Rare Victorian Forum

Hello,

Are there any identifying labels or signatures to signify that a piece was created in the Mallard factory?  As a native of New Orleans, I find this artist particularly interesting.  Thanks!

 There is a lot of wonderful folk wisdom about what constitutes a Mallard signature, most notably a cabochon (or 'egg')  in the crest, or specific embellishments on cabochons.  While they do appear on a number of documented Mallard pieces, they also were employed as a decorative motif by a host of other makers. Most of these things are probably best viewed as 'old wives' tales.

  Estate documents and correspondence suggests that by the turn of the century, ,the term "Mallard" came to be a general descriptive term to describe all New Orleans market furniture, in much the same way American neoclassical furniture has been called "Duncan Phyfe"; all Arts and Crafts furniture was sometimes deemed "Stickley"; and Renaissance Revival parlor suites with female caryatids are dubbed "Jelliff".

  Mallard paper labels have appeared on a handful of pieces of both domestic and imported manufacture.  At least one stenciled label has appeared.  That is on a Mallard piece offered at New Orleans Auction last fall.  In addition, there are Mallard bills of sale for bedroom suites at the Gallier House, New Orleans and the Louisiana State Museum.  Neal Auction also sold a bedroom suite with a bill of sale several years ago.  An article in the Magazine Antiques about half a century ago illustrated some unlabeled pieces that descended among Mallard's heirs.  Most of those pieces, and a few others of like lineage, were offered at New Orleans auction about 7 or 8 years ago.  Rosedown in St Francisville may also have a Mallard bill of sale that relates to bedroom furnishings.  An Elizabethan Revival china/bookcase in a private collection is also reputedly identified by a Mallard bill of sale.  A couple other Mallard pieces are identified in S. Harrison's May 1997 "Magazine Antiques" article.

  In my estimation, pieces that match these objects can be fairly attributed to Mallard.  As to whether he actually manufactured those pieces (in almost all cases probably not) is another conversation.  I am not aware of any companion pieces to the documented bedroom furnishings with other maker's or retailers labels or bills of sale.  At least one occasional table is quite similar to known Killian Brothers pieces.

  Among the bedroom pieces in particular, certain motifs appear again and again, and I believe may be fairly viewed as indicators of a possible Mallard association.  Most notably they include: bed testers whose curves and form assumes a particular profile; oft repeated bed bracket shapes and carvings; headboards with full length tenons to join them to the posts rather than pairs of 'ears' or metal hooks; and that distinctive bracket foot with an S-scroll molding along its lower edge.   The case pieces typically assume an over-scale Louis Phillipe profile, with applied rope-twist turnings at the corners.  They pieces employ distinctly American secondary woods, and seem to have been manufactured a good decade or generation after they fell out of favor in France.

 A particular family of dressing tables, (identified as a 'duchesse' on the Mallard sales receipts), surface from time to time, all of which share similar legs and decorative details. Neal Auction sold one such dressing table about 15 years ago with an obscure New Orleans cabinetmaker's name and address written beneath a drawer.  It is unclear whether he may have repaired the piece, or crafted it for Mallard's salesroom.

  Just my two cents.