Winning Bid: Reggie Buys a (School of) Duncan Phyfe Games Table

In today's post I reveal which of the five school of Duncan Phyfe games tables I bought during the Important Americana auctions held in New York this January.  Of the forty-three Dear Readers who responded to my query (both here and on my FB page), the vast majority thought I bought either lot 369 (52%) or lot 383 (39%) in the Sotheby's sale.  Only two of you (5% of respondents) correctly posited that it was actually lot 410 (the least "gainly" of the ones offered) that I ultimately brought home.  

Here is how it happened:

The Sotheby's and Christie's Important Americana sales were held on Friday, January 24th, and Saturday, January 25th, with previews held during the week leading up to the sales.  I was determined to make it to the previews, Dear Reader, to examine the school of Duncan Phyfe games tables discussed in my previous post, and I was fortunate to be able to slip away from my office the afternoon of the last day of the previews to do just that.

Christie's lot 147 "Superior" quality Duncan Phyfe-
attributed games table on which Reggie did not bid

My first stop, though, was at '21', where I had a leisurely lunch with an old friend—a most excellent way to start out such an enjoyable outing.  I suggested to my friend that we meet at '21' because it is only a stone's throw from Christie's, where the best of the five games tables I was interested in looking at was on display.  After bidding my lunching companion adieu I strolled over to Christie's just in time to look the table over, slipping into the exhibition room as the handlers were beginning to break down the preview ahead of the next day's sale.  While I concluded the Christie's games table was certainly a very handsome piece, it did not get my juices flowing sufficiently to make me seriously consider leaving a bid for it.  Besides, I knew it would sell well above my price range, so why even bother?

The main exhibition floor at Sotheby's Important Americana preview

I then hightailed it over to Sotheby's to take in their preview, which included the four remaining games tables, each with a supposed Duncan Phyfe connection, in which I was interested.  As is typical of the Important Americana sales at both auction houses, most of the better furniture on offer at Sotheby's was of the late-eighteenth-century ball-and-claw variety.  While I can appreciate the merits of such furniture, it is not of interest to Dear Old Reggie.  No, I was there to check out the goods of the first quarter of the nineteenth century, also known as the Federal and Classical eras, which is the sweet spot of our collecting at Darlington.

The Federal and Classical era section
at Sotheby's Important Americana preview

Fortunately there was a grouping of furniture and decorations from that period, where—not surprisingly—the four games tables I was interested in examining were to be found.

A not very good photograph of the "Best" quality school
of Duncan Phyfe games tables on display at Sotheby's

The first table I came to examine was lot 383, the "Best" quality trick-leg table shown in the preceding photograph.  While admittedly its form and execution was very fine (in auction parlance), there had been much restoration to the table, with the underside of the top largely rebuilt.  That nixed it for me.  Besides, we already own two similar form school of Duncan Phyfe tripod tilt-top tables at Darlington, which sit at either end of our sofa in our drawing room.

The "Better Yet" quality school of Duncan Phyfe
five-legged games table at Sotheby's

I next looked over lot 369, the five-legged games table on offer, but passed on it, too, because we already have a similar Pembroke-form table that we bought at Bernard & S. Dean Levy a decade or so ago. 

The "Better" quality school of Duncan Phyfe
pedestal games table at Sotheby's

Looking around the room I then noticed lot 410, a table that I had dismissed when looking at Sotheby's online catalogue.  Wait a minute, I thought—what about this one?

Moving in to get a better look . . .

On closer examination I decided I liked the gutsy form of the pedestal games table with its four turned and carved columns rising out of a four-legged base.  It was, admittedly, not as pretty or spare as lots 383 or 369, but it certainly had a lot of impact, and it wasn't in a form that we already owned.  Hmmm . . . I wondered—could this be worth considering?  

Pivoting the table top, we found a concealed compartment
for cards and chips, with remnants of its original green baize lining

By this time Boy had joined me at the preview.  He was as surprised as I was to find that he also liked the pedestal games table, and preferred it to the others on display.  After giving it a close once over, we then turned it upside down to examine its innards, as one should always do when considering buying an antique piece of furniture.  Other than the replacement of the bottom of its concealed compartment, the games table looked "clean" to us, with the expected age, condition, and color one wants to see in such pieces.

Only one obvious repair was to be found

We were not all that concerned that the bottom of the compartment had been replaced, Dear Reader, and we were actually heartened that whoever had done so hadn't attempted to give it an unnatural aging, in an attempt to deceive.  It was what it was—an obvious repair.  But that's the only one we found.

