying handles are again fitted. Legs and stands of this type were extensively reproduced between the wars. 1725-1735
A mahogany domed chest/trunk on a square fluted stand. Again the domed top affects the price as does the size and the stand which, despite the use of fluting to lighten up appearance, does nothing to disguise the bulk of the piece.

CHESTS  bow-fronted mahogany, 1780 onwards
A late eighteenth century example with brushing slide showing fine use of the mahogany grain to provide the maximum decorative effect. Note the bottom moulding which soon disappeared, and the use of needed top moulding which started with Sheraton but came into wide use in Regency times. The splayed feet add to the value. Good original handles.
c. 1790Splay feet with apron, good ripple effect on the mahogany and brushing slide  all point towards Georgian quality. Only the flat D-shaped top moulding, which suggests a move towards the Victorian, and the lack of crossbanding detract.
c. 1820sA bow-fronted chest with slide, splayed feet and shaped apron. The top is cross-banded in satinwood. A fine quality piece.
1780-1800A small chest cross-banded with satinwood on the top and showing the flat fronted form of bow which appeared in Sheraton’s design book in 1793. (In another variant of the same form pillars are found superimposed on the ends.) Quite an elegant piece helped by the existence of a brushing slide but odd and untidy in that it lacks cockbeading to the edges of the drawers. Notice that all four examples on this page have long top drawers instead of two short ones.
1795-1810n But imagine satinwood crossbanding, original shells  writing
drawer, good polish etc.,
c. 1830s
A low bow-fronted chest with splayed feet, veneered in feather figured mahogany. Not a favourite type because it is too squat and out of proportion, almost as though a bottom drawer has been taken out.
A fairly plain mahogany veneered example. With splay feet at both front and back. It has a flat top moulding and Bramah locks. Quite elegant in a modest way.
A little wooden-knobbed chest on particularly Victorian bun feet with an almost flat moulding, not very exciting perhaps but it has two virtues  it is small and the maker made an effort with the grain of the wood. It will probably end up with a reeded moulding, apron and splay feet and oval brass handles. Why oval Because the knob holes are too near the drawer ends to put on round or octagonal; oval shaped handles will make them appear better spaced. Could end up looking better than 379.
A feather figured veneered mahogany chest on turned feet of good quality throughout and with good patination. With brass replacements handles could look very handsome, despite its height which traditionally counted against it.
c. 1850-1870

CHESTS AND CHESTS OF DRAWERS
Chests, often referred to as coffers, were very important until the mid-seventeenth century and were still made in quantity throughout the eighteenth century. They were about the only form of storage for most people.
The earliest form of chest was probably a hollowed-out tree trunk with a crude lid. By the thirteenth century, however, simple coffer-like chests with carved decoration and hinged lids, which could be locked, were in use. The solid sides reached the floor to act as feet. By the sixteenth century a joined frame construction with panels was used and the panels, and possibly the lid, were decorated with carving and inlays in the grander examples.
The later part of the seventeenth century saw the introduction of drawers, both in the base of the chest to make what are now called mule chests, and in the top to form a type of half chest and half cabinet construction. There would be one or two drawers in the top half of the piece and doors below enclosed either a cabinet or more drawers.
The drawers were first grooved in the thick sides to run on bearers fixed to the carcase frame inside the piece but after about 1660 the bottom runner, which required a bearer or lining below the drawer, was used.
After the use of carved and inlaid decoration up to about 1650, mitred geometrical mouldings and split balusters were applied to the chest for decoration and this type of chest is characteristic of the period 1650-1680. Sometimes carved decoration and inlays of holly, box, bone, ivory and mother-of-pearl were used, adding to the richness of the piece. It is interesting to note that mother-of-pearl and ivory of this type came to Britain in this period from the Netherlandish craftsmen who emulated their Spanish conquerors. The latter in their turn obtained such decoration from the Moors, who use it to this day.
