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Antiques! => Antique Questions Forum => Topic started by: kathyv43 on July 13, 2016, 11:11:40 AM
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I bought these items at an estate sale. Any information and/or value would be appreciate. I think both items are circa 1870-1880 and walnut. Thanks.
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Hi there:
You are probably right about the material and time period, although the dresser may be a bit earlier.
The parlor table is very handsome, although it looks like it has some issues on the top. I'd value it around $200 for replacement. The dresser looks like it has replacement pulls on the main drawers, so I'd value it at about the same: $200. These figures may be a little more or less, depending on where you are located.
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You're right about the pulls. The original hole is in-between the holes for the brass pulls. Probably had pulls similar to ones on top drawers. I'm going to refinish the table so hopefully it will look much better. Thanks for your info.
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Thats a cute little step back chest !! Wouldn`t mind having that !! Ghopper is correct on values for most areas !! I think the table is closer to 1900 !! About right for the chest give or take a few years !!
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Around my area I can probably sell the chest for a hundred or so more, time will tell. The table probably around $200 like he said. But if you want to pay for shipping I'll be glad to sell the chest to you. haha
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Agree to disagree re: the table. I'd stick with 1870-80. When refinishing, I'd stick to a stain and finish as close to the original as possible for the best look and maximum value.
It occurs to me that the raised panels on the dresser drawer fronts probably had walnut burl applied to them. It would be great if you could find someone to restore those....it would really look terrific. Agree that the original pulls would have been wood, possibly walnut leaf style. Take a look at the back of the dresser: if there are holes near the top then there was probably a mirror as well. Just FYI.
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I checked first for the mirror holes but didn't see any. I'm going to check again though because there was a little discoloration on the top drawers that made me think a mirror had been there. I think the pulls were originally the same or similar to the pulls on the top drawers.
We happen to have a guy in this small little town I live in that could recreate the pulls but then I would not make a profit when I sold the dresser. He's good but not cheap. Haha
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Agree to disagree re: the table. I'd stick with 1870-80. When refinishing, I'd stick to a stain and finish as close to the original as possible for the best look and maximum value.
It occurs to me that the raised panels on the dresser drawer fronts probably had walnut burl applied to them. It would be great if you could find someone to restore those....it would really look terrific. Agree that the original pulls would have been wood, possibly walnut leaf style. Take a look at the back of the dresser: if there are holes near the top then there was probably a mirror as well. Just FYI.
LOL !! Whats 20 or 30 years anyway !! I will say 1890 to 1910 !! Want to flip a coin Ghopper ?? ;D
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:) Ha! Take 20 or 30 years off your life and see if it makes a difference! ;)
Let's flip that coin. I call tails (of the 7 seas)!!
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OH my goodness....laughin g so hard. You beat me to it ghopper1924! I would like the instant 20 - 30 off life at some point!
I would agree with the late 1890 - 1910 timeline as well!
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1910? uhhhhhh, nooooo. Age of Golden Oak was firmly established by then. Why? because they had already cut down all the easily available walnut and oak was NEXT! Table is a version of eastlake, i'd say 1880-1890. Looks to have original casters which is a plus. Over 95% of old antique furniture that needs a new finish will get a better price if refinish is done well or professionally. The only exceptions to the 95% rule are museum quality examples with original finish or original painted pieces.
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I see my pal Jacon and I are in agreement pretty much all down the line. Yes, refinishing is a no-no at the high end, but otherwise it's OK, if, like we said, it's done well.
I see some lingering 1870-style Renaissance Revival in that table, thus to give it a more exact date I'd say 1875-85.
This is fun! 8)
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But Jacon4,, the production of walnut furniture was the dominant wood around the turn of the century and up until late 20`s !! Yes oak was there but in an entirely different genre`and style !!