The Sotheby's Important Americana sale under way

We left the preview asking ourselves if the columnar pedestal games table would be an appropriate addition to our collection of school of Duncan Phyfe furniture at Darlington, and if so should we bid on it?  And how much should we bid?  Over cocktails and dinner that evening we decided that it was worth a try, and so we returned to Sotheby's the next day to see whether we might be able to acquire it at a sufficiently reasonable price.

The table we were interested in was one of the last lots in the sale.  We arrived at Sotheby's well before it came up, and so had a lot of time on our hands to wile away before it did.  Fortunately, in addition to watching the auction progress through the lots leading up to "our" table, there was a preview exhibition of Old Master paintings on the same floor to examine.

Working the room for what its worth

The auctioneer for the Sotheby's Important Americana sale was very professional and personable, and I have to give her a lot of credit for moving along what at times appeared to be a near-moribund room.  She had her work cut out for her, Dear Reader.  With the exception of a small number of lots that sold well above their estimates, almost everything in the sale either went within or below estimate, and in some cases well below estimate.  That is, if it sold at all.  A fairly high proportion of the lots on offer failed to meet their reserves and went unsold.  While not exactly a blood bath, it was clearly not a great day for the auction house or the sellers it was representing.  It was, on the other hand, a very good day for buyers as deals were definitely to be had.  I found myself repeatedly amazed at how inexpensively many of the lots were being hammered down—in some cases at prices well below what one might pay for new, far-lesser-quality pieces of furniture.

The bitter end

By the time lot 410 came up the room was largely deserted.  We were hopeful that we would be able to get the pedestal table at a good price, and were heartened that two of the games tables in the auction had been hammered down below their estimates (and one had been passed altogether).  While we had come prepared to bid into the estimated $5,000-to-$10,000 range for the table, we were pleased to find ourselves in what can only be described as a half-hearted contest with only one other bidder, and we were exhilarated when the final hammer came down at $3,500 and the table was ours.

Once we got the table into our city apartment and examined it more closely, we asked ourselves why was it that we were able to get it so inexpensively?  Were we the late-in-the-sale lucky beneficiaries of a less-than-stellar auction where supply outstripped demand?  Or had we bought a compromised, cobbled together mess that no one else wanted?  What if the table was not of the first period at all, but rather a later reproduction?  Upon closer examination, didn't we think the carving just wasn't crisp enough?

We then asked ourselves, given the price we paid for the table (which is less than what a run-of-the-mill, cheaply-made one at Ethan Allen might cost), did we even care?  And the answer was of course not—it was a bargain!

If I'd paid two or three times what I did for the table I might get all worked up, second guessing myself endlessly on it.  But since I didn't, I haven't, and I must say that I'm very pleased with this acquisition.

The table and our dear Basil in our
Snuggery at Darlington House

I think our school of Duncan Phyfe columnar pedestal games table looks absolutely marvelous in our Snuggery at Darlington, where it fits right in with the other, somewhat bombastic American Classical furniture of the early nineteenth century, as well as some complementary English chairs.  In fact, when we put "our" pedestal table against the wall in our Snuggery underneath a Sully-framed portrait and loaded it up with suitable period accessories, we thought it looked perfect, as if it had always been there.

Which, to my mind, Dear Reader, is the sign of a successful acquisition.  Don't you think so?

All photographs by Reggie Darling and Boy Fenwick

Duncan Phyfe Games Tables at the Sotheby's and Christie's Important Americana Sales: Better, Better Yet, Better Still, Best, and Superior

There are very few known pieces of furniture that carry a label from the workshop of Duncan Phyfe (1768-1854), one of the leading cabinet makers in America during the early part of the nineteenth century.  Only eight, to be exact.  Almost all of the furniture produced in Phyfe's New York City workshop, from 1794 to 1847,  is unlabeled.  This has been a challenge to collectors, museum curators, and dealers in accurately identifying furniture as having been made by Phyfe's workshop.  Compounding that difficulty is the fact that there were a number of cabinetmakers that were active in New York at the same time that produced furniture of similar quality, sometimes shared the same journeyman carvers, and often copied each other's work.  Furthermore, there is a fairly large group of excellent reproductions (some of them meant to deceive) that were made during the Colonial Revival era.

Given the difficulty in confidently attributing furniture to Duncan Phyfe's workshop, much of the pieces that could possibly have originated there that come up for auction or sale these days are identified as being of the school of Duncan Phyfe, or made by an equivalent workshop.  When a piece has a provenance where there is a documented link between the owner and Duncan Phyfe's workshop—such as a bill of sale—then it can be accurately described as being attributed to Duncan Phyfe.  Only when a piece of furniture actually carries a Duncan Phyfe label can it definitively be described as being made by Duncan Phyfe's workshop.