With the use of walnut from about 1680 onwards, a lighter construction of a pine carcase was used, with pine or oak outer surfaces on which decorative veneers were laid. These chests were very often mounted on stands with twist-turned legs or legs of baluster and inverted cup-turned forms. Whereas earlier chests had carried the frame to the floor to form feet or, after about 1650, had used the turned `bun’ foot, these now started to give way to the bracket foot. The bracket foot is, of course, a design feature, not a
constructional one, since the weight of the chest is taken on an inner block on to which the outer bracket-shaped pieces are fixed. It is aesthetically more in sympathy with the square outline of the chest above it and enjoyed successful use on square chests up to the nineteenth century.
After the walnut period of 1680-1740, mahogany was used, in veneered or solid construction. The grander pieces of the famous designers, Adam, Chippendale, Hepplewhite and so on, showed greater varieties of design, with serpentine, bombe, bow and concave drawer fronts. Cabriole legs were used on finer pieces and the bracket foot was curved in serpentine form too. Hepplewhite’s designs showed the rather elegant splayed foot with its tapering curves, a most suitable design for serpentine and bow-fronted chests.
It is interesting to note that the fine semi-circular (or demi-lune, for Francophiles) satinwood commodes were a later eighteenth century innovation, appearing in Adam and Sheraton designs from about 1780 onwards. Before that the commodes featured by Chippendale and others followed somewhat French designs with scrolled or cabriole legs.
During this mid- and late-eighteenth century period not only mahogany was used for chest exteriors. Oak was used for country or provincial pieces, often cross-banded with mahogany.

From the start of the nineteenth century a gradual change started to take place in which heavier, classical designs came into use with darker decorations such as ebony stringing.Gradually the influence of mass-production began to make itself felt towards the middle of the century, with chests of drawers being turned out in large numbers and varying qualities for the bedrooms of the booming population. The feet became turned and rather bulbuous, then gave way to a flat apron around the chest which gives a heavier
appearance of a solid base with no feet at all. Nevertheless a variety of woods was used, from mahogany, rosewood and satinwood to burr walnut, maple and much pine or deal.
Oak for drawer linings called wainscot oak was imported from Scandinavia. The grain is even and well suited to making of panelling (hence wainscot) or drawers. One often finds that good quality chests are lined in oak and, moreover, that the better the piece the thinner the linings and the finer the dovetails. Thus a good quality marquetry or walnut chest could have oak linings of about 1/4ins. whereas a poor quality country example might have pine linings of double that thickness. Always look at the back of a drawer and the front
to make sure that any holes on the inside are accounted for on the outside, i.e. no reveneering has occurred. There is more faked or doctored walnut furniture in existence than almost any other English furniture.
Value Points:
Oak Period (up to 1690)
1973-1977 have seen an enormous boom in oak furniture
and although oak chests have not been in the forefront of it, they have followed it and many of the same value points which apply to other pieces apply also to chests. These are:
-Colour and patination
-Originality and lack of restoration
-Original handles
-Original feet
-Carving and decoration of high quality
-Walnut Period (1680-1740)
-Original stand to chest on stand
-Marquetry or parquetry
-Choice of veneers and figuring
-Patination and colour
-Original handles and keyplates
-Cross-grained mouldings
(We have assumed that pieces have an original, veneered top unless a high chest on stand or chest on chest which was above eye level. Beware reveneered tops or ‘top halves’ with newly veneered tops.)
-Veneered and cross-banded sides
(Country pieces have plain veneered sides or sides in plain oak or  less quality  plain pine.)
-Oak drawer linings
(Country chests lined in pine.)
-Original bracket or bun feet
-Size: 3ft. wide or less
-2ft. 9ins. wide or less
-2ft. 6ins. wide or less
-Quartered top
(The best walnut chests have a top veneered with four consecutive veneer sheets set contrapositionally so as to form a symmetrical pattern. Less quality pieces have only two sheets or a plain sheet or sheets not geometrically arranged on the top.)
`Feather’ or herring-bone inlay or crossbanding   Mahogany Period
-Choice of wood and figure
-Serpentine or bombe front
-Original handles and keyplates
-Decorative inlays
-Oak linings
-Colour and patination
-Size: as for walnut chests
-Brushing slide
-Nineteenth Century Chests
-Colour and patination
-Choice of veneers or figured woods
-Size: as for walnut period above
-Original handles or knobs
-Quality of construction

Serpentine chest of drawers

Curving shapes began to come into furniture design from the reign of Queen Anne onwards, as can be seen from the pediments of secretaire bookcases and, in particular, the spoon-back chair with cabriole legs. Techniques of cutting wood into curved shapes took time to master, and it was not until the Chippendale period, when many features of French design were incorporated into English taste, that serpentine-fronted desks and chests of drawers came into fashion, around c.1750 onwards.