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Mart, hmmmmm, walnut dominate in 1900? nope, and certainly not by 1910. Thing is, you see the Eastlake style in oak during this period (1890-1900) as they had the machines set up for walnut eastlake but no walnut! The solution? do runs of eastlake style in oak and sell as hotel or cottage furniture. By 1910 the craftsman style or mission style in quarter sawn oak ruled. Stickley opened in 1900 so by 1910, eastlake was dead as a door nail style wise and the age of Golden Oak was in full bloom. Walnut was over forested during the 19th century and it was just not available in the quantities needed as that century came to a close, which is why you sometimes see late eastlake in golden oak, it's kinda weird looking but hey, we ain't got no walnut so let's go with golden oak eastlake!
The problem for the furniture industry by 1900 was twofold, they literally ran out of walnut and 2, it's not so easy to completely re-tool their machinery from the eastlake style to craftsman or mission, that was a BIG design change and it took time for them to create new machines to build mortise & tenon craftsman style furniture.
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http://antiques.about.com/od/furniture/ss/aa062706.htm#step2
Just stay tuned folks..we will be back in a moment !! :D But now, a message from our sponsors !! LOL !!
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Besides, people were sick of dark wood (walnut) by 1900 and bored to death with the victorian age and it's cluttered life.They wanted change and BAM, along comes Stickley, Limbert and hundreds of others, maybe thousands of furniture manufacturer's to provide them with a brand new look. It was very well made, it was sleek and lean in design with exposed joinery and, it was also mostly blond! as in golden oak and, it was a SMASH HIT! trust me. Check out this listing of some of the guys who made this happen in 1900 america, some big names, many small but as a group, they MADE IT HAPPEN!
http://artsandcraftscollector.com/shopmarks/furniture
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Can you please post a picture of the underside of the table and a close up of the casters? Thanks!
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https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&espv=2&ie=UTF-8#q=Eastlake+parlor+table
General search !!
Jacon4,,are you sure you are thinking about the U.S.?? I have heard that said about the UK although I do not know if walnut is so common there !! But here even most of the inexpensive depression era furniture was walnut !! Walnut was an inexpensive wood as was mahogany !! It seems that if there was little walnut left price/furniture price would have gone up !! But it was used in the furniture for the middle class !! Mahogany, up until fairly recently,was used as ships ballast !! Not our ships of course !! Thats why mahogany was used in the repro Duncan Phyfe furniture and others !! It was inexpensive and plentiful !! There are better grades of course !!
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Yes they were tired of the dark wood but if you will notice,, the woods are walnut but the finish is much lighter !!
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To all of the above,,,you realize that all of you have succeeded in totally confusing me correct? Lol
I'm posting another...so please confuse me more! Seriously though thanks
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Can you please post a picture of the underside of the table and a close up of the casters? Thanks!
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Mart, yes, pretty sure i am thinking of USA, who knows what them limeys were doin in 1910! Where is what's his name? from GB, perhaps he/she will stop by and comment on that period over there. When i clicked your link, most all of them said 1880 eastlake that were walnut, the few oak eastlake pieces didn't give a date. Understand that here in america we followed english styles pretty closely until about the 1940s. Walnut was plentiful and cheap here during most of the victorian age here but eventually they ran out in the quantities needed to supply the furniture industry in Grand Rapids that supplied furniture to millions. One could safely say that here in america, conservation and good forestry practices was not something we worried about much in the 19th and early 20th century. Sure, walnut was still available in 1900 but it was getting scarce & expensive, much to expensive to feed the furniture industry that supplied the masses with affordable furniture.
Kathy, sorry, didn't mean to confuse you, we have gone off track here a bit and are discussing american furniture history generally. Your table remains late victorian, about 1880.
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But here even most of the inexpensive depression era furniture was walnut !
Mart, i'll bet that if you sanded the finish off that depression era furniture, you will find most of it wasn't walnut but stained to look like walnut.
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Kathy, those ceramic wheeled castors are good for dating a piece of furniture.
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Kathy, those ceramic wheeled castors are good for dating a piece of furniture.