We collect early-nineteenth-century New York Federal and Classical furniture at Darlington House, and we own half a dozen examples that are considered to be of the school of Duncan Phyfe, or by an equally competent competitor.  I have written about our collection of such furniture in a number of posts, including one here.

At this January's Important Americana sales at Sotheby's and Christie's, there were five examples of games tables that were catalogued as being either from the school of Duncan Phyfe or attributed to his workshop.  Today's post examines those five tables and ranks them based on their quality and condition along the continuum of "Good" to "Masterpiece," as defined by Albert Sack (1912-1999) in his landmark reference book Fine Points of Furniture, first published in 1969 and revised and expanded in 1993.

The first games table in the group auctioned this January qualifies as what I would consider to be a "Better" example of the type.  (Sotheby's and Christie's—given their lofty standards and clientele—do not, in general, auction goods that are at such a lowly end of the quality continuum as to be considered merely "Good.")

Sotheby's lot 410.  Fine Classical carved and figured mahogany
games table, school of Duncan Phyfe.  New York, ca. 1815.
Estimate $5,000-$10,000 USD

The table was in the Sotheby's Important Americana sale, held on January 25th, and is probably the least likely of the group I'm writing about to have been made in the Phyfe workshop.  While the form is one that was known to have been produced by Phyfe, upon close examination the table's carving is the least crisp and well-executed of the group at the sales, which leads me to believe it was made by a nearly equivalent workshop, but not Phyfe's.  I wonder if the games table may be a later, highly accomplished reproduction piece made in the latter part of the nineteenth century, or even possibly a marriage piece where the base didn't start out with the top.  It's hammer price was only $3,500, Dear Reader, and well below its $5,000-$10,000 estimate, indicating that I am not alone in such speculation.  Nonetheless, I would still rank this pleasing table's quality as "Better," using Mr. Sack's quality scale.

Sotheby's lot 369.  Fine and rare classical carved and figured mahogany
five-legged games table, attributed to the school of Duncan Phyfe,
New York, circa 1815.  Estimate $5,000-$10,000 USD

The next table, also in the Sotheby's sale, is more likely to have been made in the Phyfe workshop, in my view, or by his equally competent competitors, the brothers Michael and Richard Allison.  The table's carving is crisp and confident, and its proportions are excellent.  I would rank this as a "Better Yet," or one gradation above the first table.  I would have ranked it even higher than "Better Yet" if it had one or two more flourishes to its form, or more "oomph."  The table sold within its $5,000-$10,000 estimate, at $6,500.

Sotheby's lot 385.  Fine Classical carved and figured mahogany
"trick-leg" games table, school of Duncan Phyfe, New York, circa 1815.
Estimate $6,000-$12,000 USD

The third table, also in the Sotheby's sale, was in the much-desired "trick-leg" form, where an ingenious interior mechanism moves two of the table's legs when the top is opened to form a perfect, and stable, tripod base.  The carving of this games table's fluting was crisp and well executed, and I have no reason to believe it was not made in the Phyfe workshop.  I would rank this as "Better Still," or somewhere between "Better Yet" and "Best."  Condition issues, however, limited the desirability of the table (the top had come off and one of the legs was repaired), and it failed to reach its reserve price and was passed at $4,500.

Sotheby's lot 383.  Very fine and rare Classical carved and figured mahogany
"trick-leg'' games table, school of Duncan Phyfe, New York, circa 1815.
Estimate $8,000-$12,000 USD

The fourth table, also auctioned by Sotheby's, is almost assuredly a product of the Phyfe workshop.  Its carving is more masterful than the previous "Better Still" games table, with more complicated and virtuosic leaf carvings on the legs and the central pedestal (as opposed to mere fluting on the previous example).  The quality of the mahogany was also excellent, with a vivid, almost plum pudding top.  I would rank this games table as the "Best" in its category.  It's got it all.  Condition issues, including what appeared to be later repairs to the underside of the table top, meant that it did not achieve the low end of its $8,000-$12,000 estimate, but it it did sell for $5,500.

Christie's lot 147.  A Federal mahogany treble-elliptical "trick-leg"
card table, attributed to Duncan Phyfe, New York, 1800-1820.
Estimate $12,000-$18,000 USD

The final games tables shown was the only one offered by Christie's and was the best of the lot, by a wide margin.  Christie's cataloged it as attributed to Duncan Phyfe's workshop (as opposed to school of), and it had all the bells and whistles one could possibly want in the form: it was a trick-leg, it sported a treble-elliptical top (instead of the more common double-elliptical form), it had a contrasting satinwood apron (vs. none or one of mahogany), it had a beautifully mottled table top, and its legs and central pedestal were decorated with intricate and superbly executed leaf carvings.  I would rank this as a "Superior" (as defined by Albert Sack) and the highest ranking of the five tables shown here.  It is only one step short of the "Masterpiece" pinnacle of the continuum.  Not surprisingly, the Christie's games table realized the highest price of any of the tables offered during the sales, hammered down at $15,000, or right in the middle of its $12,000-$18,000 estimate.

