Hello everyone
I have another sofa I could use some help with. I'm unable to find much thru my research. It has the Rococo serpentine front,but to me it's a Rococo/ Renaissance transitional piece.There is beautiful pierced work across the back which to me speaks New York, but I have no idea. Thanks for the help
John
Rococo sofa
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Victorian Furniture thread on victorianforum.com · started December 15, 2007 by jcapal · 5 posts, 3 image attachments · discussion in 2007.
Hello everyone I have another sofa I could use some help with. I'm unable to find much thru my research. It has the Rococo serpentine front,but to me it's a Rococo/ Renaissance transitional piece.There is beautiful pierced work across the back which to me speaks New York, but…
I'm not the expert rhR many on this board are, but I sure don't see anY Renaissance Revival in this fine Rococo sofa. I'll be checking back and hoping to have some of the experts smarten me up, if I'm wrong.
BornaHeel
BornaHeel
Looks to me to be 100% pure rococo revival.
- Jason
- Jason
I guess my question is with the pierce carvings.Most Rococo I'm coming across is naturalistic,flowers, leaves,fruit etc. Yet I have seen similar carvings on Renaissance pieces. Has any one seen this design? Any opinions on maker or region?
Thanks
John
Thanks
John
I don't suspect as that I'll have any particularly valuable insight about your sofa. Of course, I do rather enjoy listening to my fingers clicking on the keyboard, so I'll ramble on a bit for the sake of my own vanity.
Your sofa is, in my opinion, a poster child for a straight-forward, rococo revival sofa. I suspect that any number of furniture shops made roughly the same form as it was an extremely popular shape back in the 1850s and into the 1860s. I wouldn't get too hung up on the carvings not being all flowers or grapes. If you look at the picture of my black settee in the "Elijah Galusha" topic (also rococo style like yours) you will see a similar knob detail in the crest, albeit surrounded by a few flowers.
It might be interesting to determine whether or not your sofa is made of rosewood or walnut. The rosewood pieces were almost certainly more expensive than the walnut pieces, but walnut did become a somewhat more common alternative by the 1860s given the increasing scarcity of the rosewood. I guess that black walnut can be worked in such a way that it appealed to budget-minded folks and still had an allure similar to rosewood. My hunch is that your sofa is made of walnut, but I can't really tell from the photos. I'll note here that my little black settee is also made of walnut, not rosewood.
Given as that this "shape" was so common, I don't think that it is possible to even specify a region of the country that your sofa was made in without having an identified sister piece to compare it to. I would not be surprised if your sofa was made in the south, for example...maybe New Orleans...or maybe in the north like New York. Regardless, I think that it is a safe bet that it wasn't a product of a Belter, Meeks, Roux, or somebody else of the like. That having been said, I actually prefer the products of the middle-class furniture makers as those pieces fit in better in my upper-middle-class house. There would never have been a top-notch piece from NYC sitting in my front parlor...not to say that there never will be...there just hasn't been to date.
Anyway, I really like your sofa! I'll keep my eyes peeled for anything with a mathcing crest.
Thank you,
Jason
Your sofa is, in my opinion, a poster child for a straight-forward, rococo revival sofa. I suspect that any number of furniture shops made roughly the same form as it was an extremely popular shape back in the 1850s and into the 1860s. I wouldn't get too hung up on the carvings not being all flowers or grapes. If you look at the picture of my black settee in the "Elijah Galusha" topic (also rococo style like yours) you will see a similar knob detail in the crest, albeit surrounded by a few flowers.
It might be interesting to determine whether or not your sofa is made of rosewood or walnut. The rosewood pieces were almost certainly more expensive than the walnut pieces, but walnut did become a somewhat more common alternative by the 1860s given the increasing scarcity of the rosewood. I guess that black walnut can be worked in such a way that it appealed to budget-minded folks and still had an allure similar to rosewood. My hunch is that your sofa is made of walnut, but I can't really tell from the photos. I'll note here that my little black settee is also made of walnut, not rosewood.
Given as that this "shape" was so common, I don't think that it is possible to even specify a region of the country that your sofa was made in without having an identified sister piece to compare it to. I would not be surprised if your sofa was made in the south, for example...maybe New Orleans...or maybe in the north like New York. Regardless, I think that it is a safe bet that it wasn't a product of a Belter, Meeks, Roux, or somebody else of the like. That having been said, I actually prefer the products of the middle-class furniture makers as those pieces fit in better in my upper-middle-class house. There would never have been a top-notch piece from NYC sitting in my front parlor...not to say that there never will be...there just hasn't been to date.
Anyway, I really like your sofa! I'll keep my eyes peeled for anything with a mathcing crest.
Thank you,
Jason