Yep, we've got a bunch here at Chez Grasshopper. Again, 1875-85.
The history of furniture styles in the 19th century is complicated. As Mart has noted in the past, styles occurred concurrently, depending on where you were, but in general styles had ascendency at certain times, i.e. neoclassicism in the early 19th century, rococo revival 1840-1860, Renaissance Revival, Eastlake. Those were the biggies, but there were splinter styles like Egyptian Revival, Moorish, etc. as well. Styles were usually equal parts a desire to innovate coupled with a reaction against the previous style. For example, Charles Eastlake HATED the Rococo Revival, so Eastlake furniture was thought to be a "simplification" expressing "truth" that rococo revival would not, or could not, express. Subsequent history has proven that eastlake, particularly the earlier stuff, was anything but simple. Stickley's craftsman style would demonstrate true simplicity when it came to ornament, although even that looks rich compared to international style modernism.
Styles had "apex" woods that were considered the best at the time. For Neoclassical (Adam) it was mahogany, for Rococo Revival the best pieces were often rosewood, then Renaissance Revival and Eastlake with walnut, then oak at the end of the 19th century. These are generalizations of course, with frequent exceptions, but you get the idea. There is also something to Jacon's idea that new woods took over as old woods became over-harvested. Rosewood is a good example. I don't think it was ever common, but in the 1850s it was recognized as the wood for flagship items like etageres, because not only did it smell good (thus "Rosewood"), but it was difficult to work, challenging even the best furniture makers like Meeks and Belter. Now Rosewood is endangered, and not used for much besides guitar fretboards. Interestingly, it was revived in the 1950s and 60s, along with teak, for radical modernist furniture.
And yes, walnut became a "spray on" feature for 1930s and 40s furniture. Most of the best and most formal stuff was solid mahogany.
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LOL !! Did not mean to confuse and I did intend, as Ghopper has done, (Thanks Ghopper) to post an explanation !! Your table is, as Jacon4 said, would commonly be called late Victorian !! But during that period there were several styles all about the same time and overlapping each other !! Many of these are referred to as late Victorian period by some and by the descriptive term by others !! Not to be confused by the correct period name as in Empire period and Empire revival a bit later in history for example !!
Actually it makes little difference in value or style when your table was made during that period !! ( But here is the deal,, Jacon4 is an expert on Colonial and Early American (Pilgrim) furniture,, Ghopper knows Victorian furnitureand others well and I have studied late 19th & 20th centuryfurniture and its evolution !! Most times we see things on the same keel with only slight differences !! But Jacon4 has been MIA for a while and this discussion will keep him hopping :) !!) Furniture styles can be as much as a 20 year spread and occasionally more depending on the popularity at the time !!
Anytime you do not understand what we are talking about, just say so and we will be happy to trim down the explanation !!
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Been busy here plus it's HOT! now in the carolinas, was 97 today in Charlotte and humidity is very high!
Let me go at this from another angle, in 1908 Sears Roebuck started selling kit homes, that's right, for as little as $500. they would ship you an ENTIRE HOUSE in kit form, something like 30,000 pieces by rail. They used very high quality materials, this wasn't junk by any means, indeed, many of these Sears kit houses still stand today. For those that could not afford to hire an architect like Frank Loyd Wright or lesser figures and hire a general contractor to build a house, Sears had you covered folks , they would ship the entire house with marked parts and instructions so you could build it yourself. Many/most of these houses were 1 story craftsman style Bungalow's. Now, do you really think someone was going to furnish their brand new Sears Bungalow in Victorian furniture? HELL NO! they were gonna furnish it in the style of the day, craftsman, mission, arts & craft or whatever you wanna call it. The Queen was dead (queen Vic died in 1901), the victorian age was OVER and people moved on to a brand new century & a brand new style, Craftsman, Check out the pic's on some of these kit homes at link below.
http://www.arts-crafts.com/archive/sears/
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But here even most of the inexpensive depression era furniture was walnut !