If I had been feeling particularly flush during the sales, Dear Reader, I might have considered bidding on the Christie's table.  I wasn't, however, so I consoled myself with buying one of the other, lesser tables offered, for our Snuggery at Darlington House.  I'll divulge which one it is in my next post.

Tell me, which one of these tables do you like the best?  And which one would you buy if price was not a consideration?

Photographs courtesy of Sotheby's and Christie's.

Another Sale, More China, and Thoughts on Stewardship

The Collection of Keith and Chippy Irvine Sale

Today's essay was intended to be a "Winning Bid" post about Reggie's successful bidding on a number of lots at the recent auction of "The Collection of Keith and Chippy Irvine" held at Stair Galleries in Hudson, New York.  It has evolved into being yet another of his posts about collecting ceramics, and it includes one of his favorite tips for carefully storing the same.  It also includes his ramblings about the concept of stewardship.

So, Dear Reader, be forewarned!

For those of us who are as obsessed as Reggie is with pretty things and the appurtenances of refined living—at least as it was narrowly defined among a tiny minority of Anglophilic East Coasters here in the United States in the latter half of the 20th century—last weekend was a sale bonanza in the little city of Hudson, New York.  As readers of this blog well know, on October 5th Stair Galleries auctioned there nearly 300 lots of "Property of a Lady," universally understood to be that of the late Brooke Astor.

Cover of the promotional brochure for the Irvine sale
held at Stair Galleries on October 6th

The very next day Stair Galleries also held a sale of the "Collection of Keith and Chippy Irvine."  Mr. Irvine, the noted decorator, died last year, much to the sadness of those who knew and loved him.  His wife, the noted author Chippy Irvine, is very much alive and decided to sell a treasure-trove of objects that she and her husband collected over their long and happy marriage.  Stair was the fortunate auction house to be selected for this extravaganza.

We—and a number of our friends—were fortunate to come away from the Irvine sale with a pretty thing or two for our own collections.  Which brings to mind one of the reasons that I enjoy collecting antiques (or "previously owned" things): namely, that I appreciate owning objects that someone else (and, dependng on the age of the object, possibly many people) owned and enjoyed before me, and which I shall pass on to someone else to own and enjoy in the future.  We are but stewards of our possessions, Dear Reader, and it is up to us to appropriately care for them while enjoying them, so that those who come after us may do so as well.  Collecting and living with antiques (whether they be objects or houses), is the original definition of being green in my book.

But I digress . . .

We attended the Irvine sale from the first rap of the auctioneer's gavel at eleven o'clock in the morning through the late afternoon.  We did so because the lots that we and our friends desired were spread throughout the day, and also because it was all rather interesting.  Bidding in the auction was spirited, and was enlivened by an intense rivalry between two tastemakers in the room who bid determinedly for the same lots over and over again.  There was also one very active phone bidder amidst the fray.

One of the lots in the Irvine sale from which we
dropped out of the bidding, long before the final hammer
Image courtesy of Stair Galleries

Although there were any number of lots in the sale that we were interested in bidding on, we quickly decided to refrain from doing so on those that the two tastemakers were vying for . . .

Nope.  Didn't get this one, either!
Image courtesy of Stair Galleries

. . . since, given their determination and seemingly endless resources, there was no point!  Besides, we knew one of them and didn't want to bid against him, as he is a friend of many years standing.

The Irvine wall clock that we were able to buy,
 as it appeared in the Stair Galleries online catalogue
Image courtesy of same

Boy and I did come away with two lots from the sale.  One, a pretty and decorative tôle peinte Regency-style pocket watch-form wall clock (clearly not first period—it was most likely made in the 1950s or 1960s), and the second a set of prettily painted Wedgwood creamware plates.  Some of the plates in the set were made in the first period, around 1800, and others were made later, possibly as many as one hundred years later, to fill out the set.  Fortunately Wedgwood kept its early molds and had painters on staff throughout who could perfectly copy the earlier decoration.

The Irvine wall clock, photographed hanging
from a doorknob at Darlington House

Boy has rather a thing for early creamware and was excited by the opportunity to acquire a substantial stack of plates at the Irvine sale to add to our cupboards.  Fortunately the two tastemakers at the sale had their sights on furniture and pictures, so Boy was able to reasonably win the plates and bring them home at the end of the day.