Those at the top of the social scale in England who were privileged enough to own and enjoy beautiful, immaculately furnished houses were not allowed to keep them all to themselves however. All the country seats of wealthy landowners and aristocratic families had ‘open days’ when groups of people came to look over every room in the house, bedrooms included. Provincial ladies and gentlemen arrived to demand entry whether the owners were in residence or not, and all furniture became as much a part of the show
as the house itself. Chests of drawers, up to now no more than functional domestic pieces of furniture, evolved into the English equivalent of the French ‘drawing-room commode’, and even the plainest pieces, derived from Chippendale’s grand designs, had curved aprons and feet, and were made in beautifully figured woods and veneers.
The serpentine-fronted chest of drawers was made throughout the mid-eighteenth century and was only replaced by the bow-fronted design during the Sheraton period.
Signs of authenticity
1. Fine-grained, well-figured San Domingo or Cuban mahogany on cheaper mahogany carcase, or imported red Scandinavian pine.
2. Flush-sunk escutcheons to locks with no ornamental surround.
3. Drawer handles with plain swan-neck handles, cast-brass bolt-heads with pummel pins, small circular backplates.
4. From c.1770 drawer bottoms with grain running side to side with central bearer for extra support.
5. Drawers and dustboards not running, full depth of, piece.
6. Dustboards in two joined pieces with front shaped piece added separately.
7. Where chest of drawers has canted corners, matching canted corners to bracket feet.
8. Where there are carved pillar motifs on sides with rounded
bases, there is a corresponding rounded profile to bracket feet.
9. Graduated drawer depths, sometimes with baize-lined fitted top drawer.
10. Brushing slides with polished surface, cleated edges, small loop handles.
11. Lip, thumb or reeded moulding to tops with good overhang, sometimes serpentine-shape on sides.
Likely restoration and repair
12. Plain canted corners with later carving or reeding to increase value. Wood will seem rough to the touch compared to rest of piece.
13. Dustboards in single piece of timber indicates a replacement for originals. Suspect more restoration if this is the case.
14. Plain square-cornered bracket feet replacing originals
with rounded or canted corners where originals have been damaged.
15. New tops where originals have been damaged with alcohol-based lotions, etc. or reveneered for same reason. Back edges of new top will not have same patination as sides, the veneer will be thinner.
16. Brushing slides damaged and removed: lock rail to top drawer should be examined for disturbance, top edges of sides with reeding or carving may finish abruptly.
17. Cockbeading too thick and secured with pins indicates replacement of originals, or new drawer fronts.
18. Drawer-front carcase with grain of wood running in continuous line  made from steam-moulded timbers of considerably later date.
Construction and materials
Serpentine-fronted chests of drawers were made in a similar way to spoon-back chairs. The timber was cut in curving shapes which were then veneered because of the partially exposed end-grain. The construction of carcases began to change from the mid-eighteenth century onwards, with new joints for sides, such as the mitred dovetail which joined woods at right-angles on the end-grain and allowed the sides of chest furniture to be built with vertical timbers, as opposed to the earlier method of horizontal frame and panel
construction.
Many of these new techniques became possible because of the use of cheaper mahogany as carcase wood which did not split as easily as more coarsely grained oak. The tops of chests of drawers were no
longer made to conceal the joins with small cornice moulding, but could be laid over the carcase and secured, then edged like table tops with thumb or lip moulding. Canted corners were often part of the design of serpentine-fronted chests of drawers as an aid to
construction as much as a decorative feature.
Detail
Drawers were edged with elegant cock beading, handles were simple swan-necked brass with cast-brass bolts and pummel pins, bracket feet were joined with shaped aprons following the graceful lines of the serpentine front. Bracket feet were often curved and referred to as `French feet’ because of their resemblance to the scrolled feet of French commodes.