Mart, i'll bet that if you sanded the finish off that depression era furniture, you will find most of it wasn't walnut but stained to look like walnut.
Nope !! When I had my shop I had to strip more of that stuff than I care to count !! I got to the point that I refused to buy it and started buying more oak even though at that time it sold better !! Got tired of looking at it !! And everyone wanted to go back to what it looked like as new and that meant mostly dark stains !!
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lol, yeah well, you are in Texas, Texas don't count when it comes to furniture, BAM! Most of the depression era furniture i see here in the east was a white wood like poplar that had a very dark stain and the higher quality furniture that was mahogany. There probably was some walnut, after all walnut was very plentiful here once upon a time & considered our "mahogany" but it was seriously over cut during the victorian age and became expensive as the 20th century began and, american black walnut remains expensive today. I would say if the furniture you sold was walnut, it would have been on the higher end of the depression era furniture.
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I just thought of something that might explain your experience, was the depression furniture you had built in Calif? or in the east? Calif has walnut but it is a different species, same family but different than american black walnut.
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lol, yeah well, you are in Texas, Texas don't count when it comes to furniture, BAM!
Say what??????????????????? BAM back at you! :) (I would watch out for Mart's BAM!) LOLOL
Kathyv43, Porcelain casters were VERY POPULAR in Victorian times (the days prior to carpeting and shag rugs when you mopped alot and had to move the furniture to) - the furniture style and casters are both indicative of Victorian! We are all agreeing on that! (We are just splitting hairs on the dates!)
Jacon4, putting my nephew on a plane back to Columbia, South Carolina in the morning after being here for a month! He'll be okay with the heat but not the humidity! I have always kidded my brother you could cook raw spaghetti/pasta by just sitting it outside there in South Carolina (with all the head/humidity)!
Mart, how did you fare this morning? We had a major electrical/wind storm through this morning and didn't know if it was still strong when it hit your neck of the woods! (At least we kept electricity this time!)
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Yeah, it's been HOT, i get up very early here so i can retreat back home in the AC by 11 a.m. I was in Dallas Tex a couple years ago on a job, it was HOT but not near the humidity we have here, very sticky here.
Well, where did Texas and western states get their furniture back in the day? Was it shipped from the furniture centers like Grand Rapids in the east? build their own? I have no idea where furniture comes from out west. I do know that Calif has walnut but it's different than walnut here in the east.
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Its been hot but this week has been a drier heat than normal !! Has not been bad at all !! But then I am outside so much that the temps do not make me melt like every one else !! Plus our yard is quite shady with big trees all around it !! Have been picking grapes (bumper crop this year) and watering fruit trees before they get heat stressed !! Big garden is done and in the freezer (thank heavens) just some late stuff in the little garden,,squash, zuchinni, a few late tomatoes !!
KC,, it has rained all around us last few days but not a drop here !! Yesterday a thunderstorm warning for our area and rained in town which is only 6 mi. south of us but not here !!
Jacon4,, I have no idea where all the furniture came from but it was mostly solid walnut,, very little was veneered !! Only thing on it was the typical style numbers you find on most of it !! One attorney brought an entire bedroom suit that he wanted for his house !! But most of the pieces were the ordinary buffet/ servers, dining tables/ occasional tables, ect !!
We have a ton of black walnut in this area !! Wish I knew someone to buy the nuts but you need a jack hammer or steam roller to crack the things and then not enough inside to be worth the trouble !!
I would assume that since most of the mfrs in Texas were small, local and few, that most was shipped in from Grand Rapids MI or High Point NC around the turn of the century !!
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Well, if it was solid walnut from that era, i would say it was very high end and expensive when built. Most of the run of the mill depression era stuff i see is veneered, poplar, birch or plywood core with veneer surface or a straight up dark/light stain applied to poplar which accepts stain or paint like a dream. A lot of curvy-waterfall-rounded surfaces that worked well with veneers.