The creamware plates Boy bought, as shown in Stair's online catalogue
Image courtesy of same

But the story doesn't end there, Dear Reader.  No, there's more.  For when one acquires pretty things, it requires (or at least it should) that they be cared for appropriately, so that they can be passed on to others in the future in the best condition possible.

The creamware plates, now that they have come
to exist with us at Darlington House

Once we got our pretty plates home to Darlington House, the two of us spent an hour or so tending to them.  First we removed every sticky label (auction lots get covered with identifying paper labels during the sale process), and then we removed the residue left behind (thank goodness one has discovered Goo-Gone™ for such purposes).  We then followed this by a sudsy wash in warm water and a thorough drying with a soft cloth.

Our bolt of brown felt, on hand for cutting rounds

The next and final bit of tending one does under such circumstances, at least that we do at Darlington House, is to cut out felt rounds to place between each plate so acquired.  Doing so protects the plates from scratching and chipping when picked up by a careless housekeeper and ensures their stacked safety for as long as one owns them.  Although one can buy pre-made rounds to layer between one's plates, making them oneself is easy and (by far more) economical.  Furthermore, in doing so one is able to choose the color of one's rounds.  Our current favorite color of felt is chocolate brown, although we have also used grey in years past.

The felt, as marked for cutting plate rounds

Tending to such things is a satisfying, relaxing, and nonverbal activity, and a decidedly pleasant way to pass happy and productive time with one's like-minded spouse.

The plates, cushioned by layers of felt

Dear Reader, should you be so fortunate to buy, be given, or inherit pretty and fine antique dishes, I encourage you to secure a bolt of felt and cut rounds from it to protect them.  Not only will you be assured of coddling the plates for as long as you own them, but you will also be confident that when you pass them on, either directly or when your effects are auctioned after you move into the Big China Closet Beyond, whoever receives your plates will find them to have been properly—and appreciatively—cared for.

All photographs, except where noted, by Boy Fenwick

Winning Bid: Directoire Bouillotte Lamp

Several weekends ago, in pursuit of yet more silver for the entertaining household, I attended a weekend auction in the neighboring town that included several pieces of silver I fancied.  The auction featured the contents of a number of what once must have been rather sumptuously decorated Fifth Avenue apartments of days gone by, along with the contents of several country estates (quite possibly belonging to the same city dwellers also featured in the sale) spread across northwestern Connecticut and along the Hudson River Valley.  I came to the sale to bid on a large silver punch bowl and a silver cigarette box (a weakness of mine, even though I gave up smoking years ago), both of which I am pleased to have won.  I won't be posting on either of those winning bids, however, as each prominently (and beautifully) displays the engraved names of the fortunate couple who received them as wedding gifts more than fifty years ago, and who—I have since learned from a mutual acquaintance—are still alive, but no longer have much use for such possessions.  I respect their privacy.

My recently acquired Bouillotte lamp,
lit with candles, and reproduction
18th-century playing cards at the ready

While at the sale I found myself bidding on, and winning, a silver-plated Bouillotte lamp of the Directoire period.  Just as I have a weakness for silver cigarette boxes, so have I weakness for Bouillotte lamps, which I consider to be the perfect occasional lamp for one's household.  Well, at least our household.  With the addition of this latest acquisition to our collection, we now have six Bouillotte lamps scattered about Darlington House.

So, what is a Bouillotte lamp, you might ask?

The Bouillotte lamp, with unlighted candles

A Bouillotte lamp is a type of lamp that was used to provide light during night-time games of Bouillotte, a card and counter gambling game popular in France from the late eighteenth century well into the nineteenth century, supposedly similar to the modern game of poker.  The lamps feature a dish-shaped base, designed to hold counters (chips), a central shaft with a movable candelabra attached to the shaft with a key, a movable metal or tole shade, also attached to the shaft with a key, and a ring at the top of the shaft that can be used to pick up the lamp or hang it from a hook.  Because both the candelabra and the shade are movable, and slide up and down the lamp's central shaft, Bouillotte lamps are a highly versatile form of lighting, and can be adjusted to shield the game players' eyes from the candles' flames as they are burned.  Bouillotte lamps provide a most pleasing, directed form of light to one's table.

A detail of the key that is used to fasten
the candelabra to the shaft of the lamp

Most Bouillotte lamps are electrified today.  Old ones made before the days of electricity, such as the one I found at auction, have in many cases been subsequently electrified.  Newer ones are routinely made as electricified lamps (and oftentimes as a result do not have as many movable features as the original ones do).  Half of the Bouillotte lamps that we have at Darlington House are old and were originally made to hold candles.  The other half are of a more recent vintage and were electrified when made.