Variations
Curved shapes of any sort were difficult to make without sophisticated tools and techniques, and serpentine-fronted furniture of any sort is extremely rare among genuine country pieces. Some late eighteenth century plain-fronted, well-made oak chests of drawers might have tops cut in serpentine shapes as a concession to fashionable styles, but in general chests of drawers of the period continued to be made in traditional fashion, often still using the frame and panel technique which had long been superseded by mitred dovetailing on more sophisticated furniture.
If serpentine-fronted pine chests are found, they are sadly most likely to be later nineteenth-century pieces, originally veneered and recently stripped. By that period it was possible to shape softwoods by steaming and clamping them into shape and the timbers seen in the top edges of drawers will have the grain running in a continuous line.
Below left: an early George III chest in fine, well-figured walnut veneer.
Below: an example in the Chippendale manner, c.1770.
Reproductions
Nineteenth century
The serpentine front is the least copied and reproduced of all chests of drawers. The bow-front is much easier to manufacture, and serpentine-fronted designs are more heavily constructed and the shape is less commercial or convenient to manufacture. Nineteenth-century, so-called, serpentine-fronted chests of drawers on pine carcases with thin mahogany veneer were made in some quantities, but the positive sinuous curve is reduced to a mere wavy line lacking any authority. The bases presented problems, and were sometimes exaggerated with thick mouldings which protruded several inches out from the bottom drawer.
Many reproductions are Continental: French versions were much larger, originally well-veneered, but often on poor-quality oak carcases. Dutch `commodes’ in over-decorated marquetry, usually with a bulbous curved shape known as `kettle-shaped’, were made continuously and well into the nineteenth century. Ornate French serpentine commodes with heavy ormolu decoration on the canted corners, heavy drawer-handles and ornamental escutcheons were very popular at one time with the Victorians and there are still
large numbers of them around.
Price bands
Finest-quality mahogany with veneered drawer fronts and shaped bracket feet, c.1770, $2,750-3,250.
Georgian mahogany with fluted and canted corners, shaped bracket feet and brushing slide, $3,800-4,500.
Georgian with fine detailing and veneering, 14,000 5,000.
Nineteenth century versions,$1,000-1,750.

18th Century American Chests of Drawers

Not long after the American Congress signed the Declaration of Independence on 4 July, 1776, the Revolutionary War began in earnest. While the colonists fought for their independence they had neither the energy nor the enthusiasm to keep up with British fashions, as they had in the past. And so, while the British embraced Robert Adam’s Neoclassical designs, American cabinet-makers continued to develop the 19th century American chests of drawers they had been making for the past 30 years.
NEW STYLES
It was only after the war ended in 1783 that the new styles were seen in America, and they were probably not actually made there until after 1790. For some years, the old Chippendale and new Federal styles were
made alongside each other, or even combined. In fact, the new American chests of drawers did not adhere to Adam’s Neoclassical designs, but followed the styles seen in the latest British pattern books from George Hepplewhite and Thomas Sheraton, often adding a regional twist to these forms. It did, however, borrow Adam’s use of marquetry, caning, painted surfaces, and the use of exotic woods.
A NATIONAL STYLE
This emerging style became known as Federal because it reflected the new identity of America, which now had a Federal government, a Federal party, and was building a Federal city
Confusingly, the style is sometimes called Sheraton or Hepplewhite, depending upon which style it was based. With the new politics came prosperity, and Baltimore and New York joined Philadelphia, Newport, Boston, Charleston, and Williamsburg as centres of fine chests of drawers production.
Early Federal chests of drawers was restrained in form and shows great attention to detail. Pieces had simple, geometric shapes. Those that were Hepplewhite in style had slender, tapered, square legs, while the Sheraton-style pieces had round, slightly vase-shaped or reeded legs. The feet were usually shaped like spades or arrows.
Early Federal chairs typically had shield, oval, or square backs, or painted finishes. They were
upholstered in silk, cotton, or wool, either in plain colours or had Classical, striped, or lattice patterns.
NEW FORMS
As America became more prosperous, the variety of chests of drawers increased. Traditional candlestands, serving tables, and dining tables were joined by Pembroke tables, side tables, and pier tables, along with small card, sewing, and worktables. These were made from New England, through New York and Philadelphia to the southern States. Dressing tables began to replace lowboys, especially in Maryland, New York, Philadelphia, and Salem. Chests of drawers were made in the latest styles in all the states.