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Well, where did Texas and western states get their furniture back in the day? Was it shipped from the furniture centers like Grand Rapids in the east? build their own?
This should answer your questions, to wit:
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Early Texas furniture industry was well beyond primitive
Sam Houston was spitting mad about the wagon load of furniture arriving at his Huntsville home. The stove had no pipe, the bed's canopy and side rails were missing and a bedpost was split, the mirror was shattered and the sideboard was "infamous beyond all things else."
"The veneering is broken and split," Houston furiously complained to the Galveston merchant who sold the items. "Wherever it needed it, and I should say at least 20 places, it has been puttied. ... One end of the sideboard was split for near a foot and filled with wax. I have not told you all, nor is it worth the trouble."
Furnishing a house in mid-19th century Texas, where even short-distance transportation could be treacherous, could pose serious problems. Thousands of early Texas settlers arrived with little more than a trunk, and the items needed to fill their homes - especially those in the hinterland - often were improvised on the spot.
Yet, when it came to furniture, Texas was filled with surprises. Among the frontier settlers were skilled craftsmen capable of transforming native woods into functional, sometimes highly sophisticated, furnishings.
Although most settlements of any size had someone capable of fashioning at least rudimentary furniture, 19th century Texas furniture production centered in Austin, Galveston, areas around New Braunfels, Round Top and Nacogdoches and the blackland prairie of North Texas.
Shops ranged from single-man operations to those with multiple artisans using simple hand-operated machinery. Workers often doubled as farmers or builders of coffins and wagons. Some craftsmen also offered ready-made imported pieces.
By the 1880s, cheap industrially produced furniture brought by rail was available in most parts of Texas, and furniture artisans - some of whom had fled Europe to escape mechanization of their craft - found their skills obsolete.
Read more @ http://www.chron.com/news/houston-texas/article/Early-Texas-furniture-industry-was-well-beyond-3340496.php# (http://www.chron.com/news/houston-texas/article/Early-Texas-furniture-industry-was-well-beyond-3340496.php#)
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AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA AAAAAA! what i said earlier was truer than i thought! Sam Houston agrees with me!
" Texas don't count when it comes to furniture, BAM"
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Darn !! Hate to admit it but,,,Jacon4 is (bite my tongue) right !! ;D
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Furnishing a house in mid-19th century Texas, where even short-distance transportation could be treacherous, could pose serious problems.
Yeah, that was also true on the east coast in the mid 18th century, postal services were very good because that only involved a horse and rider but if you needed to haul any type of cargo in a wagon (like logs for instance), you had some serious issues because the roads were very bad.
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Thanks Cogar !! That article was correct !! Thank heavens we had a pretty good rail system after 1900 !! Otherwise we would still be sitting on tree stumps !!
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(http://www.clipartbest.com/cliparts/aiq/z8K/aiqz8K9kT.png)
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LOL, cute. I got that BAM! thingy from that cooking show, Emeril, who was always saying BAM! as he finished this or that dish. Interesting piece on Sam Houston, an interesting man who was removed as Governor of Texas because he opposed joining the south in the civil war. Lt Col Robert E Lee, another virginian as was Sam, was in Texas when war broke out, returned to Washington to make a painful decision about that war, he opposed leaving the union as well.
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Thank heavens we had a pretty good rail system after 1900 !! Otherwise we would still be sitting on tree stumps !!
Mart, that's pretty much true for all areas in North America that was 50+ miles inland from a coastal or a river port. It t'was the Erie (Barge) Canal that made New York City a major center of commerce. Up n' down the Hudson River to Albany and across to Buffalo and the Great Lakes.
Ha, ;D ;D the origin of the rail system into Texas was for shipping cattle to Chicago stockyards. And West Virginia would still be known as the hillbilly "backwoods" of western Virginia if not for the railroads that were built for transporting coal and lumber to the great cities on the East Coast.