Here the lamp is shown with the candelabra
and shade at the low end of the lamp's shaft

Most of the Bouillotte lamps we own are electrified, but a few of them are not.  We like to use a candle-burning Bouillotte lamp on our dining table at night when it is just the two of us for dinner.  When lit with candles a Bouillotte lamp casts a most lovely and intimate light.

Although one wouldn't normally slide the
candelabra and shade to the top, I am showing
it here to demonstrate the lamp's versatility

Bouillotte lamps have been popular forms of lighting since they were first made, and they are frequently seen in photographs of chic, classic interiors of upper class tastemakers of the latter half of the twentieth century, such as those of Brooke Astor, Jacqueline Onassis, Bill Blass, and Cy and Alessandra Twombly.  Bouillotte lamps work well in both traditional and modern interiors.

A detail of the key used to fasten the tole
lampshade to the shaft of the lamp,
and the ring used to carry or hang the lamp

When I attended the auction on the day it was held, my sole purpose for doing so was to bid on the silver bowl and cigarette box.  I did not go expecting to buy a Bouillotte lamp.  Not only did we not "need" another, but lamp buying was simply not on my radar screen that day.

The discarded candle-form electric sockets

I arrived at the sale well before the silver bowl or cigarette box lots were up, in the middle of the auction's household furnishings section.  I noticed that there were probably five or so Bouillotte lamps of varying quality in the sale, some first (pre-electrification) period and others later.  The first two lamps were hammered down at remarkably good prices (Bouillotte lamps tend to be rather expensive), which perked up my interest (Reggie being one who appreciates a bargain), and I found myself bidding on the sole Bouillotte lamp that I had admired at the preview, a diminutive silver one with an old tole shade.

Residual evidence of the lamp's later electrification

Within a minute or two I found myself to be the owner of the lamp.  I was relieved when I picked it up to bring it home with me that it appeared to be first period, made in the late eighteenth century.  While it was catalogued as Directoire style, I am convinced it is of the Directoire period, dating from 1795-1799.  This was confirmed to me by Isaiah Cornini, the architectural historian we work with at Darlington House, who is an expert on early period lighting and whose opinion I trust in such matters.

The Bouillotte lamp, restored to its
original functionality

Since we didn't "need" another Bouillotte lamp, Boy decided to de-electrify my purchase so that we could use it with candles.  He pulled out the lamp sockets and wiring, and in so doing restored the lamp to its original functionality.  Although the lamp was unfortunately (but discretely) drilled in a number of places when electrified, it is easy to have such holes plugged by knowledgeable silversmiths, which I shall do at some point.  Or not.

Tell me, do you have any Bouillotte lamps in your house?

Winning Bid: Pretty Little Pictures

Several weeks ago, Reggie was the winning bidder at a country auction of two charming guaches of romantic landscapes.  Of diminutive size, they were painted in the first half of the nineteenth century and are likely French, at least to his eye.  If not French, they are most certainly Continental.

Pretty little pictures on easels on a table
in the drawing room at Darlington House

The two paintings Reggie acquired are shown in the foreground of the above photograph.  Although sold as a single lot, the pictures are not associated--not a pair, not by the same hand, and so on.  Reggie bought them because they are attractive, decorative, and nicely framed.  And he got them at a very reasonable price--less than the cost of a dinner for two in a nice restaurant in Manhattan.

The first--and larger--of the two paintings is really quite well done.  It is a romantic landscape with picturesque tumbledown cottages, a castle with flags flying from its towers, and a body of water in the distance.  The painting includes rustic figures and a little dog joyously frisking about.  The artist (unsigned) deftly depicts the scene at the height of summer, with trees and climbing roses embracing the cottages.  It is a pleasing little picture, and I am glad to have it.  I also like the frame, which I suspect is original.  I date the painting to the mid-nineteenth century.

The painting has some minor losses to its surface, but I do not mind.  I'm not planning on sending it to a restorer, as I think it looks just fine as it is.

The second--and smaller--painting Reggie bought is also a romantic landscape.  It shows two figures in a garden overlooking a body of water, with a classical building (or is it a ruin?) and several boats at sail.  Judging by the clothing depicted, Reggie thinka the scene was painted in the 1820s or 30s, at the latest.

Not as finely executed as the other landscape, this little painting is still skillfully done.  It is clearly old and retains its original frame, and it is signed on the back by the artist (I suspect).