Escutcheons usually matched the pulls on doors and drawers. Where wood, ivory, or bone plates were used, they were inset into the wood. Brass pulls on Hepplewhite-style designs usually had an oval mount and a bail handle. On Sheraton designs, which were popular in Salem, they often had an oblong plate and a bail handle, a rosette with a ring, or were in the form of a lion’s head with a ring pull.
In Baltimore, Newport, Salem, and New York, chests of drawers was generally made from mahogany, but maple was favoured in Boston. Cabinet-makers used satinwood, ebony, ash, and other contrasting veneers. Baltimore, in particular, was known for its painted gilt glass panels and delicate inlays.
DECORATIVE FEATURES The grain of the wood often provided the only form of decoration, but some pieces featured carvings in low relief, veneers, inlays, or paint. Carved decoration was confined to the early years of
the period, while painted Federal chests of drawers is rarely seen today.
Popular motifs inspired by antiquity included patera, bellflowers, thunderbolts, sheaves of wheat, and vases of flowers. Many pieces of chests of drawers from this period were carved or inlaid with patriotic symbols, including the American Eagle, the symbol of the Federal Union.
NEW ENGLAND CHEST OF DRAWERS
This Sheraton carved, mahogany, bow-front chest of drawers has a D-shaped top with outset rounded corners above four wide drawers the same shape. The stiles are carved with leaves above barley-twists and
terminate in turned feet. c.1790.
RHODE ISLAND CHEST-ON-CHEST
This cherry bonnet-top chest-on-chest is constructed in two parts: the upper part has twin drawers above three graduated drawers; the lower part has a case of four graduated drawers, and stands on a base moulding supported on ogee bracket feet. c.1770.
BY THE TIME the Revolutionary War was under way, the southern states of Maryland, Virginia, North and South Carolina, and Georgia were home to some of America’s wealthiest people.
EUROPEAN INFLUENCE Successful trade with Europe had enabled the local planters and merchants to live the lives of a sophisticated elite who kept abreast
of London fashions. By visiting Europe and importing European, and especially British, goods, they were able to give their homes a British feel. Those who did not import the latest London chests of drawers designs could have them copied locally by some of the finest craftsmen in the country It used to be thought that all good southern chests of drawers originated in Britain, but research over the past
few years has proved that much of it was made in the south, by immigrant British and other craftsmen.
POST-WAR chests of drawers
After the war, southern chests of drawers started to be influenced by chests of drawers from New York and New England; many southern Neoclassical chairs were very similar to New York ones of the same period.
Dining tables were usually simpler in design following the English taste. Corner tables and other small, drop-leaf tables were used for dining, tea, writing, gaming, and sewing. Cards were a popular pastime in the south
and so many tables were designed for this purpose.
Sofas, which had been expensive to upholster, became more affordable after the war and many were made by urban and rural craftsmen. However, early examples were likely to be British.
REGIONAL DIFFERENCES
Wealthy families in the coastal areas, who had once furnished their principal rooms with chests, moved them to less important bedchambers and passages, using chests of drawers and clothes presses for storage
instead.
Inland, in West Virginia, families continued to use chests in the main bedchamber and other formal parts of the house. These were often painted, German-American examples.
Desks, rather than secretaires, continued to be made as well as desks and bookcases with wooden or glazed doors to protect the books from the sun and dust.
The British trend for sideboards was also fashionable in the south and, along with buffets and china presses, provided a useful place to display valuable objects.
Southern style The Heyward-Washington House in Charleston, South Carolina, built in 1772, houses a fine collection of Charleston chests of drawers. The dining room is furnished in typical styles and colours.
Bottle cases — a type pe of free-standing cellaret — were more typical in the south than the north. This was because drinking cider, beer, and wine was seen as a healthy, acceptable way to cope with the intense heat
and humidity in the south.
Outside the major towns, people tended to keep to the old, British chests of drawers styles and so rural craftsmen did not learn the new Neoclassical skills such as inlay-making and veneer-cutting. However, as the number of chests of drawers-makers in the towns grew, competition often forced some of them out into the country As a result, their skills gradually spread outwards.