Claire Charlotte Coynart was a better painter than she was a calligrapher, given the crudenes of her signature.  Reggie suspects that she was Mademoiselle Coynart when she painted this pretty little picture, as he believes it is what many of us in America call "school-girl art," done by young ladies of refinement when still of a school age.  In the early nineteenth century in the United States, such young ladies as Mademoiselle Coynart were admired particularly for the needlework pictures they made--some of astonishing virtuosity--while students at the academies where they were educated.

We currently have these little pictures, along with the English eighteenth-century oil portrait in small shown in the first photograph of this post, on easels on an early nineteenth-century New York pembroke table in our drawing room.  Reggie likes small paintings put about in such a manner, and this is not the only table in his house with such an arrangement.  He is always on the lookout for useful easels for such purpose and buys them when he finds them and when his budget allows for it.

Tell me, do you also display paintings on easels in your house?

Photographs by Boy Fenwick

Winning Bid: American Fancy Chairs II

Reggie seems to be having a bit of a problem with Blogger at the moment.  He just posted a new essay this morning titled Winning Bid: American Fancy Chairs that Blogger is insisting that I already posted on October 11th, and has therefore buried it back in October's postings.

One of a pair of New York fancy chairs, ca. 1815-1820
that we recently acquired for Darlington House

If you would like to read the essay, and Reggie encourages you to do so (otherwise, why would I have written it?), please click on the link to it above.

Thank you,
Reggie

Winning Bid: American Fancy Chairs

Several weekends ago Boy and I attended a country auction where we were the winning bidders on a pair of exuberantly painted American fancy chairs, circa 1815-1825.  We bought them to place beneath two windows in our kitchen at Darlington House, a room that has aways looked somewhat under-furnished to us.  With the purchase and placement of these chairs our kitchen is now pleasingly complete and well-furnished.

Detail of the smoke-decorated finish on our "new" fancy chairs

We were attracted to the chairs because they are a "better" quality, early example of the type, commonly known as "Hitchcock chairs," after Lambert Hitchcock (1795-1852), the Connecticut-based entrepreneur who founded the Hitchcock Chair company in 1818.  Hitchcock chairs were simple and affordable, and were the first mass-produced furniture made in America, with the Hitchcock factories churning out 15,000 of them annually at the firm's peak in the late 1820s.

But such chairs were not only made in Mr. Hitchcock's factories; other workshops in other states also produced them (albeit in far lower quantities).  We believe that the chairs we won at auction may have been made in New York, given their shape and decoration.  Consequently, it is more accurate to refer to our chairs as "fancy chairs," rather than "Hitchcock chairs"--which is the name of a manufacturer and not the type of chair.

Our "new" pair of American fancy side chairs
in the condition we found them at auction

When I characterize our chairs as being of a "better" quality, I mean as defined by Albert Sack in his seminal book, Fine Points of Furniture, and also in the later "New" edition, where he ranked early American furniture on a five-point scale, from "good" to "masterpiece."  Although Mr. Sack does not include fancy chairs in his book, his grading system can be applied to many forms of early American furniture--including fancy chairs--and not just those covered in his book.  Needless to say, "better" ranks just above "good," and three meaningful grades below "masterpiece."  In other words, Reggie is well aware that our chairs are a rather nice example of their type, but nothing more (or less).

Since we, like so many Americans, spend an inordinate amount of our time in our kitchen (I'm sitting at our kitchen table as I write this), we wanted to get appropriate, interesting, and "better" quality chairs for the room, since we would have to live with and look at them for many of our waking hours.

Pair of side chairs, New York, ca. 1815-1825
Private collection
Image from American Fancy: Exuberance in the Arts, 1790-1840 

A pair of chairs similar to ours, but decorated with painted scenes and with caned seats, and of a higher quality than ours (I'd rank them as straddling "best" and "superior" on Mr. Sack's scale), appears in American Fancy: Exuberance in the Arts, 1790-1840, by Sumpter T. Priddy, III.  The book formed the catalogue of a traveling exhibition of the same name organized by the Milwaukee Art Museum in 2004-2005, and which Boy and I traveled to Baltimore to see in early 2005, where it appeared at the Maryland Historical Society.

"American Fancy" was a marvelous, eye-opening exhibit that Reggie will never forget.  I highly recommend that you, Dear Reader, seek out a copy of Mr. Priddy's book.  Not only is it fascinating, scholarly, and well written, but it sheds new light on an aesthetic movement, now referred to as American Fancy, that took this country by storm in the first part of the nineteenth century, as the New Repubic was being established.  Not only is it a fascinating book, but it is a handsomely executed one,  too, and is profusely illustrated with page after page of photographs of gorgeous objects that--after reading it--you will never look at the same way again.  Trust me.

So what, exactly, was American Fancy, and what are fancy chairs?

Joseph More and His Family
Painted by Erastus Salisbury Field, circa 1839
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Massachusetts

American Fancy was an aesthetic movement that swept this country between 1810 and 1835 (give or take five years on either end) characterized by exuberantly decorated furnishings with painted finishes, sparkling surfaces, plays of light, bright colors, and wild prints.  Much of the wooden furnishings were painted in fanciful "faux" finishes to mimic more costly veneers and materials.

The definition of the word "fancy" in American Fancy is not what many people consider its meaning today, which is akin to "swanky" in this country or "posh" as our English cousins might say.  No, the "fancy" in American Fancy has its roots in "fantasy" (or the old English "fantasie"), referring to a dream state or flight of imagination.  Webster's most closely defines it as "an image or representation of something formed in the mind," or alternately in its archaic use as a "fantastic quality or state."

Until recently, much of what was produced during the American Fancy period was mis-classified as "country," when in fact a great deal of it was made for this nation's burgeoning, urban middle classes.  The naivety of the decoration of much of the goods produced during the American Fancy movement was entirely intentional, and not (usually) due to the lack of training of the artisan who made them, many of whom were highly skilled in their craft.   Most American Fancy goods and furnishings were inexpensively made and sold at affordable prices to people of moderate-to-comfortable means, and were not targeted to the highest levels of the urban elite in this country who preferred more sophisticated, often European-made or inspired, furnishings.

One of the painted Fancy Chairs, ca. 1825-1835, that appears in
Field's painting of the Moore family
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Massachusetts 

The painting that appears earlier in this essay of Joseph Moore and his family, by Erastus Salisbury Field, is a masterpiece of American art in the collection of the Museum of Fine Art in Boston.  It shows a young, middle class American family in an interior that exemplifies the American Fancy movement.  Although the Moores are shown dressed somberly (albeit fashionably for the time) in black clothing, the room in which they sit is anything but somber.  It is decorated to delight the eye, according to the tenets of American Fancy.  The floor is covered with a wildly colored, boldly scaled carpet, upon which sit black and gold painted fancy chairs and an exuberantly figured mahogany table.  A similarly figured mahogany framed mirror, decorated with gilt moldings, hangs between the windows.  The bright red-green-gold of the woven ingrain carpet is echoed in the red curtains and green exterior shutters at the windows.  All in all, it is a pretty and fanciful interior.

A near-identical chair (one of six) in our collection at Darlington

Fancy chairs is the generic name for the inexpensive, mass-produced chairs made during the American Fancy movement in such factories as Mr. Hitchcock's, often (although not always) with painted finishes.   Two are featured in the painting of the Moores, with Mr. and Mrs. Moore shown sitting on them.  One of the chairs (or one from the same set), is shown in the photograph immediately following the painting, which descended in the Moore family and is now in the collection of the MFA Boston, along with the painting.

A nearly identical chair is in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City.  And six of the same chairs, except with caned seats, are in our collection at Darlington House, where we use them as occasional chairs in the less formal rooms of the house.

One of our "new" fancy chairs, 
after Boy cleaned it with Murphy's Oil Soap

Our "new" fancy chairs were consigned to auction by the Crane family of Massachusetts, along with other furnishings from their various houses.  I'm not quite sure which Crane family sold the chairs.  It might have been the Cranes of the bank-note and stationery products, or it might have been the Cranes of the bathroom porcelain fame and fortune.  For all I know they may be one and the same.

The crest rail of one of our chairs, showing
the brass plaque that is attached to each of them

Whoever owned our chairs once valued them sufficiently to place brass plaques on the top rails of each of them, with something engraved on them that has since been worn away by generations of polishing.

Even though Boy cleaned the chairs after we brought them home with a mixture of Murphy's Oil Soap and water, they are still rather dark and discolored with age.  However, even though their surfaces have darkened over nearly two hundred years, you can still see that they were once quite vivid, decorated with smoked yellow paint, green banding, and gilt balls.

As you can also see in this photograph, the chair's original rush seats retain their original painted surface, a common finish at the time they were made.

The chairs are in remarkably good shape, with no evidence of any repairs.  They were clearly revered by their owners in the past, and are remarkably pristine survivors from when they were made, unlike many other fancy chairs that weren't treated so kindly over the years.

Another view of one of our "new" fancy chairs,
showing its alert and handsome profile

I am quite happy to have this pretty pair of American fancy chairs sitting in our kitchen at Darlington House.  I hope to one day decipher the worn engraving on the brass plaques and learn what the chairs' significance was that led someone to place such plaques on their rails.  I'll let you know what I find out.

All photographs, except where noted, by Boy Fenwick