SOUTHERN CHEST
This rectangular southern chest is made of pine. It has a flat top with a small overhang. The case retains much of its original painted surface, comprising blue-and-white latticework decoration with painted pinwheels on a salmon-
coloured background. It was probably made as a dower chest: a special piece that was designed to hold wedding finery and textiles. The moulded base terminates in bracket feet, which are decorated with pierced
spurs. c.1780 .
VIRGINIA CHEST
This mahogany and yellow pine chest has a rectangular top, two-over-four graduated and dovetailed drawers, and ogee feet. Late 18th century.
The drawer handles are made of brass.
BY THE LATE 18th century, American chests of drawers styles were once again very similar to those in Britain. This was partly due to the number of British craftsmen emigrating to the colonies, and partly because of the continuing popularity of British pattern books in America. Craftsmen moved to wherever they could find work, taking their designs and techniques with them. As a result, styles were gradually disseminated over a wide area.
Differentiating between a piece
of British or American chests of drawers can be difficult, since craftsmen in both countries used similar techniques to create similar styles. Many American craftsmen were technically as proficient as their British counterparts, and their wealthy American customers wanted chests of drawers that was just as elegant and well made as pieces imported from Britain. American Chippendale, which was still being made at this time, was not just a provincial adaptation of the British style but
also an elegant interpretation. However, the origin of a piece can often be determined by the material used. Mahogany was imported to both Britain and the ports of the east coast of America, for example, so the
secondary, or inner wood, used for parts such as drawer linings, often identifies the place of manufacture. Maple and cherry were more commonly used in American chests of drawers, whereas oak and elm were typical of British pieces.
American cabinet-makers developed distinctive pieces of their own, such as a desk-and-bookcase combination in which the secretary drawer protrudes over the others. However, due to the fact that they often followed the same original design as British cabinetmakers, the only clue to where a piece originated is usually buried in the details. American craftsmen often used brass finials, for example, and turned feet on American pieces tended to be higher than those made in Britain.
ENGLISH CHEST-ON-CHEST
This mahogany chest-on-chest is Neoclassical in style. It has a moulded cornice above an architectural frieze and chamfered sides designed to look like pilasters on the upper case. The lower case has three drawers and bracket feet. 1760-70.
AMERICAN CHEST-ON-CHEST
This Massachusetts piece is made of native maple. The upper case is similar to that of the English example, as it has little carving, but the pulls and moulded base are Chippendale in style. The lower case has graduated drawers and high, bracket feet. c.1765.
AMERICAN DROP-LEAF TABLE
This large drop-leaf table is made of walnut, indicating that it was probably made in Pennsylvania or further south, where walnut :.as common. The oval leaves have moulded
edges and the frame is supported on eight square-section legs. The colloquial term in the United States for this type of table is a coffin table, which links it to the Irish wake table above. c.1790.
IRISH DROP-LEAF TABLE
Commonly described as a wake table in Ireland, this mahogany piece has a drop-leaf top with oval leaves supported by a simple frame. The legs swing out to support the table when it is open. 1760 70
ENGLISH CHEST OF DRAWERS
This mahogany, serpentine-shaped chest has a matching top with a moulded edge. The graduated drawers have cast brass bail handles. Both the sides of the chest and the bracket feet, which have large C-scrolls on
either side, are canted. c.1765.
AMERICAN CHEST OF DRAWERS
This New England chest is of reverse serpentine form. The top and drawers are edged with bead moulding. The base has a central pendant, which is typically American, and C-scroll bracket feet. The brass bail escutcheons and handles are English.
ENGLISH CHEST OF DRAWERS
Made of mahogany and pine, this bow-front chest of drawers is veneered with cross-banding. The drawers are graduated in size and descend to a shaped apron. The case sits on flared feet. The brass drawer pulls are
simple in design. c.1780.
MID-ATLANTIC CHEST
This bow-front mahogany chest has a rectangular top with a crossbanded veneer edge. The graduated drawers are emphasized by further crossbanded veneer. The tapered legs flare out at the base – known as French bracket feet. c.1790.